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[Jagtornado]

Hi guys,

I bought myself an old Boss DF-2 feedbacker distortion. I notice that on a some amps I get more sustain and a more fluent sound than on other amps. The same I have experienced with the Boss Metal zone. On some amps I get almost endfless sustain and on other amps a lot less.

Does anyone know what's the reason of this?

By the way on all the amps only the clean channel was used as I always do. On most amps I don't like the overdrive of the amp itself.

Cheers

[paul_]

Different EQ and gain
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[theshadowofseattle]

Tonewood of the cab resonating along with the cosmic microwave background radiation.
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[NickS]

[sunshiner]

[dub]

Could be the type and sensitivity of the speakers.

[Gabriel]

I'm going to go with the level of natural compression. Some amps even though they sound clean have a level of natural compression to them. This is the difference between playing through something like a Vox and a Roland Jazz Chorus.

My favourite amps to play through are lower powered valve amps that can play pretty clean but compress a little when you turn them up. I've played a show in a concert hall with a big band using a 11 watt Ampeg Jet (albiet with a super efficient speaker fitted) and not had any issues being heard.
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www.gabrielwareing.com

[Bacchus]

Is this question not "why do different amps sound different?"
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[Concretebadger]

There's certainly an element of the compression to pick attack in some amps (e.g. a Deluxe Reverb with its valve rectifier gives this great "bounce" and sag that a Twin with its diode rectifier doesn't) but I dunno if the effect is heard on the fuller duration of notes rather than the initial fraction of a second after you strike a note. I'd say it probably does. Speakers add a bit of compression as well, don't they? I bet that's a factor too.

I wonder whether the eq and the way it filters out different frequencies that are less or more audible as a note rings out also makes a difference. If the tone stack lets through frequencies that are present even when a note is dying away, it's going to sound like it's sustaining longer than a tone stack that filters them out. If, say, the bass component of a note dies away before the treble does, a low pass filter will give less sustain than a high pass one.

[NickS]

OP is talking about using these different amps with the Boss DF-2 and the Metal Zone, not clean into the amp, which would affect things. Four-egg-sample, I imagine a distortion/crunch/fuzz is going to take much of the dynamics put of the signal and give you a pretty compressed waveform in the first place.

[Jagtornado]

When it comes to almost endless sustain, the best result with the Metal zone I had was when playing on a clean Marshall tube half stack. And the volume was not not on a high level at all.

[Jagtornado]

[Bacchus]

Did he die?
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[NickS]

He felt his heart strangely warmed and founded Methodism.


Oh hang on, no, that was John Wesley.

[Jagtornado]

He was operated. If he survived the operation I don't know.

[paul_]

The supposed health impact of microwaves and that of microwave ovens are different topics of conversation in this particular context.
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[Grant]