Dan0h
Well-known member
Let’s get this out of the way first. The Chop Shop was not a board I would have bought, even after watching Mark Johnston’s amazing video about it. I just have too many overdrives. But luckily @MichaelW gifted me an extra board he had, so of course I’m going to build it, and…
Holy crap this thing is really really good. With the Sag and drive down this might actually be the clean boost/enchantment magic box I’ve been looking for and with the sag and drive up this thing kills in the transparent drive realm. It’s like a transparent fuzz face with clean fuzz is the best way I can describe it. The wild thing is with the two trim pots you can really take this thing so many places. I have mine biased so the clean is very clean until you really dig in and then it breaks up beautifully. But the crazy part is when I turn the drive up it also drives perfectly. Super clean no fizzy nasty over tones. It sort of reminds me of a very crisp clear benson preamp. And the real magic is the way this thing holds its cleanliness until you dig in hard and it starts to get really good. I’m very impressed that without a tone knob this thing is perfectly eq’d the Fairfield guys know what’s up.
Anyway, maybe it’s the mojo of being a gift, maybe it’s the magic of lucky by ear biasing. Or maybe it’s the combo of j201s (my personal favorite fets) & the 2n2222 combo that is the winning ticket. What ever it is it always blows me away when a low component count build delivers such awesomeness.
Huge fan of this thing. As an ode to @MichaelW I rocked it in a 1590b with top jacks. My first success doing top jacks in one of these.
Only negative is I thought I had another led bezel so I drilled for it but then didn’t. So my led hole is garbage. But when I get a bezel it will be fine.
Holy crap this thing is really really good. With the Sag and drive down this might actually be the clean boost/enchantment magic box I’ve been looking for and with the sag and drive up this thing kills in the transparent drive realm. It’s like a transparent fuzz face with clean fuzz is the best way I can describe it. The wild thing is with the two trim pots you can really take this thing so many places. I have mine biased so the clean is very clean until you really dig in and then it breaks up beautifully. But the crazy part is when I turn the drive up it also drives perfectly. Super clean no fizzy nasty over tones. It sort of reminds me of a very crisp clear benson preamp. And the real magic is the way this thing holds its cleanliness until you dig in hard and it starts to get really good. I’m very impressed that without a tone knob this thing is perfectly eq’d the Fairfield guys know what’s up.
Anyway, maybe it’s the mojo of being a gift, maybe it’s the magic of lucky by ear biasing. Or maybe it’s the combo of j201s (my personal favorite fets) & the 2n2222 combo that is the winning ticket. What ever it is it always blows me away when a low component count build delivers such awesomeness.
Huge fan of this thing. As an ode to @MichaelW I rocked it in a 1590b with top jacks. My first success doing top jacks in one of these.
Only negative is I thought I had another led bezel so I drilled for it but then didn’t. So my led hole is garbage. But when I get a bezel it will be fine.
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