JHS Colour Box, What's inside?

[FUZZZZzzzz]

Hi Guys!

Been following this pedal with great interest since the NAMM anouncement. It's available but pretty expensive. I was wondering if anyone has more information about it?
http://www.jhspedals.com/products/guitar-pedals/colourbox/

We have gone to great lengths to bring the color and character of a real vintage console to your feet or desktop. We started with two gain stages in series that produce beautiful clean tones but that can also destroy any signal into a beautiful fuzzy mess, full of rich harmonics and body with over 39db of gain on tap. The local feedback of each gain stage makes for a very unique type of distortion. We used the same topology and discrete gain stage found in the Neve* 1073, but we have two gain stages in series instead of one.  We use a high quality Lundahl transformer that adds weight, heft, and a 3D quality just like preamps that you will find costing much more. The transformer fattens the lows, adds harmonic complexity and richness to the midrange (kinda like stirring flour into your drippings to give you gravy) as well as smoothing and rounding of the high frequencies. It also blocks all DC voltages, adds electrical isolation, and blocks RF frequencies ensuring super quiet operation and noise floor.

[wavley]

Peterson Goodwyn is a super nice guy and has been working on the 500 Series Colour module for quite a while.  It's not a stomper, but the kit is much cheaper, does pretty much the same thing but with three slots for different plug in colour modules.  There are several kits for the sub modules and even a little perf board to build your own.

I imagine this could be adapted to a stompbox quite easily and if I hadn't already built a thing to saturate transformers for my guitar I would be building one of these.

http://store.diyrecordingequipment.com/colour/

[PRR]

> ame topology and discrete gain stage found in the Neve* 1073

Neve 1073 is far from simple:



For guitar-only he might omit the transformers on the left side and modify the gain settings.

Each rectangle is a several-transistor amplifier or L-C card.

Real Neve 1073s and good clones sell for $600-$3,000.

The price asked seems a bargain.

[FUZZZZzzzz]

Thank you for the answers, guys! Personally, I think this is more an addition to the studio to make everything sound nicer rather then use it on the pedalboard.
http://store.diyrecordingequipment.com/colour/
I stumbled on this website before.. seems like an affordable experiment.

[Scruffie]

Well... if JHS's past is anything to go by...

I'd look for a pedal with a similar control set and sound to find out what it might be.

[knutolai]

Well... if JHS's past is anything to go by...

I'd look for a pedal with a similar control set and sound to find out what it might be.

My thoughts exactly. Maybe its some stolen circuit pimped up with a lundahl transformer and XLR jacks

[drj]

They posted a photo of the pcb's here (reply #215)

http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showthread.php?t=1370265&page=15

[pappasmurfsharem]

Not going to be cloning that one any time soon.

[PRR]

> Maybe its some stolen circuit pimped up

As the blurb says: "same .... found in the Neve* 1073", which is a very famous and desirable mike-preamp (with line input) used in UK broadcast consoles and many recording studios.

Block-diagram of a 1073 in my post above.

The gut-shot shows a similar level of complexity (though much more tightly-packed than the original).

This isn't one of your $5 builds. Fairly complex even if spread-out big. Apparently not *exactly* a copy of a 1073, but adapted for guitar duty, so you can't just copy Neve's blueprints.