All user reviews for the Boss SD-1 SUPER OverDrive

One input, one output, a volume, drive, and tone knob. How much easier could it be? It also has a standard BOSS style center negative 9V DC jack. It uses a buffer bypass (and not a good one).


UTILIZATION

Plug in, set the knobs where you want 'em and get playin'. It couldn't be easier to use. Wanna use it as a boost? Volume dimed, gain low, and set the tone to your personal taste. The TONE knob isn't that responsive though. It takes a big turn to get any noticeable change in tone, which can be annoying because you can't get a large selection of tones from it, but it's still workable.

SOUND QUALITY

This is a decent pedal stock. It can go from thin, crunchy, trebly gain, to thick, smooth OD. when used as a boost, it is somewhat transparent, but still colors the tone. I keep the tone around 1 o'clock, and the gain around 9 o'clock. This gives me a nice, crunchy, style OD. A bit like Don't Fear the Reaper by Blue Oyster Cult. This is not a true bypass pedal. It connects the input jack to the output jack using a buffer. The buffer isn't a very good one though. It causes some somewhat noticeable tone suck, which causes some treble to be lost. It's too dynamic either. It's more dynamic than some pedals, but it's nothing like a Honey Bee Over Drive by BJFE, which could be one of the most Dynamic Overdrives out there.


OVERALL OPINION

This is a good OD pedal. The tone knob is not very responsive, but with a quick, no soldering needed mod, it opens up and becomes a better pedal. This is a great pedal to mod. a few mods and it goes from a decent pedal to awesome. Stock, It's a decent OD for a good price.

In essence, this pedal is simply designed to do what it says... it's an overdrive pedal that gives a bit more kick than just your average tube amplifer's overdrive tone. It has level (volume), tone, and drive (amount of gain) controls.

The pedal is basically your standard Boss enclosure, with a durable metal casing (painted in a really cool bright yellow), 1/4" input and output jacks, and an adapter jack for a Boss PSA adapter. It isn't designed to be anything more than a basic stompbox, so there aren't any MIDI or computer editing based parameters.

As they say, simple is the way with things like this.

UTILIZATION

It's a very simple pedal. I received it as a present from my parents when I was 8 years old and even at that time I had no problems dialing it in. Because it only has three controls, it's quite easy to dial in. It was my main source of overdrive tones (in conjunction with a clean or mildly overdriven amp) for about 4 years straight.

There really isn't too much more I can say about the setup. It's not a very high gain pedal, so I often used it in conjunction with a mildly overdriven tube amp in my younger days for sonic satori. Definitely a very easy to use pedal, and when you integrate it into your rig, it sounds killer!

SOUND QUALITY

When I first got this pedal, I was using a G&L Tribute S-500 and various Yamaha and Tokai guitars into various and sundry Peavey, Yamaha, and Laney amplifiers. I used this pedal for a few years as a standalone drive unit in various jazz and blues projects until I started getting into more high gain tones around age 10 or 11 (ca. 2004-05). At this point I begun using the pedal more as a booster when running into a high gain amplifer to add more distortion and tighten up the sound.

Circa 2007-08, I wasn't using the pedal as much, and I had my guitar teacher at the time modify it for more gain and a midrange boost. When I got it back, I was blown away by the tone and proceeded to have him build me a few more pedals that were to compliment it. When all was said and done I was running three different gain boxes built/modified by him into a mildly overdriven amp. It was noisy... but it worked VERY well for the neoclassical shred I was playing at the time.

I haven't used the pedal very much since I started getting into more high dollar tube heads, but writing this review has inspired me to perhaps dust it off sometime soon.

OVERALL OPINION

All in all this pedal is great. It has served me very well for almost ten years and I've used it in every style imaginable at this point and it's held up great. Whether running it into a clean amp for a bit of dirt, into a mildly overdriven one to push it over the top, or as a high gain booster to give amps a serious headrush, the Boss Super Overdrive always worked great, and sounded, well, super.