Death of the 9V powered pedal as an icon

[R.G.]

I think we are seeing the death throes of the 9Vdc powered pedal.

The use of 9Vdc as a standard came about historically as the world got transistors that needed a bit more voltage and 9V was enough.

In many ways, the use of 9Vdc as a standard was nice - it was the right answer for every new pedal design. As pedalboards got more complicated and one or two pedals was not enough, and 40 was not too many, we couldn't afford the batteries, and the AC powered 9V adapter was born.

I think the guitarist world has finally gotten the idea that batteries are not needed, and we're seeing the death of the 9V powered pedal. Well, maybe not death, but decline to oblivion. It's suddenly fashionable for BUMS sufferers to stick 12, 18, 24, whatever, into a pedal to see if it offers "more headroom" or "more gain" (always a favorite!) or whatever. We're seeing a continuously rising number of posts asking about voltages other than 9V here.

That's OK. 

It's simple for a power supply designer to turn out whatever is needed. It vastly complicates things for pedal users who no longer have one answer (i.e. 9Vdc) for powering stuff. There may be a profusion of power voltages, and power adapters. That will cost more, until we get back to one power supply per pedal because they're all different.

Ah, well. At least we can count on 110Vac... er, I mean 112- uh, 115/117/120 and 208/220/240...

Uh, where was I?

[Perrow]

Yeah, lets all go metric

[chptunes]

Interesting post Mr. RG.

Some might recall my recent questioning of voltage solutions for the PT-80 Delay, a power hungry PT2399 beast.  I modified this circuit, until the current draw is down to 26 milliamps.  Was my labor worth the result.. for me, yes.  But, I can see the droves of folks that are ready to leave behind the vulnerable 9v battery.

It is, what it is.. the natural evolution I suppose.  Thanks for your insight, sir.

For now, me and my PP3s are behind-the-times.  

[alparent]

And what about the center pin being the negative? Let's change that also!

[midwayfair]

Regardless of the voltage internally, I see very few pedals being manufactured that run on anything other than a 9v adapter. The phrase "Standard Boss adapter" contains the word "standard" for a reason.

Charge pumps are becoming more widespread, even in the very short time I've been doing this. They're basically everywhere. (And part of that is everyone and their brother building a certain overdrive that uses one.) Their desirability is by no means universal ... I've built at least three things recently (yesterday it was the ROG Azabache) that were absolutely horrendous on higher voltage, to the point where the voltage drop of a protection diode is a feature, not a bug.

At this point, even going digital isn't going to change things. Check Strymon for an example. Not to mention that many digital effects want just 5v ... and no more.

I'm thrilled about the death of batteries, however. But it'll be a cold day in hell when they pry my dinky daisy chained 9v supply from my stiff dead hands!

[wavley]

Yeah, lets all go metric

"This thing makes a great Christmas gift for whenever Canadian Christmas is. Here it's December 25th -- I know everything's metric up there, so I'm gonna say the 57.28th of Kilo-Vember." -- Stephen Colbert http://on.cc.com/TNfumt

It's nice to see the death of batteries, but I don't really want to see the death of the 9 volt standard, I already have too many things that either run on AC or non-standard voltages that I have a multiple 9v power supply AND AC wall warts for my EHX tube stuff and my boomerang+ AND regular plugs for my Morley PFL and space echo.  It's a danged power supply nightmare already.

[Perrow]

"This thing makes a great Christmas gift for whenever Canadian Christmas is. Here it's December 25th -- I know everything's metric up there, so I'm gonna say the 57.28th of Kilo-Vember." -- Stephen Colbert http://on.cc.com/TNfumt

Calendar jokes aside, in Sweden we celebrate Christmas on the 24th

[RandomGlitch]

I think the 9v standard is fine for guitar effects.  It's not that "hi-fi" is usually required anyway.

It's interesting how standards are arrived at, I once read somthing about how the width of
Roman chariots led to road widths led to car and trucks.... all the way up to the dimensions of
the Space Shuttle. But I digress!

Standards are usefull, however they are arrived at. Just imagine the confusion without it..

Anyway was talking to a friend in fire protection, they use tonnes of batteries a year, lots of lead
And mercury, which ends up in landfill. So theres a big environmental impact to batteries.  The more we can
do to reduce it the better

[wavley]

"This thing makes a great Christmas gift for whenever Canadian Christmas is. Here it's December 25th -- I know everything's metric up there, so I'm gonna say the 57.28th of Kilo-Vember." -- Stephen Colbert http://on.cc.com/TNfumt

Calendar jokes aside, in Sweden we celebrate Christmas on the 24th

Well then, I bet Stephen Colbert would not be friends with you

[amptramp]

I am working on a pedal that uses a bipolar wall wart with +12, 0V, -12, GND and spare connections.  I use regulators to get down to +5 and -5 VDC to run the op amps.  Positive and negative supplies have been used with op amps for a long time.  The only problem is the need for bipolar coupling capacitors, but those are readily available.  Batteries are a nightmare for the touring musician.

I think we are going to see more of the AC-line operated digital effects pedals where the user selects a program number and the system configures itself to the needs for that song or even sections within a song.  These are available at local music shops and even the price of $420 CDN that I seem to recall would compare favourably with buying a bunch of analog effects to do the same thing.  There are AC inverters that automatically sense the input voltage and configure themselves to provide the correct output on worldwide AC power.  Death of analog is going to follow death of the 9V supply, but it could be held off maybe for a decade.

[Mark Hammer]

It's not just supply voltages higher than 9v.  More and more manufactures are migrating to digital, which typically runs on 5V.

All of which makes me wonder what's out there in the way of multiple coin-cell holders.  For instance, is there such a thing as a unit that holds 5 or six  2032 cells?

[MetalGuy]

I never used batteries for my pedals but went straight for the adapter so I'm not missing those at all.

And what about the center pin being the negative? Let's change that also!

This is also one of the things that I consider just wrong compared to all other jacks which have the tip positive/active.

Yeah, lets all go metric

For all of you that are not it will be a very good idea. No, this is not a discussion just a fact.

[R.G.]

It's not just supply voltages higher than 9v.  More and more manufactures are migrating to digital, which typically runs on 5V.

5V er, 3.3V - I mean 3.0V; well, OK, 2.5V or 1.8V...

I never used batteries for my pedals but went straight for the adapter so I'm not missing those at all.

... until you plug in a 9V**AC** adapter that the digital pedal guys so thoughtfully supplied with a 5.5mm x 2.1mm pin DC plug. 

Yeah, lets all go metric

Down with metric. Don't give an inch!

[Devius]

Metric is SO easy even an american can do it!
Seriously though, I thought metric was screwed up until I realized fractions suck. Way more precise as well.

[Jazznoise]

Feed em all 50v and let the crowbars sort the men from the boys!

[R.G.]

Metric is SO easy even an american can do it!
Seriously though, I thought metric was screwed up until I realized fractions suck. Way more precise as well.

Yeah, well.

Real men don't use FPS, or MKS.

Ream men use binary.

Remember, there are 10 kinds of people in the world - those that understand binary and those that don't.

[Perrow]

Last off topic post, honest 

[John Lyons]

^ 

[rockhorst]

In the midst of these times that are a changin', I recently got a requist if I could mod an overdrive pedal that runs on no less than 48V (forgot the name). The user wanted to be able to use it with a 9V adapter and have it sound the same. I briefly fantasized about cascading voltage doublers or something like that...then decided to skip this job and continue playing my own modded TubeScreamers...

[MetalGuy]

That's not hard to do. Check out some PAiA stuff.