Donner Multi Effects Guitar Pedal Alpha Cruncher 3 Type Effects Delay Chorus Distortion Pedal with Adapter for Electric Guitar

Where to begin. I guess I'll start with a quick word on this class of pedal and then give my review so you know where I'm coming from. First, if you're the type of person who orders a multi box like this, or one of the mini pedals from Asia that are so popular lately, and you blow your top because it arrives DOA or has a blemish or maybe a knob that doesn't work so well, this review is not for you. Take that negativity back to your man cave or she-shed.You have to remember that we are able to buy pedals in almost any color or size, with any mod, effect, etc(thanks to Amazon and these manufacturers), for what used to be the price of a couple of good studio patch cables.There has been a shift in the way people buy and what they expect of things brought about by Amazon IMO. Expectations used to be much lower on inexpensive products but now a days, everyone is expecting a $25 product to be just as good as a $300 one. For the most part they kinda are. But that extra money goes along way for craftsmanship. And better materials. Not saying these materials are bad just that they can be better but it cost a lot more money.I expect for the occasional item to be broken when it arrives or to have a part that might fail, because they're cranking out so many of these at these different companies they're not handmade one off's, so that's just part of it. On the same hand I've also purchased wvery expensive products that have arrived broken, DoA, or worse, destroyed in shipping. It happens it's part of the game and this is where a company can shine with their support team.OK, enough of that on to the review. This is my first multi effects pedal of this type and from this company. And I have to say it is outstanding! The FX work perfectly, they all have massive range which enables you to dial in the exact sound or tone you want. None of the effects sound like they have poor or cheap electronics, nor do they have that "tinny" tone due to small guage wire.The unit arrived packaged very nicely snug and in a very nice box. Instructions were well written and easy to understand and they explained each effects and what each dial did for its assigned effect. It also comes with its own power supply which is a huge bonus!!I've added some pictures of each of the effects areas on the pedal as well as what it looks like attached to my paddleboard so you can get an idea of the scale of the box.OK more on the FX. As I mentioned each of them works perfectly and not is there a massive range within each of the settings, but you can stack all of them, run them as singles by simply leaving the other two off(which by the way works amazingly well because its a true bypass unit so there is zero hum, or line noise of any kind when you don't have any effects enabled). Aside from the FX being amazing, robust, and sounding great... each of the first two switches is also a tap selector, all you do is simply hold down the switch with your foot for a few seconds and the green light will be going to blink. This way you know it's in tap mode and you can set the parameters with your toe while you're playing. Hold down the button for a few seconds again to turn off the tap setting. I'm not sure how to explain it in a review other than you just have to try it for yourself. I can't even say a "the effects are good for the money" because they're outstanding and has nothing to do with price. Except that I think personally, this multi effects board is a steal at the price that it's listed for. My final thoughts are, would you use this to play and record professionally in a studio environment? Maybe, you probably could, but there may be better units for that. Could you use it to gig live around town and mess around inside your house for practice? Absolutely!! Could you play in a local band and gig with it? I think so because so far, it's been just as good as any of my pedals that I've paid four or five times as much for. So as of right now, I'm blown away by this little guy and will be ordering a lot more from Donner as soon as possible.P.S. Please excuse any typos you may find...it's late, I'm typing this on my phone, and I'm tired. :)

I received my Donner Mini Effect Chain Alpha BASS Guitar Effect today. It's super small, in a good way. As you can see in the pictures it's not much larger than a stand size effect pedal. You can just tuck it into your bass case be be good to go. The packaging was great. I confess I already own two of the Donner Mini Effect Chain Alpha Crunchers for guitar. Solid little units. One is home and the other is in my gig bag in case something happens to my pedal board. Some nice features we that the power cord is approximately 10 feet long which should be fine for most gigs and there is a XLR direct out on the side of the unit making it perfect for recording and anyone going direct such as church musicians. I won’t be able to test that feature until the next time we have a gig. For this review I used a Warmoth custom five string bass with EMG pickups so I could get the most clear sound possible. For the review I used a small SWR LA 12 practice amp instead of dragging my monster GK rig out. Right to left you have a compressor, bass drive and a chorus. Setting all controls at noon, the Compressor added a nice clarity to the five string, even the low B string. Of course you have to do some slapping to test out the Compressor and it did great. The setting I liked best was everything at noon but the level I pushed to about 1:30. Next up the the Bass Drive. All my bass heros growing up, John Entwistle, Jack Bruce, Chris Squire etc, had very overdriven tones. Well, their bass amps were cranked into distortion at levels we mere mortals can’t play at at clubs or most of our gigs. It’s always been hard to get a good overdriven or distortion tone with a bass at lower volumes without losing the low end. The method I’ve used in my band when an overdriven bass is required is using a AB box to split the signal so I can mix the clean and dirty to get the drive and clarity. A lot of work to get “that tone”. Again starting with all settings at noon, I found the Bass Drive more on the distortion side of things as opposed to the overdriven side. At 9 o’clock with the tone rolled back you get a big overdriven sound, at 3 o’clock with the tone rolled up you are almost in fuzz territory. The Chorus is a simple one knob which adjusts the level. I found this most useful by itself or combined with the Compressor. Nice for chording work. I found the Compressor running into the Bass Drive really cleaned up the clarity of the overdriven and distorted notes. Especially the E and B strings. With a few adjustments you can find yourself in the John Entwistle zone playing “Won’t Get Fooled Again” or “515" and reasonable household or rehearsal space volumes. I did notice a light sound notch or bump in the various Bass Drive levels when you adjusted it. Not a big deal as this is more of a set it and forget it pedal. My Rickenbacker was in the shop so I wasn’t able to try that bass to see if I could get any Chris Squire tones out of it. Just for HaHa’s I did pull out my eight string bass and ran through a few Cheap Trick songs. The eight string has a slight chorus sound anyway so running the individual effects and together was interesting and fun. I’m looking forward to taking it to my next gig and running it direct into the PA and also into my jumbo bass rig.

Right to what I didn’t like: there is a sudden volume cut when you try lowering the volume of the delay. This is because of cheap pots. The same thing happens in guitars with cheap pots. I had the issue on a guitar and when I replaced the pots with better quality pots… only then could the volume be lowered to zero without a noticeable cut off. Then again… what do you expect for a small $50 pedalboard? They had to save money by utilizing cheaper pots.Other than that, the pedalboard is good. The gain is very powerful, the chorus is solid, and the delay is decent. The build quality from the outside is good, and thankfully it came with a power cable. The packaging was nice and sturdy. I was going to return it but decided to keep in case I buy a large amp for jamming with friends. It’ll come in handy for that. Donner products seem to be good for the most part. Solid value for what you pay.BTW this is not a modeler. It’s just a board with three effects. Meant to be used with an amp or a separate modeler on the clean channel.