It came at lunch time today. Only had a few minutes with it but had to get back to office. Played a strat into RTO into Voodoo Amps modded Blues Jr with Weber 12F150 50 watt speaker.

My intitial thoughts are that this pedal will probably not find a permanent home on my board. I really like the ocd v.4 (actually have two with different settings for each guitar) and use it for just about everything. For soloing I boost the front of the ocd with a timmy set to clean boost. So my impressions are set against this set-up.

My previous impression of the RTO was that it was somewhat of a cross between the OCD and the Fulldrive. I can hear that in the pedal. Problem is . . . I don't like the Fulldrive. The RTO reminds me more of the Fulldrive than the OCD in that it deffinitely seems to have a lots of boost in the mids. The RTO does not seem as harmonically rich as the OCD, not as many overtones. I think this is part of the reason the OCD seems to get buried in the mix. The RTO may not get as buried as the OCD but it does not seem to jump out either. It has that blanket over the amp sound to me. On the OCD i find myself attenuating the highs (tone set at 10-11 o'clock) but on the RTO I had to crank the tone up to 3 o'clock to get that crisp high end going. It just seemed a bit muffled to me. It is bigger sounding than the Fulldrive but not nearly so big as the OCD. At least to my ears. Of course, I'm playing a 15 watt modded Fender. I'm sure the thing opens up a bit paired with a 100 watt Marshall or perhaps a Twin. In fact I can image that this pedal might work well with a Twin when other pedlas might not. But, I don't know, sounds very TS to me, better, to be sure, than a TS, but TS never the less.

It sounds good, but not better than what I already have.

For what it's worth.

Thanks for the review. Please give us a second impression when you get to fiddle around with it more...

Interesting. Thanks for the review.

H

I received mine a few days ago, so this review is definitely a "honeymoon stage" review. I'm also a long time Trower nut, so my impressions are probably biased. So be it.

I agree that the RTO is a cross between the OCD and the Fulldrive... and that's exactly what I like about it so much. I own both a very old Fulldrive and an OCD V.3 (and I really like both of these pedals). In comparison, the RTO combines some of the smoothness and fatness of the Fulldrive with some of the amp-like distortion of the OCD. It has less gain than the OCD, but it overtakes your sound less than the OCD. The RTO has more overtones and complexity than the Fulldrive, but not as many as the OCD because it doesn't sound as much like a cascading gain stage pedal. It retains string detail better than a Fulldrive but also has some of that Fulldrive thickness. The RTO has excellent sustain, but it also responds very well to picking dynamics. These are the qualities of the pedal that really do give it a "Trower" vibe. I think it's easier to sound like Trower with this pedal than either the Fulldrive or OCD.

So, can I say anything bad about it? Well, it's clearly more for blues and bluesy rock. It doesn't venture into higher gain tones. The tone knob has a fairly limited range up until the 3 o'clock position, at which point it bleeds in some sharpness. Your setting will depend on whether you have a bright amp or a dark amp. I have been running mine into an old 50 watt non-master Marshall and I tend to put the tone knob between 12 and 3 o'clock.

Anyway, yes, this pedal seems to be a mix of the OCD and Fulldrive. I'm giong to use it in band practice in a few days and then gig with it in a couple of weeks. I'll let you know what I think afterward.

To me, it's a keeper because, as Coldwater said, it will cut through better than the OCD -- but it will sound more amp-like than the Fulldrive.

long time Trower fan .... and Ive been very interested in hearing this one.... but I think this may be one that will play amazing well in Robins rig, but may not travel well to quieter - non big stage volume rigs ... perhaps an RTO 'Bedroom of Sighs' version is afoot

quote:

Originally posted by Donner:
long time Trower fan .... and Ive been very interested in hearing this one.... but I think this may be one that will play amazing well in Robins rig, but may not travel well to quieter - non big stage volume rigs ... perhaps an RTO 'Bedroom of Sighs' version is afoot

Or, since it will work in smaller venues, a "Bridge of Smaller Size" version.

Harris,

Great review. It seems that we experinced the same things with the RTO. I guess my review was a bit more negative because I'm not a big Fulldrive fan. Anyway, your review nailed it. I'm going to try it later in the week with a brighter, louder amp and see how I feel about it then.

quote:

Originally posted by Coldwater:
Harris,

Great review. It seems that we experinced the same things with the RTO. I guess my review was a bit more negative because I'm not a big Fulldrive fan. Anyway, your review nailed it. I'm going to try it later in the week with a brighter, louder amp and see how I feel about it then.

Coldwater,

Thanks very much for the kind words. After playing the pedal some more and doing A/B tests with my OCD V3 and my first edition Fulldrive, I can say that the RTO sits much closer to the Fulldrive than the OCD. In fact, I think it's really a modificiation of an old Fulldrive, but it comes in an OCD-like box. That's what has people making the OCD comparisons. Fuller says that the circuit is a simple JFET with diodes, so that sounds more like an older Fulldrive. Again, the RTO isn't quite as mid-focused, but I can get my Fulldrive to sound pretty close.

So, yes, it should play better with brighter amps than darker amps. But if you're not a big Fulldrive fan then I can see why you weren't impressed with the RTO. I've got a few OD pedals on my board and many have rotated through, but the Fulldrive has been on there since 1995.

Members of the L.L.C. should report to the YouTube RTO clips.