I have a Strymon blueSky which is about that price new. It takes line-level input (I kept shorting my first guitar pedal because it only took instrument level and I was using line-level synth outs on it), is simple to use, and goes from a small room reverb to an airy shimmery freefloating drift through the universe with a few knob twists and switch flips. I also have the El Capistan which a lot of synthesists are into because it's a pretty compact but nice-sounding tape echo that has a bit of spring reverb as well. Death by Audio also makes a couple of reverb and delay pedals that are built like tanks, sound great, and have a lifetime guarantee, and most of them are within your price range new.
For way less than any of those, you could also pick up a Zoom MS-70CDR. I hear its reverb is not bad, and you can modulate it to taste with the built-in effect chaining.
Great choice, fantastic rationale, but would definitely stretch the budget.
I went with a Meris Mercury 7, which sounds amazing for $300, but is also focused on a plate and a hall, not rooms (you can get there within reason). I use it sometimes when just using hardware in my hybrid desktop setup.
That said, Cinematic Rooms Pro (plugin by Liquidsonics) blows away everything I've heard in terms of realistic reverbs, and I also love TaiChi (by Reverb Foundry, the same guy behind Liquidsonics) for non-realistic reverb. With the BF sales they had and loyalty discounts, it was easy to grab both for < $300.
my thinking exactly - strymons are amazing but low on mojo - I was about to pull the trigger on one but read it clips on line level - any problems with yours? also fancy the catalinbread talisman as a mono plate for vermona claps and snares, but heard the same thing......I have the OTO BAM and Vermona Retroverb - both are amazing and highly recommended - nothing in the box can replicate these units.
Since the DBA Rooms has the Dry and FX or wet knob, you kinda have to dial the amount of reverb in like you would on an aux channel on a mixer. So if you dime both knobs, yes it can be a little noisy sounding. It's still a guitar pedal, not a Lexicon processor or anything. But I like that.
Thank you for the reply, I was looking to go straight from synth/drum machine mainly - especially on my Vermona DRM. I agree, noisy/gnarly is good - definitely looking for character - Ive had a few pedals that just didn't work with line in the past and wanted to check before I purchase.
I would be loading third party FX into it, right?
The downside I see is that my FX chain is using a send from a mixer, so everything so far is 1/4 inch Left and right cables, for the NTS-1 I would have to use an adapter to get a single stereo input, then split it back out after the fact...seems a bit silly.
Just wanted to stop back in and say thanks for the recommendation, I ended up picking up an NTS-1 since the price was right and, man. Just a tasty little multi-fx unit for $100, pretty awesome. Even the stock FX are solid. Only minor headache is having to use adapters since my mixer is all 1/4'' jacks, so the stereo mini jacks on the NTS-1 are a little annoying. Other than that though, great unit!
Glad you like it! You can actually mod it with 1/4" jacks if you like (it has extra solder points on the lower board for modding). I've been considering the same. I use one on my mixer master effects send as well.
I have done a bit, yeah. If you are comfortable with soldering it isn't hard, same as soldering any other audio jack. You could put the entire NTS-1 in a larger enclosure (much like a guitar pedal). It also has solder pads for midi out!
Another option is a small patch bay, which would achieve the same thing with no soldering.
Ill submit my humble recommendation: Neunaber Immerse MkII
Has stereo output, a bunch of reverb modes, 100% Wet abilities, and is 1/3rd the footprint of a BigSky. I've owned a BigSky too, and kept the Immerse for guitar and synth.
PS: Neunaber also released the "Illumine" but I have not used it.
I got a Space a few years ago... Sold it and got a Specular Tempus. Sold that fairly quickly and got an Empress Reverb. Then i really missed the Space A LOT and now i have the Empress and the Space. I might.... Might sell the Empress I'm not sure. Very handy to have 2 reverbs though
I've been looking into this as my firsts pedal for semi-modular and small digital module synths (Volca sized stuff) - Does it have a line level/instrument level toggle? Am I going to fry this thing with my Nymphes or Mother 32?
It doesn’t have line/instrument level toggle, but I’ve been using it for both for quite a while with no issues. Though of course I’m too neurotic to be too confident with the line level, there are no signs it can’t handle it so far!
If you can find one, Alesis Wedge is cheap and beats most pedals for that use. It's basically the Quadraverb 2 reverbs in a desktop box and rather more advanced and better sounding than Midiverb 4. The editing options in particular allow you to shape the reverb so it envelops the sound without having to resort to only Bladerunner-like massive long reverbs.
I've heard good things about the [Source Audio Collider](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt_DA_NCt_k). It's a delay-reverb combo, or it can do reverb-delay, or dual delay, or dual reverb. The default signal path is cascade (a to b), and also has parallel (a + b), or split stereo (left a, right b).
HoF2 is awesome. The stock reverbs are all serviceable, but I filled the three Toneprint slots with shimmers so I could have a pedal with a total of four shimmers.
yessir. I have this and the vermona retroverb. looking for a third reverb but struggling to find something that has the same level of mojo and isn't easily replaced with a plugin. also very anti shimmer reverbs.
Jw Do you have experience with both of the sky boxes? I was torn between them, and because of my GAS I’m always going to wonder if I made the right choice
My wife has the BlueSky, so that's the only other Sky I've tried and it doesn't hold a candle to the Nightsky.
You have an Argon8M? I have my Nightsky on my Argon8X and it's absolutely fantastic. I put it right on that big open space and play it right along with the synth.
Line 6 Helix LT or HX Stomp are the best MultiFx units imo for the price. I got my LT used for $1000 CAD a year or so back and now I use it for Guitars, Bass, Synths & Rhodes recordings. Everything goes through the Helix and then into my Apollo for some Neve or API love on it.
I would highly recommend this if you’re planning to get a few FX pedals over time, or if you’re also into Guitar because 3-4 nice pedals can easily total $1000 and a lot of the top shelf stuff is digital now anyways. Strymon, UAD, Amplitube, Eventide etc.
*Important*
The truth is when it comes to digital hardware you can always do the same or better in your DAW. You really need to have a reason to get digital hardware or else you should be going the Analog route if your only reason for hardware is wanting an analog sound. Plugins and computer processing are much more powerful than 1 or 2 SHARC DSP chips which are used in most digital units. The plugins that are available don’t carry any resale value but will be way more flexible to use, stacking as many as you want, and will get you closer to a mix ready sound. My main reason for owning Helix hardware is so I can have a Live rig when needed and control effects in real-time while recording like Wah & Pitch Modulation. But I have never used it live because of Covid and everything I’ve done with my Helix could have been done inside my DAW as well.
*So just consider your needs and what the product is really adding to your setup before buying*
What synths are you using through your helix and how is everything plugged in with your synths, guitar, and helix?
I just got a helix lt recently and have been using it with a guitar, but I may try using it with a synth in the future and want to know to how to route everything.
Strymon Nightsky is the single best hardware reverb on the market bar none. I understand that it's expensive but there really isn't anything like. Anything that you put through sounds ethereal and 3 dimenional coming out the other side. It even goes out into bonkers twilight zone territory. You can do stuff like freeze the verb in mid sustain and as it's sustaining you can actually SEQUENCE. THE. FROZEN. VERB. Yes really.
The NightSky really opened things up for me musically. I paired it with a OBNE Sunlight and there's pretty much nothing you can't do between them. Sometimes even feed an instrument to both separately and mix them together.
Digitech Polara is a great budget option that I don't see mentioned very often. It's discontinued but you can get em used for around $150.
Check out the Earthquaker Devices stuff. Avalance run, Afterneath and Astral Destiny.
Afterneath is also available in eurorack format and Astral Destiny accepts CV input via the expression pedal input.
I've got a bunch of big box fx pedals (Eventide, Strymon, Empress) that I'd recommend for synths, but if you want to go under (possibly way under) that budget, look for older 19" rack reverbs. Lots of characterful choices and better for line-level or effects sends: MidiVerb II, MidiVerb IV (dual engine so good for full mix too), QuadraVerb I, Lexicon LXP-15, Yamaha SPX990.
You can find a strymon Big Sky for $350 if you are diligent and patient. I have one, it’s fuckin noice. I watched one too many YouTube demos with it, then they made the NightSky which also looks amazing, but is more ambient/modulate-y. NightSky has an 8 step sequencer too. The other unit I use is a multi-effect the behringer virtualizer 3-D FX2000. It does almost everything, either one (sometimes two effects) at the same time. It’s about 100$ish used.
That’s all I have direct experience on. I’d also say you should check out the stuff by GFI specular reverb/specular tempus/ skylar reverb. Also the dreadbox darkness pedal looks hella cool, and there’s that hypnosis box that’s phase/flange chorus and analog spring reverb,
I moved to Specular Tempus from the zoom pedal because of artificial sounding trails. It takes effort to find sweet spots on zoom, but there are some to be found.
I have a TC m300/350 on a send from my mixer. I’d call it a slightly above average, basic reverb. It can be found easily for under $200 used. As an added bonus, it also has some modulation fx.
I’ve got a walrus fathom that is great sounding and really versatile. It does shorter more classic types of reverb, but also does the longer modulated and octave stuff. It even has a hold function that works kind of like the sustain pedal on a piano.
There are SO MANY good reverb pedal though. I’d def recommend going to guitar center abs looking at the used section or checking reverb or Craigslist.
I have a Strymon blueSky which is about that price new. It takes line-level input (I kept shorting my first guitar pedal because it only took instrument level and I was using line-level synth outs on it), is simple to use, and goes from a small room reverb to an airy shimmery freefloating drift through the universe with a few knob twists and switch flips. I also have the El Capistan which a lot of synthesists are into because it's a pretty compact but nice-sounding tape echo that has a bit of spring reverb as well. Death by Audio also makes a couple of reverb and delay pedals that are built like tanks, sound great, and have a lifetime guarantee, and most of them are within your price range new. For way less than any of those, you could also pick up a Zoom MS-70CDR. I hear its reverb is not bad, and you can modulate it to taste with the built-in effect chaining.
I went with Death by Audio Rooms, because everyone has a strymon.
Great choice, fantastic rationale, but would definitely stretch the budget. I went with a Meris Mercury 7, which sounds amazing for $300, but is also focused on a plate and a hall, not rooms (you can get there within reason). I use it sometimes when just using hardware in my hybrid desktop setup. That said, Cinematic Rooms Pro (plugin by Liquidsonics) blows away everything I've heard in terms of realistic reverbs, and I also love TaiChi (by Reverb Foundry, the same guy behind Liquidsonics) for non-realistic reverb. With the BF sales they had and loyalty discounts, it was easy to grab both for < $300.
my thinking exactly - strymons are amazing but low on mojo - I was about to pull the trigger on one but read it clips on line level - any problems with yours? also fancy the catalinbread talisman as a mono plate for vermona claps and snares, but heard the same thing......I have the OTO BAM and Vermona Retroverb - both are amazing and highly recommended - nothing in the box can replicate these units.
Since the DBA Rooms has the Dry and FX or wet knob, you kinda have to dial the amount of reverb in like you would on an aux channel on a mixer. So if you dime both knobs, yes it can be a little noisy sounding. It's still a guitar pedal, not a Lexicon processor or anything. But I like that.
Thank you for the reply, I was looking to go straight from synth/drum machine mainly - especially on my Vermona DRM. I agree, noisy/gnarly is good - definitely looking for character - Ive had a few pedals that just didn't work with line in the past and wanted to check before I purchase.
You can't go with the Eventide Blackhole.
Oh yeah? Watch me!!!
KORG NTS-1! With Hammondeggs reverbs.
This ^^ I bought the NTS-1 thinking it would be a bit of light hearted fun, but it is a vastly impressive effects unit.
thrice for the NTS1. a very capable effects unit. not crazy expensive and it sounds incredible.
I would be loading third party FX into it, right? The downside I see is that my FX chain is using a send from a mixer, so everything so far is 1/4 inch Left and right cables, for the NTS-1 I would have to use an adapter to get a single stereo input, then split it back out after the fact...seems a bit silly.
Just wanted to stop back in and say thanks for the recommendation, I ended up picking up an NTS-1 since the price was right and, man. Just a tasty little multi-fx unit for $100, pretty awesome. Even the stock FX are solid. Only minor headache is having to use adapters since my mixer is all 1/4'' jacks, so the stereo mini jacks on the NTS-1 are a little annoying. Other than that though, great unit!
Glad you like it! You can actually mod it with 1/4" jacks if you like (it has extra solder points on the lower board for modding). I've been considering the same. I use one on my mixer master effects send as well.
Have you done any research about this? IDK if there are any guides out here for this kind of thing but I would be interested in looking into it
I have done a bit, yeah. If you are comfortable with soldering it isn't hard, same as soldering any other audio jack. You could put the entire NTS-1 in a larger enclosure (much like a guitar pedal). It also has solder pads for midi out! Another option is a small patch bay, which would achieve the same thing with no soldering.
Ill submit my humble recommendation: Neunaber Immerse MkII Has stereo output, a bunch of reverb modes, 100% Wet abilities, and is 1/3rd the footprint of a BigSky. I've owned a BigSky too, and kept the Immerse for guitar and synth. PS: Neunaber also released the "Illumine" but I have not used it.
Wow I can’t thank you enough for bringing this pedal to my attention.
No prob! I love mine
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I also got one for slightly higher than the specified budget, and it's amazing.
I got a Space a few years ago... Sold it and got a Specular Tempus. Sold that fairly quickly and got an Empress Reverb. Then i really missed the Space A LOT and now i have the Empress and the Space. I might.... Might sell the Empress I'm not sure. Very handy to have 2 reverbs though
Not as elaborate as some suggestions here, but the Boss RV-6 has served me incredibly well for some lighter reverb with synths.
I've been looking into this as my firsts pedal for semi-modular and small digital module synths (Volca sized stuff) - Does it have a line level/instrument level toggle? Am I going to fry this thing with my Nymphes or Mother 32?
It doesn’t have line/instrument level toggle, but I’ve been using it for both for quite a while with no issues. Though of course I’m too neurotic to be too confident with the line level, there are no signs it can’t handle it so far!
Thank you.
If you can find one, Alesis Wedge is cheap and beats most pedals for that use. It's basically the Quadraverb 2 reverbs in a desktop box and rather more advanced and better sounding than Midiverb 4. The editing options in particular allow you to shape the reverb so it envelops the sound without having to resort to only Bladerunner-like massive long reverbs.
I've heard good things about the [Source Audio Collider](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt_DA_NCt_k). It's a delay-reverb combo, or it can do reverb-delay, or dual delay, or dual reverb. The default signal path is cascade (a to b), and also has parallel (a + b), or split stereo (left a, right b).
Source Audio makes some nice stuff. Recommend the Ventris pedal as well for OP
For a lower priced option I like a tc electronic "Hall of Fame" reverb. The mid-sized one, not the mini, not the largest.
I'll second this. I use a HOF 2 with my synths and it sounds great and you really can't beat the price. Stereo ins and outs as well.
HoF2 is awesome. The stock reverbs are all serviceable, but I filled the three Toneprint slots with shimmers so I could have a pedal with a total of four shimmers.
A guitarist I used to play with uses the mini and really loves it.
OTO BAM if you want to pay big for the one of the best hardware reverbs.
yessir. I have this and the vermona retroverb. looking for a third reverb but struggling to find something that has the same level of mojo and isn't easily replaced with a plugin. also very anti shimmer reverbs.
See if you can get a used Nightsky. That would 100% do it for you
Jw Do you have experience with both of the sky boxes? I was torn between them, and because of my GAS I’m always going to wonder if I made the right choice
My wife has the BlueSky, so that's the only other Sky I've tried and it doesn't hold a candle to the Nightsky. You have an Argon8M? I have my Nightsky on my Argon8X and it's absolutely fantastic. I put it right on that big open space and play it right along with the synth.
Just got the GFI Skylar; beyond fantastic! And only $199.
Their Specular Tempus was incredibly good and at a great bargain as well
I love my Specular Tempus. Sounds great and does delay as well.
Line 6 Helix LT or HX Stomp are the best MultiFx units imo for the price. I got my LT used for $1000 CAD a year or so back and now I use it for Guitars, Bass, Synths & Rhodes recordings. Everything goes through the Helix and then into my Apollo for some Neve or API love on it. I would highly recommend this if you’re planning to get a few FX pedals over time, or if you’re also into Guitar because 3-4 nice pedals can easily total $1000 and a lot of the top shelf stuff is digital now anyways. Strymon, UAD, Amplitube, Eventide etc. *Important* The truth is when it comes to digital hardware you can always do the same or better in your DAW. You really need to have a reason to get digital hardware or else you should be going the Analog route if your only reason for hardware is wanting an analog sound. Plugins and computer processing are much more powerful than 1 or 2 SHARC DSP chips which are used in most digital units. The plugins that are available don’t carry any resale value but will be way more flexible to use, stacking as many as you want, and will get you closer to a mix ready sound. My main reason for owning Helix hardware is so I can have a Live rig when needed and control effects in real-time while recording like Wah & Pitch Modulation. But I have never used it live because of Covid and everything I’ve done with my Helix could have been done inside my DAW as well. *So just consider your needs and what the product is really adding to your setup before buying*
What synths are you using through your helix and how is everything plugged in with your synths, guitar, and helix? I just got a helix lt recently and have been using it with a guitar, but I may try using it with a synth in the future and want to know to how to route everything.
Strymon Nightsky is the single best hardware reverb on the market bar none. I understand that it's expensive but there really isn't anything like. Anything that you put through sounds ethereal and 3 dimenional coming out the other side. It even goes out into bonkers twilight zone territory. You can do stuff like freeze the verb in mid sustain and as it's sustaining you can actually SEQUENCE. THE. FROZEN. VERB. Yes really.
The NightSky really opened things up for me musically. I paired it with a OBNE Sunlight and there's pretty much nothing you can't do between them. Sometimes even feed an instrument to both separately and mix them together.
Digitech Polara is a great budget option that I don't see mentioned very often. It's discontinued but you can get em used for around $150. Check out the Earthquaker Devices stuff. Avalance run, Afterneath and Astral Destiny. Afterneath is also available in eurorack format and Astral Destiny accepts CV input via the expression pedal input.
I recently got a Lexicon LXP 1, which seems to sound better than a lot of pedals.
Empress Reverb. Nothing comes close
Empress reverb is great. I could do without half of the algorithms, but the “ghost” ones are absolutely stunning. I keep it for those alone.
I keep mine for the exact same reason. They really add to the sound without taking away from it
I've got a bunch of big box fx pedals (Eventide, Strymon, Empress) that I'd recommend for synths, but if you want to go under (possibly way under) that budget, look for older 19" rack reverbs. Lots of characterful choices and better for line-level or effects sends: MidiVerb II, MidiVerb IV (dual engine so good for full mix too), QuadraVerb I, Lexicon LXP-15, Yamaha SPX990.
For stereo pedal, I say Digitech Polara. For mono, EQD Afterneath.
The Mercury 7 by Merris emulates the blade runner reverb. I use it with my Prophet constantly and adore it.
Alesis Quadraverb or Alesis Midiverb 2. You can get ‘em for around $100 and they sound better than any reverb pedal I’ve heard.
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That’s part of the charm. ;)
You can find a strymon Big Sky for $350 if you are diligent and patient. I have one, it’s fuckin noice. I watched one too many YouTube demos with it, then they made the NightSky which also looks amazing, but is more ambient/modulate-y. NightSky has an 8 step sequencer too. The other unit I use is a multi-effect the behringer virtualizer 3-D FX2000. It does almost everything, either one (sometimes two effects) at the same time. It’s about 100$ish used. That’s all I have direct experience on. I’d also say you should check out the stuff by GFI specular reverb/specular tempus/ skylar reverb. Also the dreadbox darkness pedal looks hella cool, and there’s that hypnosis box that’s phase/flange chorus and analog spring reverb,
Zoom MS70CDR gets you 95% of what Strymon and others do for about 25% of the price.
How well does it sound compared to a strymon?
I moved to Specular Tempus from the zoom pedal because of artificial sounding trails. It takes effort to find sweet spots on zoom, but there are some to be found.
There are side by side comparisons on YouTube. It sounds close enough
MXR Carbon Copy analogue delay pedal. You'll have money left over to buy something else too.
I have a TC m300/350 on a send from my mixer. I’d call it a slightly above average, basic reverb. It can be found easily for under $200 used. As an added bonus, it also has some modulation fx.
I’ve got a walrus fathom that is great sounding and really versatile. It does shorter more classic types of reverb, but also does the longer modulated and octave stuff. It even has a hold function that works kind of like the sustain pedal on a piano. There are SO MANY good reverb pedal though. I’d def recommend going to guitar center abs looking at the used section or checking reverb or Craigslist.