# TC Electronic Smorgasbord



## metallica86 (Aug 17, 2009)

I tried to search in the forum but don't see any thread about this new line from TC.

Yesterday I tried the Phaser and Vibrato and Overdriver pedal, man, it's sound Great !! especially with 70$ price tag. 

The phaser sound really nice and warm, you can do a bit of Van Halen and Gilmourish with just a few tweak.

The OD is nice as well

The pedal I want the most is delay, too bad L&M don't have them anywhere, all of them are 70$, feel really nice and sturdy too !! It will kill all Mooer line pedal imo


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## keto (May 23, 2006)

So, I was told by a music store they are rehoused Behringers, the exact same pedals you can buy for $20-40, that they had done side by side tone testing and confirmed, and that none of the guys involved in the testing would ever have on on their board (hey, opinions, OK?).


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## fretzel (Aug 8, 2014)

I read the same thing. It's a + being in the better housing.


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## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

Yep. I nearly jumped on a verb for $60 used at L&M. Then I found out they were only $70 new so no real deal there. These are probably very similar to the Chinese pedals I bought recently, except a lot bigger. The controls (3 knobs and a 3 way switch with the same reverb types) on the verb were even the same as my $30 verb.

This is risky for TC. They were a boutique company in the early 80s when I bought my SCF. If these things suck, it could hurt their overall reputation.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

keto said:


> So, I was told by a music store they are rehoused Behringers, the exact same pedals you can buy for $20-40, that they had done side by side tone testing and confirmed, and that none of the guys involved in the testing would ever have on on their board (hey, opinions, OK?).


Behringer _bought_ TC, but I doubt that the budget pedals are merely "rehoused" Behringers. After all, why invest money in a company with a _good_ reputation only to drag them down with your own _poor_ reputation? More likely, Behringer's purchase provided seed money for taking a stab at a budget line, courtesy of the vast production facilities in China (And they ARE vast. There were video-tours posted some time back and they're something the size of a major Hollywood studio or GM/Ford plant.)


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## metallica86 (Aug 17, 2009)

I read somewhere from TGP forum as well, but for my ear, I can't tell difference between 70$ phaser and 150$ MXR phaser... 
Are they all copy-paste from Behringer ?


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

Nope.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

The majority of phasers are 4 or 6-stage. Once you fit into that category there aren't all that many differences obtainable, unless one adds different control features. If anything Behringer cut and pasted earlier stock designs. I have a Behringer clone of the Phase 90, and all it adds is a switch to convert from script to block. The various 1970's issues of the MXR Phase 90 (script/block) differed in essentially two small ways: some issues had a wider sweep than others, and some had more feedback/resonance than others. The differences were actually pretty small, but those differences were only important because MXR only included a speed control and no width or feedback controls as found on other 3-knob commercial units. Had they always included width and feedback controls every single issue would have been able to duplicate every other.


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## Cups (Jan 5, 2010)

The rehoused Behringer theory is a good one. And one would naturally assume that. But looking at the lineup and doing a little digging it seems it's its own thing. Not having one in my hands I can't confirm or deny but I follow Marc's logic on the subject. 
Build something simple, analogue and cheap.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

Visual Sound / Truetone attempted this in 2009 with their Garage Tone series ( Visual Sound GarageTone series ). The idea was well-built decent-but-simple basic effects. Company president Bob Weil proudly showed off the series to me when I visited with him in 2009, but for whatever reason it tanked. I don't know if that was because of distribution issues or what. It certainly wasn't because of price, because they were in the same price range as the Behringer/TC pedals being discussed here, and at that point in time there wasn't the spate of inexpensive Asian-made mini pedals we see nowadays.


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## tomsy49 (Apr 2, 2015)

I believe some are rehoused Behringer pedals with some circuit tweaks but i believe some are totally new circuits (like the rusty fuzz, which actually sounds really good).

EDIT: Found this quote from Tore at TC Electronics on the gear page

"Hey guys,

Just wanted to give a little more insight into the design of these pedals. Most of them are indeed based on some of the old Behringer pedals, but it is incorrect to say that it's a rebranding or re-housing. I gave the Behringer pedals a listen over a year ago, and truly though a lot of them sounded really good. From there the idea formed that with some work they could form the basis for a new cheaper product line... something I (and our dealers) have been wanted for years.

So here is the skinny on what has been changed from the original pedals. As you can hopefully tell, this has in now way been a quick copy/paste job... quite the contrary! The TC team in Denmark made a whole new mechanic design. We designed new mainboards to support true bypass. All the pedals have changes to their original circuits (both component and signal flow) to change the tone, add or remove knobs or switches, remove unwanted noise, etc.

In essence we've diligently gone over every single pedal and changed the things necessary to make them work and sound the way we wanted them to."


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

Thanks for the intell. That's very helpful.


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## metallica86 (Aug 17, 2009)

awesome, I will try the Prophet delay this weekend and if its sound half good as my old boss DD7, i will grab one, also the Echobrain Analog delay too.


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## Guest (Mar 10, 2017)

TC Electronics regular quality pedals have a well deserved reputation for being poorly made, unreliable and prone to failure. To add insult to injury, they don't repair anything. If the pedal switch fails outside of the short 1 year warranty they will only sell you a new pedal at about 10% off full retail.

Now they are saying they are improving Behringer?


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

Player99 said:


> TC Electronics regular quality pedals have a well deserved reputation for being poorly made, unreliable and prone to failure. To add insult to injury, they don't repair anything. If the pedal switch fails outside of the short 1 year warranty they will only sell you a new pedal at about 10% off full retail.
> 
> Now they are saying they are improving Behringer?


Weird, touring for two years hasn't given me the same impression of TC. *shrug*


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## Guest (Mar 10, 2017)

Search TGP. You get them to repair a broken switch? Nobody else can get them to.


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## Budda (May 29, 2007)

Just haven't had a switch get broken, nor read about anyone who has.


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## Guest (Mar 11, 2017)

Budda said:


> Just haven't had a switch get broken, nor read about anyone who has.


You are not reading The Gear Page then... Just one of many many threads:

https://www.thegearpage.net/board/i...ctronics-problems-with-foot-switches.1765066/

I quote: 

"Worst switches ever in my experience

Just crap"


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## gtone (Nov 1, 2009)

Player99 said:


> Search TGP. You get them to repair a broken switch? Nobody else can get them to.


Not only broken switches, but glitchy, unexplainable quirks with some of their pedals. I bought two TC pedals and they were both glitchy. Their own customer service team told me to check their forum for possible hints as to how to deal with the issue (probably because of their outright refusal to do anything about them). In reading that, found it was rife with myriad tales of woe concerning that particular pedal. I will never buy another product from TC Electronics unless/until they amp up their quality control and customer service standards. Maybe the Behringer thing is a step in the right direction for them...


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## High/Deaf (Aug 19, 2009)

Budda said:


> Weird, touring for two years hasn't given me the same impression of TC. *shrug*


Me neither. My 35 year old SCF has never missed a beat - and I keep stepping on it with admittedly more and more and more weight every year. My Nova Delay is only 15 years old and my tuner, only 5 - so that's maybe to early to consider them reliable, although they've been flawless as well. Go figure.


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## Guest (Mar 11, 2017)

gtone said:


> *Maybe the Behringer thing is a step in the right direction for them...*


Sad to think Behringer is a step up for TC Electronics.


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## gtone (Nov 1, 2009)

Player99 said:


> Sad to think Behringer is a step up for TC Electronics.


Sad indeed, but quite possibly true on the customer service side of things.

TCE is the only company I've run across that hasn't bent over backwards to do the right thing or back up their products and I've bought effects/pedals from a fair few manufacturers from the mid-70's onward. In fact, it seemed more like they had a process in place of "passing the buck" in a concerted effort to _not_ deal with the issue at hand.


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## zdogma (Mar 21, 2006)

Budda said:


> Weird, touring for two years hasn't given me the same impression of TC. *shrug*


Nor me. I've been using my polytune so long that the paint is wearing off and it still works fine.


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2017)

zdogma said:


> Nor me. I've been using my polytune so long that the paint is wearing off and it still works fine.


My Polytune was glitchy new, but I wasn't aware of the problems everyone was having. When it went completely DOA a little over a year, I learned about their "buy a new one" repair plan.

I have a new Chorus Plus that power up ON sometimes, and OFF other times. This is with the pedal off on power down. Or on, it doesn't matter. Annoying when playing live and you get used to it off and you play the first song and it sneakily has turned itself on...


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## zontar (Oct 25, 2007)

It was only the rubber foot on the bottom of the pedal--but one was missing & they were easy to deal with and sent me new ones quite quickly.
So they will do that...

I was considering trying out their reverb pedal, but haven' had a chance to do that yet.


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## metallica86 (Aug 17, 2009)

Back to this thread, I tried the new Delay ( the Prophet, not the analog one) yesterday, didn't like it at all, very noisy even plug in the loop or in front, doesn't matter, weird cold sterlie sound. BUT I really like their Rush boost pedal, simple, one knob and very transparent, sometime I just need a boost for my solo to standout a bit


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## Sam-i-am (Nov 17, 2017)

I've got the thunderstorm flanger,
It sounds fine,
And hey, its in a better housing than the Bheringer.
I also enjoy the foot switch on them too,
Better to have a soft switch than that hard CLACK you get with overly solid switches..... *COUGH*Donner*COUGH*


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

I gather that the purchase by Behringer allowed TC to make use of Behringer's considerable Chinese manufacturing facilities. The low price of the recent budget line is partly a result of not having to do much, or any, R&D for products (the majority being analog classics, rather than digital), and the ease with which boards can be laid out for the larger enclosures, partly a result of simpler form-factor (only 2 or 3 knobs for many), partly a result of cutting back on quality control, and partly a result of Behringer's HUGE distribution network.

As for getting them to repair a switch or any other aspect of this pedalline, I can't imagine ANY manufacturer offering such service for pedals retailing for $60 or less. And any who do are probably regretting it and hoping the pedal line vanishes quickly. Even where the manufacturer simply sets up "authorized service centers" at major retailers, exactly how many people are going to want to bring in a $50 pedal only to find out the repair is going to cost them $30?

But this raises an interesting question: what is the inflection/price point above which manufacturers WILL be willing to provide service and set up authorized service centers? $100? $150? $200?


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## JazzyT (Nov 1, 2017)

Who doesn't love a smorgie? Just don't expect fine dining.


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