Musician Gear & Tech Discussion

I have been looking at the following as options:
-DigiTech Hardwire TL-2 Metal Distortion
-MXR M116 Fullbore Metal Distortion
-Electro-Harmonix Metal Muff with Top Boost
-Boss MT-2 Metal Zone

I am currently using an Epiphone Les Paul standard as my guitar. I need an affordable pedal, but I need a pedal that doesn't just sound like hiss or static. Some of my favorite metal bands/influences include Avenged Sevenfold, Metallica, Megadeth, and Bullet For My Valentine to name just a few. Any past experience with these pedals or personal preferences are greatly appreciated.
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chairs | office chairs

I've got the boss.. I love it to death. (Literally. I snapped the level knob off.) It can, however, sound a little thin at times. You might want to check out the keeley electronics mod for it, I hear it's fantastic.

I'm still reporting you Shatya, you spammer

I have the Full Bore and I love it!! Although my only gripe is how it sits in the mix. It's a very hot pedal but I still have to crank to get it to come through. I still need to tweak settings when recording but you totally get a great Obituary tone on it. The song I have posted "Government Created Nuclear Monsters" was recorded with the full bore and then doubled in production.

I run it through a Bugera 333XL on the clean, and a Marshall Cab.

I would say go for one of the somewhat older Made in Japan heavy metal type pedals. Here's a few older ones that I think sound pretty cool:
Boss HM-1
Boss HM-2
Ibanez Super Metal 9 series (looks like a blue tube screamer w/4 knobs)
ProCo Rat (older)
The super metal can be a bit expensive and a little tough to find, but I would say it's the best of the 4. All can be found on Ebay pretty easily, the HM pedals go for about $50, Super Metal $100-$150, not sure about the Rat. All these pedals were Made In Japan and (IMHO) are of much better quality than the newer ones. Of course none of these older pedals are true bypass. But with distortion pedals in general I've never had any "tone sucking" issues. I've only noticed it with older phase/flange/chorus type pedals, and some analog delays. I hope this helps a bit

ah this guy is a spam bot, fyi people...

I would say go for one of the somewhat older Made in Japan heavy metal type pedals. Here's a few older ones that I think sound pretty cool:
Boss HM-1
Boss HM-2
Ibanez Super Metal 9 series (looks like a blue tube screamer w/4 knobs)
ProCo Rat (older)

I have an HM-2, mij... really? you liked the high gain sound it gets? Mine works well as a mild overdrive... but high gain it is not.


the new proco rats don't use the lm308 chip... that is key. A NOS lm308 metal can is by far and above the 'mojo part' that makes a rat sound good. I've built them with other chips... even the sm model but in the std ic package... just not the same. So in short, I completely agree.

Of course none of these older pedals are true bypass. But with distortion pedals in general I've never had any "tone sucking" issues. I've only noticed it with older phase/flange/chorus type pedals, and some analog delays. I hope this helps a bit

side note: the original proco rat is millenium bypass... it's much closer to true bypass than any buffered bypass mechanisms like boss/ibanez use.


I don't want to sound like I'm the champion of tb... nor do I want to open any argument about the merits of tb for fear of being accused of being a natzi... but I will say that 'tone suck', at least the type I was talking about in my original post, has nothing to do with the type of effect, but wrather the FACT that ALL buffered bypass pedals (many ibanez, boss, mxr, dod, etc) utilize a buffer to buffer the signal while the pedal is IN BYPASS MODE... and you may not have ears keen enough to hear it when it's just one buffered pedal in the chain... but string ten boss pedals together (all bypassed) and compare your signal straight in to the signal through the bypassed pedals and well, it's a fact that this scenario will bleed subtle highs... and the difference is electronically measureable!
Furthermore, I have recorded tests using just 4 boss pedals here in this forum that demonstrate this.
That said it is just as bad to run through several pedals and have zero buffers running...

I do realize that chaining together several older pedals hurts your sound. I'm saying the older overdrive-distortion pedals did not seem to affect as much as other pedals I've owned. I've a few older phase-flange type pedals, where you could hear very slight amounts of phase-flange even when the unit was in bypass. This does lead me to a question you may be able to answer. Is there any way to make an Ibanez 9 series pedal true bypass without adding a military type switch

"I've a few older phase-flange type pedals, where you could hear very slight amounts of phase-flange even when the unit was in bypass"
back in the day a lot of mfg used a 2pdt and simple switch that didn't send the output from the fx to ground... this can lead to issues with bleed through.

In answer to your q... you can't have true bypass without a mechanical switch... so my solution would be to simply create or buy a true bypass loop pedal.
just has an input/output and a send/return (or multiple s/r). Then you simply turn the ibanez pedal on and leave it on... but use the loopers stomp switch to turn on and off the loop - voilla! true bypass w/o modifying the original at all.