The 'train' day (Episode 2)

The PT-2 is now velcroed. All the pedals are mounted. Power supplies are hooked as well. My rig is still half-done so I don't want to reveal it here yet. Will do so when I've gotten everything.

Why does PT-2 solve the problem of messy cables? You can wired up everything from beneath. This is how it should looks like. You can tie all the cables together like this so that it will look neater. Damn, I like this. 

Oh, all the patch cables can be connected from beneath as well. No more cables over the pedals or stuck at the switches.

Modtone Chromatic Tuner

Something else I got today. A Modtone MT-CT Chromatic Tuner. It is simply a pedal tuner. That's all.

I often get questions like 'What is so special about this?' and 'how is this different from Korg Pitchblack'. 

Here are the similarities:

1. True bypass
2. Silent tuning. When you switch on your tuner, your signal will be muted. The good thing about this is that you can use your tuner as a momentary killswitch as well. 
3. Calibration is adjustable from 436 - 445 Hz

Differences:

1. Modtone is very hungry for power. It draws 3 times as much current as pitchblack. (Ptichblack's max current draw is 30mA
2. Blue LED instead of RED and GREEN. One of the main reason why I get this. My eyes can't stand red lights. 
3. Smaller tuning range of A0 - C8. However, it is more than enough to tune any guitar or a 5 string bass.
4. Slightly smaller
5. No D.C. out. This tuner CANNOT supply power to another pedal.

Modtone items can be purchased at SV Guitars.

The 'train' day

I used to use a pedalboard and often find that those people paying $200 for pedaltrains with hard case are stupid. Yes, that's how naive I was. Now I'm one of the 'stupid' people.

Got it fresh from Ebenex. The customer service at Ebenex is as superb as ever. I didn't get it with the hard case as I don't see the need for it. Soft case should be more than enough for me.

Which model did I get? The tag says it all!

Unzip the bag and this is what you see inside it (there is some piece of paper there though).

'Undress' it further and you get the Pedaltrain-2 (non-stealth mode). Why do I get a pedaltrain? After using a pedalboard for months, I realised that I hate messy cables and wires. Pedaltrain solves all that problem. I'll talk more about it on the next episode.

NOTE: THE PRICES OF PEDALTRAINS ARE SLASHED. PT2 SC would normally cost $200. I got mine for $180.

Tomorrow is the day...

Tomorrow is the day I'll be getting quite a few stuffs after selling away all the pedals I don't really need. Please stay tuned to find out more about it. =P

Words finally materialized

My CCA teacher said we will be getting a new drumset since last year. After how many months later, those words have finally materialized.

A Tama Swingstar. Quite a neat set. So as for the old drumset (which is falling apart), it's time for it to retire after 6 years of use (and abuse).
Now, I wonder why he didn't wait until Sunday to get the drumset. But again, Tama Swingstar is priced on its NETT price, so the 50% discount probably isn't valid.

2 in 1: A pedal case, guitar stand or both?

If you are looking for a guitar stand for multiple guitars and a pedal board at the same time, take a look at what Gator has to offer.

This is what I would call 'killing two birds with one stone'.

Block the Noises~! (Episode 2)

The title may already give you a hint on what I've got today. Need more hints? It is a pedal.
Well, obviously, it is a noise gate. I got Beta Aivin NG-100 for my noise gate.

This is not new though. It was preowned by someone else for at least 2 years. However, the pedal seems to be underused since it is still in a perfect condition. Or the ex-owner takes real care for his stuffs. Well, either way, thumbs up for the good condition and for the price I paid for it. I got it at almost half of what it costs.

Pre-national SALE! @Swee Lee

Yes. Once again, Swee Lee is holding up a sale again! And this time, it is at Bras Basah. This definitely isn't just clearing of stocks since they have just restock most of their items. 

As usual, long trials will not be allowed. Or trials may not be allowed at all depending on the crowd. So please do understand them. Serving a crowd on the sales day is not-at-all an easy task. There is no dress code for this sales and no entrance fee as well. Some people had complained about the entrance fees Swee Lee had imposed during some sales at Katong. It is just a strategy to filter all the window shoppers and thus reducing the crowd. 

I definitely am going there, if they have the stuff I want.

Is this okay?

It's 4:52 AM and I can't sleep. So I decided to do some blogging.

I'm very sure the above statement is very familiar to many of us, especially if we shop 2nd hand stuffs online on forums. You get to see this statement more often nowadays. Some people would conveniently use this term 'lowballer' without even understand what it really means. It means: to bargain extremely lower than that of the retail price or the reasonable price. So if a person is selling a pedal at $100 (when it costs $80 for new) and the buyer bargain it for $70, will you call him a lowballer?

In my opinion, this term is best not used when selling an item. I had never used this term when I'm posting ads in the forums. Reason? The negative connotation of this word is enough to chase people from buying stuffs from you. People may think twice before wanting to deal with you. After all, first impression is very important. Of course, I do get rather excessive (sometimes even absurd) bargains while trying to sell my things. Never would I scold the person off or ignore their SMS when a simple & polite reply could solve all the problems.

Now, I'm not targeting this to any specific people in the forum or anything. I know the frustration of getting 'lowball-ed'. However, why would you want to chase potential buyers away from you? 

Just my personal thoughts...

Pronunciation

A few things I noticed nowadays. Many people have various interesting ways to pronounce names of a guitar.

I see many people calling Squier as 'Squire'. 

Different people pronouncing Ibanez differently. Some pronouce it as Ai-Ben-Nex while some pronounce it as Ee-Ben-Nex (sounds so much like the shop). The worst case I've ever heard is 'Ai-Ban-Ne-Zz'. 

Basswood.. People would conveniently pronounce it as Base-wood. The correct pronunciation would be Bas-Wood, rhyming with words like 'has'. I myself used to have this problem.

Another mistake of mine. I used to call Strymon pedals as sty-ra-mon (like how you would pronounce Poke'Mon). I just realised that it's pronounced as Sty-mon (rhyming the 'mon' of the word demon).

One of my schoolmate couldn't pronounce Seymour Duncan. I'm not being mean but it's 'entertaining' to make him pronounce that. Thus, he simply calls it SD. 

DiMarzio is another one. Some pronounce it as Di-Marzio while some would simply make it D-Marzio. I once know a guy who ended up calling it D-Mario. 

Well, I'm not saying you MUST pronounce them correctly. It is just fun to listen to people calling them in different names. :)