Yo Hoes

So what shoegazers used this unit and how does it compare to other yamaha reverbs/FX racks. I love FX500 how does it vary from that model, or is it the same just repackaged?

Please tell me your opinions of this unit I am licking my lips for this unit to arrive paid 70 bucks for some fun namely some interesting vintage guitar tonez.

I am getting an early 90's tone bone u dig?

Thanks Champs keep on lusting

I'm interested in this unit as well. not alot of info out there about it...

anyone have experience with one?

I think a big thing about the appeal of the FX500 is that it had some very cool presets already in there. The FX900 is pretty much like a big brother to the FX500 (Acreil could probably jump in and give an exact run down of how they differ... but it certainly differs in the presets, so while you may be able to program whatever that's in the FX500 into the FX900, you've got to do the programming.

Otherwise it's got the standard collection of yamaha EFX. It seems to most resemble a multi block SPX90II aimed at guitarists with som trashy digital distortions thrown in. You can certainly get shoegazery type sounds out of it. There are two things I like about the FX900 relative to other multi effects boxes.

1) It has an hi z input on the front panel so it's easy to simply plug a guitar or whatever in when it is racked.

2) there are push buttons to engage/mute the 5 effects blocks on the front panel, so you can dub it up a bit.

It's the kind of thing that's worth spending $75 bucks on, and not worth the bother of selling for $75 bucks.
As for interesting efx on a similar budget... I think the 90s ART racks are pretty overlooked. ART was a spin off of MXR I believe, and their racks offer a mix of analog (compression, gate, distortion) and digital efx (reverbs, delay pitch shift etc) They are typically fully controllable by midi and allow you to design custom mult effect programs. The DRX-2100 is the one I've got. It'll do pretty trippy stuff without sounding glossy and ethereal. Totally opposite from the current crop of pedal efx. IMO the reverbs especially are unique and cool, and having a gate and overdrive before it works well. The flanging and chorus is good. The pitchshift is lofi and interesting. It has a pretty different character than lexicon/eventide/yamaha, grittier more rock guitar style -- but it can work really well on electronic percussion and synths.

thanks for sharing!

The FX900 has more effect blocks. It's pretty much 3 SPX90s (dedicated to specific effects) plus the EQ IC from the SPX900. The FX500 only has two SPX90-style blocks plus the EQ, and I think the routing is less flexible. The reverbs aren't very good, but the symphonic effect is great, plus you can use the wah notch filter in the EQ block as a sort of pseudo-phase shifter. So on the FX900 you can put the symphonic effect through two different reverbs in parallel, then put that through the wah effect. It ends up sounding great, even though the individual effects aren't all that special.

The later FX770 is different (closer to the EMP700), more powerful and probably more worth getting. But the SPX90 is kind of the quintessential shoegaze effect, so the FX900 is the one to get if you really need that sound. It's the most powerful of the SPX90-related models.

MXR basically split into ART and Alesis. I messed with one of the Multiverb models once (without the analog processing section) and thought it sounded pretty awful. The Alesis effects ended up being a lot better, although the ART DR1 might possibly be worth investigating. The DMV-Pro actually seems really neat and advanced, but those are rare.

If I were looking for some cheap, unsexy effect processor with lots of menu diving, I might try the Digitech TSR-24s, or look for the ART DMV-Pro.

Thanks for your input.

I just bought one of these and some of the buttons are resting deep in the faceplate and it seems to only get worse every time I use it.

Have you had this problem at all?

No, you might have some screws missing behind the front panel. I had some minor problems with mine (a broken solder joint in the power supply and a **WARNING** MEMORY DATA message that comes up every time I turn it on, although the patch data seems fine).

I don't know how all the the ART racks compare, but I spent some time last night with the DRX-2100se and a moog subharmonicon and had such a good time that I ordered a DR1 and a DMV-Pro this morning. I'll let you know what I think.

Overall I much prefer the DRX-2100se to the alesis quadraverb. It's much weirder and and has a fuller sound with all the analog efx in there. The remind more of electroacoustic verbs. Not so much spacey ethereal shimmer stuff.

I did some digging and found that the ART models made up through the early 90s (not sure if this includes the FXR series) are actually derived from the original MXR/Alesis design (including the MXR 01, Alesis XT, Midiverb, Midiverb 2, Microverb, etc. but not the Quadraverb or Midiverb 3), but apparently with some significant improvements that make fancier effects more practical. It's all discrete logic with no custom ICs.

I don't know if this applies to the DR1 as well, but I suspect it does. There are no schematics or service manuals available for any MXR/ART gear, so if you could take a decent photo of the inside of the DR1 (and maybe the DMV-Pro as well), that would clear some things up.

I had an old SGX2000 in my amp’s effect loop for a long time. I seemed to love it at the time... though at one point I swapped it out for a Digitech 2120. Maybe I just liked purple more?

Reviving this for a quick question - in the FX900 is there anyway to set the global mix to 100% wet for all FX? Or do I have to go into each effect and set at 100%? Not seeing any global wet setting....

I don't know about the FX900, but I think Yamaha often didn't include a global wet/dry mix on their lower-end units at least. My REX50 makes me set the mix per program.