Extensive compressor reviews and FAQ

Metal Pedals LimCom Plus: This pedal builder had the interesting realization that a compressor is a type of envelope follower, so the same circuit could be used for both compression and envelope filtering. This pedal can footswitch between compressor and filter effects--but unfortunately it can't do both at the same time.
 
The other bad news is it doesn't do either one of them well at all. In fact I had a fairly hard time getting any good sounds out of it at any setting. It's noisy and glitchy. The envelope is hard to control, and often sucks the guts right out of your signal. It rolls off the lows significantly. It's so squirrely overall that I assumed it must be defective, so I sent it in to the maker so he could check it out; he responded that it was working exactly the way he designed it.
 
Even in the instances where I found a compression setting that was sort of usable, the same settings did not work at all for the filter mode--and vice versa. So there was no point to foot-switching between the modes since it was necessary to completely change the settings each time. Adding to the fun, the release time control is in the form of two 3-position toggle switches, instead of a normal knob. To adjust the release time you need a map of the nine possible toggle settings.
 
There is an LED to indicate to activity of the effect, but it does not work well either. The housing is the medium size of Barber or Diamond, and the construction quality seems decent enough. For power it requires both an external 9V DC supply and a battery at the same time. The footswitch is "true bypass".
 
Price in USD: $299 new, less than $100 used.
 

 

 
 
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