First multieffect pedal

[electrictabs]

do you guys know which and when was the first multieffect pedal ever???

[petemoore]

Hard to define that. Where do you draw the line?
 Multi-effect is a broad term, Volume and tone come under effect category, who knows when someone decided to have another switch thrown in.

[toneman]

R U talking errrrr,(digital) or **all** analog???
ibanez put a screamer & others in one box long ago(far away)..
see them on ebay a lot.
:-)

[petemoore]

I had one of those, PS trubs [jacked up PCBreak] tore it apart, had Tube Screamer type thing in it, 4 effect pedals, some knobs IIRC...pretty horrid by my 'review'..somebody probably loves this thing, perhaps mine was a lemmon...it was a sad state of affairs that day for effects using and IRC.
 I didn't check if it had reverse protection, sounded like maybe it got inverted a few times...it all 'worked'...so to speak.

[electrictabs]

sorry i had to define multieffect....
i mean digital and not analog...

[KarbonHed]

sorry i had to define multieffect....
i mean digital and not analog...

Digitally controlled or pure digital processing and control?

The waters get a little murky.

[toneman]

i still have a Digitech FX7.
an oldie, but no-manual-needed...
staysimple...errr  digitallymetallized??
T

[Rob Strand]

Fuzz-wah's

[mat]

I had Ibanez UE-300 which had tube screamer, compressor and chorus in it. Did not like either of them.. Bought it in 1980 used.

(now i have BSIAB2\Blue Magic, Orange Squeezer and Small Clone built - totally different story)  

cheers,
mat

[electrictabs]

sorry i had to define multieffect....
i mean digital and not analog...

Digitally controlled or pure digital processing and control?

The waters get a little murky.

pure digital...

[Torchy]

Boss ME-5 (if you want totally digital) ... I still got mine from 1985 (I think)

[bryantabuteau]

I've got an old Ibanez UE305.  It has a compressor, delay and chorus.  I use it all the time.  Nice chorus sound, lovely (if a bit short) delay, but i don't use the compressor.  I Hate compressors.  I should really pull it apart and do some tracing

[Mark Hammer]

I don't know if it was the first EVER, but some of those monstrosities put out by Shin-Ei under the various jobber labels like Jax, Companion, Apollo, etc., in the late 60's probably count.  Not only would they pack fuzz AND wah (remember, there weren't too many  effects to combine at that point) but would sometimes come with "surf", "siren" and a tuning reference.

[roseblood11]

This question was never answered.
What was the first PURE DIGITAL multi fx pedal?

The ME-5 was digitally controlled, but only delay and reverb where digital, all other effects were analog circuits. (That's why I love it and still use it daily...)

[Ice-9]

I had an ART SGE Mach II Guitar effects rack with foot pedal back in the 80's , although I can't remember which part of the 80's. Still have it as it happens, maybe time to put in  anew battery and sell it.
Back in the day It was about £820, lucky to get £20 for it now

[ElectricDruid]

Boss ME-5 (if you want totally digital) ... I still got mine from 1985 (I think)

A bit of online research suggests the Boss ME-5 was released in 1988, if you believe the interwebz.

The early Alesis stuff is 1985 (XT Reverb) and 1986 (MIDIVerb) - that's all digital, in the days before DSP. Doesn't even use a processor.

Based on this, the "first digital multi effect" is going to date to sometime in the second half of the 1980s. The MIDIVerb might even be it.

Tom