Red Llama vs OD 250

[AM]

Hi,
I was wondering which one of the two sounds more "natural". By natural I mean adding less artifacts to the original guitar tone.
I've built the Red Llama already. I really like it. It has less midrange emphasis than a tubescreamer and it works well with almost any amp I 've plugged it into. This is important for me because I rarely carry amps around. My "road-rig" consists of a PRS McCarty (just a simple sweet sounding axe I bought second-hand. NO ten tops and stuff like that here) and a very small pedalboard. I plug to whatever amp is available at studios, gigs, etc. I have more options available at my home studio but I'm trying to keep it as simple as possible when it comes to carrying gear around. As a result I need my boxes to be versatile and match well with various amps (I get to plug into some real dogs sometimes)
I'm in the process of selecting my next project to build. I liked the llama a lot and I was thinking of building one more and have the two of them set at different settings to provide cleanish boost, overdrive, or cascading into each other for heavier stuff. I wanted to ask the people who have built both circuits:
1) Is the OD 250 better for cleanish boost than the Llama?
2) Is the OD 250 more neutral/natural sounding than the Llama?

Of course, any other suggestions are always welcome too.
Thanks for reading this.

[petemoore]

2) Is the OD 250 more neutral/natural sounding than the Llama?
The llama, that's a CMOS amp rounding to sound like tube amp smooth distortion IIRC.
1) Is the OD 250 better for cleanish boost than the Llama?
I've never used it for that, [I cheat with 250/treble control], it's a hard clipper, I never used it for boost [because I have boosts for that], good for distorted [basically a little fuzzy] power chords and leads.
  Circuit looks alot like a DiST+.

[frankclarke]

Check out the Double D on runoffgrove.com, That is 2 llamas in a box, one has an extra gain stage. http://www.runoffgroove.com/doubled.html. Well, you change the feedback resistors on the Jiggle to be 1M, and so on.
The DOD 250 doesn't sound like much by itself and isn't as loud as the Craig Anderton TSF/llama, I never liked the OD250 I had. With the double D you could have a bright llama and a dull llama, for example.

[nbabmf]

I have both on board right now and the RL is NOT clean.  It's got the most natural sounding drive to me though.

[AM]

Hey, thanks for responding guys. I appreciate it. So, is the consensus so far that the Llama would give the most natural overdrive tone? I struggled for years with tubescreameresque circuits and they never worked for me. That mid hump bothered me so much that I ended up abandoning them. I understand why this midrange frequency boost is there and I'm not saying anything bad about the T/S design. It's just not for me. All I need is an almost clean with just a hint of controlable dirt main sound (without altering my guitar's tone) for when I plug into a lifeless amp or when the amp is too loud to work on its optimal volume level. For my lead tone I just need a dirtier counterpart of my main tone without extra midrange or any other frequency shift. I use my guitar's tone and volume controls a lot for slight tonal adjustments.

Check out the Double D on runoffgrove.com

Thanks for the tip. I have already checked this one out. I like those guys work a lot. I was actually thinking that if I will end up having two Llamas on my pedalboard I 'd rather fit them in one box utilising some elemets of the Double D.

I have both on board right now and the RL is NOT clean.  It's got the most natural sounding drive to me though.

Thanks. This was what I wanted to know. Yeah, my Llama is not 100% clean either. This is with the guitar volume at full though. If I roll off some volume using my guitar volume knob it's practically clean when I play chords with smooth attack and breaks up when I hit the strings harder. With Llama's gain knob at zero and my guitar's volume knob at eight let's say I get an almost clean slightly compressed signal that makes even some rigid solid state amps sounding responsive to picking attack etc. With Llama's gain at zero and guitar volume at ten I get a pretty crunchy rock rhythm sound.

[AM]

Sorry, just double-posted by accident.  Ok, it's deleted now

[~arph]

Crappy sample of my double d:

http://www.friedair.com/audio/dubbeld.mp3

[AM]

Hey Amoud,
Thanks for the sample. By the way you have a very nice site. Your boxes look way cool !!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The clean channel on double D sounds fine to me in both your samples and the runoffgroove samples. The distorted sound though in both yours and R.O.G's samples is not what I'm after. I think I prefer Llama's overdrive to the Double D's dirty channel. Just a personal preference I suppose.
Do you guys think it's worth building two separate circuits and house them in the same box so I can cascade one into the other or just a double channel would do?

I have both on board right now and the RL is NOT clean.  It's got the most natural sounding drive to me though.

Do you have any samples recorded comparing your bypassed tone, the Llama and the 250 at low and hi gain settings? If yes and it's not too much trouble for you to upload them I would be very interested to listen to them.

[nbabmf]

I'd be glad to record some clips as soon as I get them into some enclosures hehe.

[AM]

Ha ha
I'm like that too. Things stay way too long under trial period until I decide to put them in a box. I understand though that between the two
the Llama lets your original guitar sound more unaffected as far as mid boost etc goes and also it's cleaner when the gain knob is turned all the way down. Am I right?

[paperhouse]

Ha ha
I'm like that too. Things stay way too long under trial period until I decide to put them in a box. I understand though that between the two
the Llama lets your original guitar sound more unaffected as far as mid boost etc goes and also it's cleaner when the gain knob is turned all the way down. Am I right?

yeah, for the most part. at light crunch levels they're sort of similar but at high gain they're pretty different. the DOD gets harsher and the llama gets smoother with the gain maxed. the llama is also more responsive to your pick attack and volume knob adjustments.

[AM]

...the DOD gets harsher and the llama gets smoother with the gain maxed. the llama is also more responsive to your pick attack and volume knob adjustments.

Thanks. This describes exactly what I wanted to know. I did some more testing on the Llama yesterday and decided to go with it and just add a couple of mods. I will also add a booster in the same box. The mini or the cmos boosters are the candidates. I want to try and see if I can figure out how to build both the Llama and Cmos booster circuits around one 4049. I'm not very experienced with building so this could be quite a task for me. The Llama-Minibooster combination would be more straightforward for me though. This is a project within my range as a builder.

[nbabmf]

You could try increasing the output of the effect by a switchable level pot at the output.  I plan on doing that with an upcoming Tube Screamer build.