View other reviews for this product:
moosers
Published on 02/25/09 at 10:10
The Boss OS-2 Overdrive/Distortion is exactly what the name of the pedal suggest - an analog distortion and overdrive guitar pedal. It has a 1/4 inch input and a 1/4 inch output and is powered by a nine volt battery or a nine volt power supply. It is not a rackable unit as it is a stomp box.
UTILIZATION
The configuration of the pedal is quite simple. It has four knobs - one for level, one for tone, one for drive, and one for color. Different combinations of the parameters will give you a wide variety of different overdrive tones. The tone is like an EQ, with all the way up being hi, and all the way down being lo. The color knob can either lean towards overdrive or distortion. I don't have a manual, but the pedal is easy enough to figure out that you shouldn't need it.
SOUND QUALITY
The tone and overall sound quality of the Boss OS-2 is about average in my opinion. While there are a few different sounds you can get from this pedal, none blew me away, and a lot of them came off sounding a bit stale and tinny. I have only used this pedal with guitar as it is what I play and is what the pedal is made for, although it is compatible with any instrument you can plug a 1/4 cable into. I like the overdrive type sound more than the distortion, and while the effects from this pedal are usable, they aren't ground breaking and didn't impress me as much as I would have liked.
OVERALL OPINION
I've been using the Boss OS-2 Overdrive/Distortion pedal for about four or five years. However, I don't use it all that often as I'm not a huge fan of it overall. While Boss makes some great pedals and this pedal is built like a brick, the tone quality is about average and I have found some pedals I consider to sound much better than this one. Don't get me wrong, the pedal has a usable overdrive and distortion tone, but I prefer the Boss DS-1 as a distortion and would rather have a Nady TD-1 or a an Ibanez TS-808 for overdrive. The price of this is reasonable, but isn't cheap enough of a difference to make up for the sound quality. I recommend checking this out if you are looking for an overdrive and distortion pedal in one, but this isn't my favorite pedal out there.
UTILIZATION
The configuration of the pedal is quite simple. It has four knobs - one for level, one for tone, one for drive, and one for color. Different combinations of the parameters will give you a wide variety of different overdrive tones. The tone is like an EQ, with all the way up being hi, and all the way down being lo. The color knob can either lean towards overdrive or distortion. I don't have a manual, but the pedal is easy enough to figure out that you shouldn't need it.
SOUND QUALITY
The tone and overall sound quality of the Boss OS-2 is about average in my opinion. While there are a few different sounds you can get from this pedal, none blew me away, and a lot of them came off sounding a bit stale and tinny. I have only used this pedal with guitar as it is what I play and is what the pedal is made for, although it is compatible with any instrument you can plug a 1/4 cable into. I like the overdrive type sound more than the distortion, and while the effects from this pedal are usable, they aren't ground breaking and didn't impress me as much as I would have liked.
OVERALL OPINION
I've been using the Boss OS-2 Overdrive/Distortion pedal for about four or five years. However, I don't use it all that often as I'm not a huge fan of it overall. While Boss makes some great pedals and this pedal is built like a brick, the tone quality is about average and I have found some pedals I consider to sound much better than this one. Don't get me wrong, the pedal has a usable overdrive and distortion tone, but I prefer the Boss DS-1 as a distortion and would rather have a Nady TD-1 or a an Ibanez TS-808 for overdrive. The price of this is reasonable, but isn't cheap enough of a difference to make up for the sound quality. I recommend checking this out if you are looking for an overdrive and distortion pedal in one, but this isn't my favorite pedal out there.