In the market for a new delay, please help.

[Eric O'Reilly]

I was looking at 212 cabs as my next purchase but the one i have is ok for this month or so, and was really sick of playing my new peavey 5150 head dry, i dint use reverb usually( sometimes) but i LOVE delay for high gain leads. I was gonna take a trip to GC Boston tomorrow and check some out, as many of you know im a huge Evh fan and are looking for his 90s to early 2000s live tone, my no 1 axe is a usa peavey wolf special in sunburst (mint) and a sterling ax40 upgraded to an ad40d with oil wax neck. And chrome switch. Heres my front runners
1. Mxr carbon copy... Its analog, its mxr, its a good quality pedal, ive used one in a store once for a min, and liked it but could not figure out how to get my settings right, probably would have if given the time.
2. Tc flashback, digital, sounds great and has a lot more options than the mxr, ( ps all pedals im looking at have to be true bypass)
And i have no others in mind right now, but am open to suggestions, my budget is $150 $160 tops. Thanks for all the help in advance!

 

[wolfbone07]

I have a Malekko 616 Dark Echo I like a lot (has modulation feature) and also the Tech 21 Boost DLA pedal is quite good (lots of knobs for tweaking). I also like the Flashback, which you already mentioned is quite flexible. I'm pretty sure that all three of these delays have optional buffers for the bypass (this allows for trailing echos after the delay is shut off). That way you can try the pedal with buffered bypass or not buffered bypass and pick the one you like better. I like it usually with the buffer (trails) ON. My 2 cents.

 

[Lou]

Flashback x4

 

[Tollywood]

Hello Eric, the carbon copy is a good pedal. I just got the Catalinbread Belle Epoch, which sounds similar to an Echoplex...very vh. It was $200 new, but used it would be less.

 

[Samoht]

Flashback, with a caveat

TC Flashback, but don't try to use it with a One Spot power supply along with analog pedals. If you have a Voodoo Labs system, or if you will be getting a separate power supply for the Flashback, you'll be fine. Of course, a 9V battery will also work well.

I'm a big fan of TC Electronic products, and find the Tone Print feature to be very useful, and not a gimmick. For your price range, I can't think of a better pedal for delay.

 

[DrKev]

Another TC fan here and I love the TonePrint thing too.

The Carbon Copy is really nice (possibly the most mentioned delay I can think of over the last ten years). Yes, it does the dark sounding 'analogue' repeats thing and it's also got the modulated repeats option, but that makes it a one-and-a-half trick pony. The Flashback can do something very similar and a whole lot more. And if you were to buy the Flashback and borrow a Carbon Copy, you could dial in your own personal TonePrint that'll be close enough for most guitar players not to know which was which in a blind fold test.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

Im leaning toward the carbon copy because of it being analog and only needing a delay for leads , ya know a few repeats and so on. Ive been watching demos and the tc looks great to though.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

Are both true bypass , and do both not color the tone of your amp at all?

 

[QuietSpike]

For your budget, +1 for the TC. They make great stuff. Extremely versatile.

MXR's stuff is made in china, and I have had more than one of their pedals go bad on me (the stereo chorus being the latest and last MXR I will buy).

 

[DrKev]

Are both true bypass , and do both not color the tone of your amp at all?

The Flashback is true bypass. Don't know about the Carbon Copy (you can look it up). You can switch the Flashback to buffered bypass if you prefer (which allows the delays to trail off naturally even when you switch the pedal off, rather than echos coming to an abrupt halt). I run mine (and my TC Hall of Fame reverb pedal) in buffered bypass mode. No change in tone. Sounds awesome.

The Flashback already has a analog-style delay built in - the repeats are not quite as dark as the carbon copy, which I think is a good thing, Carbon Copy is just too dark for my tastes. But like I said, you can program your own echo sound using the TonePrint editor to do almost whatever you like. It'll even double as a chorus/flange/vibrato pedal if you want it to.

BTW, with the TC pedals, the effect is digital but your dry signal always stays analog. Neat trick!

And if you are a fan of vintage tape-style echos, look at the TC Alter Ego V2. Fun!

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

It seems like the tc is everyone heres favorite, the options sound great! A lot to play with, the mxr is simple one trick pony, but a beautiful one at that. I want my leads to sound huge and live, im going for Eddies 90s tone with my peavey 5150, nt the early 90s ( cause i do not have a harmonizer) im going for the 98 Gary Cherone tour live tone, if you watch the footage of that year, his sound is killer, i saw that tour, i was 16 and my first VH concert, so i want to get close to that sound. Im still on the fence as far as delay, and i really want to get it right, the reason im getting it is for high gain leads and lower gain or clean struming and picking. The Carbon Copy sounds great from what i see, and the tc does too, but im probably gonna go carbon copy, i can get a used one for 89$ and a cheap power supply, i heard the carbon sounds great with high gain because of its darker sound. But please keep the suggestions coming!

 

[ksandvik]

Carbon Copy is a great analog delay. The nice thing with TC is the programmability. I got a Vox DelayLab dirt cheap on GC dump sale some time ago and it's a pretty crazy good delay system for gigs where I need to program lots of delay types.

Also experiment with the delay in front of the amp or in the send-return chain of your amp.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

Well i did it! I ordered a nice mxr carbon copy! And i cant wait! It should come by mon or tues and i will let you know how i like it and maybe record.

 

[ozzyrules]

Eric,
I sold my TC due to "Impedance mismatch" with my Egnater. That being said, I was looking for a simple,functional analog delay. I gambled on the MXR Carbon copy. I love it. I've had it now for a couple of years. It's very inexpensive. I run it through my loop. It is awesome.

 

[Screamindv]

Remember if you are going to use your amps overdrive for leads, you want a pedal that will work well in your Effects loop.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

I would only use time based effects in the loop anyway, but thanks anyway.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

This pedal i know will sound great with the 5150, im psyched ! I cant wait to next get a better cab!

 

[Alistair Taylor]

Just mind that not all pedals work in a loop. Does the 5150 have a switchable instrument/line level loop? I had major issues with my older CAA PT100 being so hot in output it would cause most pedals in the loop to clip at anything above 3 or 4 volume level. Swapped it for the newer Suhr PT100 LE with the switchable loop and it's night and day. A friend has a Bogner XTC and has the same issues with instrument level pedals in the loop.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

No the loop works great with all delays ive heard.

 

[Eric O'Reilly]

And yes its line level pre send and return loop before the power sec.