Boss GT-100 acoustic and bass patches

[Adam]

Hi all,
Not sure if this was the place to post, but I've recently come into possession of a Boss GT-100 (it's been updated to firmware v2) and I am having a blast fiddling around with all the different effects. As I am still new to making patches and playing around with effects, I also get a little impatient and frustrated when I can't seem to find that right tone or effect. I was just wondering if you guys can help me out here. I'm trying to make two patches:

- An acoustic guitar patch: I'm aware the Boss GT-100 comes with an Acoustic Simulator. I'm using a Fender Stratocaster with an Lr Baggs piezo X-Bridge with Control-X and I also have humbuckers. I was just wondering how I would go about this if I were to use the piezos. I am finding the tone to be really thin, harsh and brittle. It's not very pleasant to the ears. What effects should I use?

- A guitar to bass patch: I've had not much luck with this one as I can seem to get a stable and pitch from the octaving. I'm finding that my notes are as loud and full as well as the pitch jumping around all over the place. Any ideas here?

My inspiration for asking how to go about making these two patches comes from watching this video. In my opinion, this guy has a very convincing acoustic tone as well as a very nice bass sound.

I hope you guys are able to help. Any help will be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[ashcatlt]

I have no experience with this unit, but I'm gonna run way out on a limb and try to give some advice anyway.

I'm pretty sure that acoustic simulator is meant to make a magnetic pickup sound more like an acoustic guitar. It can only do that by applying a filter (or probably a complex set of filters) to the signal. That filter probably tries to bring down the resonant peak at the top end of the mag pickup's range and then add treble above that. A piezo pickup doesn't have that resonant peak, but actually has plenty (or way too much) treble for miles beyond what any magnetic pickup is going to give. So this thing basically just making the already crappy piezo sound even worse.

As for the bass thing - this is more than a filter. It actually has to figure out what note you're playing before it can make any sound at all. It will get confused if you try to play more than one note at a time. Even a single note on most guitars is actually quite a bit more than just one note, though. You've got a whole series of harmonics on top of the fundamental, and - especially if you're picking up near or at the bridge - some of those harmonics can be just about as loud as the fundamental. Every device of this type works best if you use a pickup closer to the neck and roll off the T knob so that it gets mostly just the note you want it to double.

Then we go over to the video you posted and (after we stop laughing at dude's wardrobe) notice the position of his 5-way selector. Unless there's something we don't know about his guitar, this dude is playing all of this through the humbucker at the neck. Can't be sure where his T knob is set, but he doesn't turn it down when he goes to bass. This is already going to be the darkest, most fundamental-ful tone on his guitar.

So...I'm afraid the piezo you're trying to use is kind of exactly the wrong tool for the job.

[njdkintx]

Mar 16, 2015 9:23:34 GMT -5 Adam said:

Hi all,
Not sure if this was the place to post, but I've recently come into possession of a Boss GT-100 (it's been updated to firmware v2) and I am having a blast fiddling around with all the different effects. As I am still new to making patches and playing around with effects, I also get a little impatient and frustrated when I can't seem to find that right tone or effect. I was just wondering if you guys can help me out here. I'm trying to make two patches:

- An acoustic guitar patch: I'm aware the Boss GT-100 comes with an Acoustic Simulator. I'm using a Fender Stratocaster with an Lr Baggs piezo X-Bridge with Control-X and I also have humbuckers. I was just wondering how I would go about this if I were to use the piezos. I am finding the tone to be really thin, harsh and brittle. It's not very pleasant to the ears. What effects should I use?

- A guitar to bass patch: I've had not much luck with this one as I can seem to get a stable and pitch from the octaving. I'm finding that my notes are as loud and full as well as the pitch jumping around all over the place. Any ideas here?

My inspiration for asking how to go about making these two patches comes from watching this video. In my opinion, this guy has a very convincing acoustic tone as well as a very nice bass sound.

I hope you guys are able to help. Any help will be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Hey I Know this is from a long time ago and you may have already solved it, but the GT-100 has an AC Processor which is designed to be used with piezo pickups. It's less disgusting sounding than the Acoustic Sim. Try it if you haven't already!
Dave

[newey]

njdkintx-

Hello and Welcome to G-Nutz2!

I don't know that the issue was addressed any further than what was said earlier in this thread, so your input, belatedly or not, is valuable. Someone else may come along with the same issue and be thereby enlightened.

[tsilva]

Hi,

I was looking for a bass simulation patch myself. I stumbled on the "Metal Gt w/ Bass" patch that comes with the unit (P38-1 on my GT-100 v2). It mixes channel A (guitar) and channel B (bass), so you can just start from muting A and fooling around with B configuration -- e.g. just tweaking the parametric EQ in FX1 of the channel B should give a clearer sound for the strikes.

[newey]

tsilva-

Hello and Welcome to G-Nutz2!

Even though this is an older thread, new tips are always welcome, so thanks for your input.