What is most important in a distortion unit?

[Dirty Horse]

hey there everyone,
I'm currently doing a 3rd year project for my sound technology degree making distortion pedals.
I need to do some research to find out what people would want in a new product (and how they are attracted to the product) and thought what better place to ask than somewhere people make their own. I assume everyone makes their own units for fun (i know i do) and i'd also like to know what changes people have made to existing designs in order to accomodate personal preference.

So what do you find is the most important part of a distortion unit? and what attracts you to certain pedals over others?

Here are some simple options if you don't want to elaborate.
1.)Sounds produced
2.)Case design of the pedal
3.)Ease of use
4.)Superior Specification
5.)Marketing and Advertisement

Thanks
Will

[panterica]

So what do you find is the most important part of a distortion unit? and what attracts you to certain pedals over others?

Here are some simple options if you don't want to elaborate.
1.)Sounds produced
2.)Case design of the pedal
3.)Ease of use
4.)Superior Specification
5.)Marketing and Advertisement

Thanks
Will

Just my two cents:

1.) "Scooped" mids (unlike the Tubescreamer style pedals), a well-designed tone stack, lots of crunch and sustain, and an "openness" that can be sometimes had with higher supply voltages.

2.) Attitude! Don't hold back. Scare people. Larger sizes don't matter. They may even impress more than smaller pedals. Heavy is ok as well. Obviously, avoid colors like yellow, pink, orange, etc.

3.) That's a plus. Guitarists don't want to feel they have to turn six knobs forever to find their sound.

4.) I'm not sure what you mean, but high quality components and construction is necessary. No recipe is any better than the ingredients you cook with.

5.) You're talking about a distortion pedal, so you're hoping to sell to a guitarist attracted to heavy music. If I were you, I'd start by looking through a guitar magazine for the ads where companies are trying to sell to heavy metal musicians. It's easy to notice a theme.

[CynicalMan]

hey there everyone,
I'm currently doing a 3rd year project for my sound technology degree making distortion pedals.
I need to do some research to find out what people would want in a new product (and how they are attracted to the product) and thought what better place to ask than somewhere people make their own. I assume everyone makes their own units for fun (i know i do) and i'd also like to know what changes people have made to existing designs in order to accomodate personal preference.

So what do you find is the most important part of a distortion unit? and what attracts you to certain pedals over others?

Here are some simple options if you don't want to elaborate.
1.)Sounds produced
2.)Case design of the pedal
3.)Ease of use
4.)Superior Specification
5.)Marketing and Advertisement

Thanks
Will

IMHO:

1. Smooth but versatile sound. Personally, I prefer distortion with a fairly transparent tone. Another plus would be being able to have clean or close to clean settings possible. If you wanted to go in this kind of direction, I'd suggest a FET gain stage design.

2. I'm a fan of plain old 1590B style boxes but don't hold back with the colours. The weirder the colour design, the better.

3. For ease of use, try to control the knobs' range. I find that commercial distortion pedals have either unusable settings on their knobs, or the knobs' effects are too small. Also, with tone controls, experiment with other designs than the regular tone knob (presence, mids, distortion character, etc.).

4. I don't know what this means.

5. I agree with panterica, look through guitar magazines. I'd suggest also looking at manufacturer's websites for ideas

[sean k]

Yu could take a look at the workhorse thread to get an insiders veiw of production and the whys and wherefores which should give you some insight.

Secondly I'd like to say that this may be the wrong place to ask or,if not neccessarily wrong, then maybe prejudiced?

I mean that most of here aren't interested in how a pedal meets the market simply because we aren't in the market. Well lots here may survive by building pedals but the emphasis of this place is how to build things as opposed to how to sell them.

I only say this because we are going to skew way towards doing the job, stressing that we can meet our needs quickly as regards the current  paradigm of sound as expression, as opposed to manufacturers who have to define their market by, usually, whats already hip and make reliable approxiamations as to where the market will be when their product is ready for ir.

Not only that but when building for musicians who want stage pedals you are in different territory from musicians who tinker and want to record stuff. We here can build an opamp stacked T.M.K.(too many knobs at circuit snippets) with an extra few stages personifying all the possibles and have almost ludicrous amounts of choice in distortion. 14 knobs and an arsenal of rotary switches...

Now you put that in a shop against a single awesomely designed die cast alloy enclosure with only one transistor in it , two skulls head knobs and a lump of lead inside to make it feel heavy... whats going to sell?

What people want and why they are attaracted to it is not always allied to getting what they need.

Giving people what they need while being aware of what they want is the real skill when it comes to surviving in the market place.

Give them what they need while not being aware of what they want will just make other people rich. People who realise you got the need right then invest in the want part.

Give them what the want but not what they nedd will give short term payback but you better understand shell companies because people will see your label only equals a quick fix and shoddy over time.
So your enclosure and branding are giving people what they want... the personna as it were.

The guts have to sound  like a stack of big tube amps at saturation... what else is neccessary?

[Dirty Horse]

i'd like to say thanks to the people who have replied so far. i'll take all that's been said into account when doing the rest of this work as it's all valuable.

I'd like to say that this may be the wrong place to ask or,if not neccessarily wrong, then maybe prejudiced?

I agree now that this was probably not the best place to ask why someone would buy one pedal over another as we all build them  but it's still good to get the input from the tinkers as you've all got an idea of what your ideal unit would look, feel and smell sound like.

as for not being in the market, i'm split on that one because though we're all DIYing it, we're all subject to advertising. whether we choose to ignore or acknowledge an advert is essentially up to us but if you were shown 2 different adverts (one aimed at your demographic, one aimed at a totally different demographic) for the same product then you'd probably have an opinion as to which one was more attractive even if you weren't going to buy it.

Now you put that in a shop against a single awesomely designed die cast alloy enclosure with only one transistor in it , two skulls head knobs and a lump of lead inside to make it feel heavy... whats going to sell?

i'd go for the TMK to be honest, but that's just my inner tinker talking  . i know what you mean though with regards to potential customers.

The guts have to sound  like a stack of big tube amps at saturation... what else is neccessary?

like it.

that is all some hefty good advice. i'll take a look round the workhorse thread.

the product is basically a dual channel distortion called the Fuzzy Duck. it's still a W.I.P but it's getting there.

Thanks again

[MoltenVoltage]

Re: What is most important in a distortion unit?

That it is exactly like the Boss Metal Zone and nothing like a Tube Screamer.

[jefe]

So what do you find is the most important part of a distortion unit? and what attracts you to certain pedals over others?

A distortion pedal should be able to produce such chugging lows that it makes you shit your pants. It should produce highs that make your ears bleed. It scares both old people and young children. And it makes the bulge in your pants look larger.

But thats just me.

[FlyingZ]

So what do you find is the most important part of a distortion unit? and what attracts you to certain pedals over others?

It must be usable for more then one or two songs to earn real-estate on the pedal board.

[brett]

That it sounds bad.  Sick and dirty. 
Like the illegitimate child of the union of an FZ-1 ("Satisfaction" by The Stones), an MFZ-1 ("Thickfreakness" by The Black Keys), and a Rat (various artists).

[MannequinRaces]

I'm looking for something unique.  It's all been done before so in order for me to take notice it better be something that I haven't heard before or a new take on an old classic.  For me the tonal quality is of the upmost importance followed by the aesthetics of the pedal (the more boutique looking the better but it can't be too "crafty" looking).  For marketing, if I see it on AnalogueHaven or FuzzHugger, I might be a potential buyer!

[Mark Hammer]

1)  A sufficient range of gain adjustment to provide either hints of clipping at the outset of notes up to prominent clipping maintained across a longer portion of the note's lifespan.

2)  A sufficient range of treble adjustment to provide acceptable tonal contrast between effect and bypass (i.e., one doesn't go from mellow clean neck pickup to running back to the amp to turn the treble down so that your ears will stop bleeding).

3) A sufficient range of output levels such that subsequent devices or the amp can be co-opted into adding their own distortion in predetermined ways.

4) Some means for altering what parts of the spectrum are in closer "proximity to clip".  Some might call this pre-clip EQ.

[newfish]

Here's my metric 2 cents...

Sounds wise - definately agree with the 'sh*t your pants scary' comments.  Sounding like a stack-on-speed is a big plus - so lots of low-end 'chunk', but without sacrificing the top-end for leads. 

So far, so good, but also no loss of character at lower gain settings.  For a pedal to be on your board (and stay on your board), it should do more than just 'thrash-in-a-box' - so if you choose to use the pedal to push your tube amp 'over the edge with a bit of extra EQ' - any pedal that does this is a keeper.

Although favouring the 'scoop' - a versatile tone stack would help keep the pedal in use for more than a couple of songs - so the EQ controls should be responsive, and useable across pretty much all their range.

Colours / design-wise, 'Black and Scary' would spring to mind, although I'm sure the other Spice Girls could help out too. <sorry!>

Ease of Use again goes back to the earlier comments about versatility of the Gain / EQ controls, but if at all possible without ending up with a shed-load of knobs to use.

Solid construction is a big plus too.  There are people out there who mistreat their gear, then whine in online reviews when their super-mega-death-fuzz stops working.
Any bad press is bad, right?

Marketing and Advertisement?  Watch 'This is Spinal Tapp' for starters.  Ask yourself - does my pedal have an Armadillo in its Trousers?

Hope this helps.

[panterica]

...
The guts have to sound  like a stack of big tube amps at saturation... what else is neccessary?

Touche'!

[quote/]
A distortion pedal should be able to produce such chugging lows that it makes you sh*t your pants. It should produce highs that make your ears bleed. It scares both old people and young children. And it makes the bulge in your pants look larger.
[/quote]

Lmao! Right on.

[Dirty Horse]

this has turned out to be quite good research.

we've basically got a unanimous vote on "it's got to sound effing mean"

keep the opinions coming though.

Ta

[R.G.]

By far the most important characteristics in a distortion unit are the paint job and a suitable endorser for your target demographic. 

[Baktown]

To me the most important quality of a good distortion is that it inspires me to want to play more and better guitar.

Rick J

[km-r]

mine:
according to priority.

1. post distortion eq
2. pre distortion eq
2. multiple distortion stages and inter stage eq-ing

[slideman82]

Re: What is most important in a distortion unit?

That it is exactly like the Boss Metal Zone and nothing like a Tube Screamer.

Mmmm you'll have to listen or try a lot more distortions... and probably a lot more DIYer designs, you don't know what are you missing! For example, the Dr. Boogey... there are a lot of interesting sounds!

RG is right, as probably the 99.99% of the times he talks 'bout something: most people want to look right than sounding right... the same goes for stompboxes...

Well, IMHO, you'll gotta have tone flexibility (for example, from heavy metal mid-scooped sound to killer hollow mids...), high output from clean to full distortion, and if you can, that clean pretty good when lowering guitar volume...
It's tone? It depends on what you like, fuzzier, crunchier... or maybe a bit of both.
In my case, I avoid Op amps and diode clipping, I like the "transistor drive" sound.

And of course, Baktown opinion has a lot to do with this, if you turn it on and after 2 hours you realise you've lost a couple of hours making noise... you'll know that's the sound you want!

[R.G.]

In the Engineering Real World (ERW), the techies don't get to decide what features are important. That's because the techies in general have no clue about what the business guys know: success in sales depends more on looks, sales schemes, diddling the financial books, incentives to the sales force, targeted customers, and the other stuff that makes techies go glassy-eyed than any actual performance of the product.

I put the smilie in for an indication of light heartedness. But the facts I stated are correct as stated. 

[slideman82]

Right, but that seems to be quite a lot of marketing stuff, and I'm sick of it! Standing from the DIYer side, I think cards are shown, and there are really good tips!

My stompboxes don't look like the best, but they sound maybe better... or maybe not! But they do sound good, compared to clones.