Technology News, Reviews and Buying Guides review, monitor review, tablet review, laptop review, mobile review, smartphone review, buying guide,
The new Wampler Ratsbane Overdrive Distortion pedal packs the classic RAT sounds that we all know and love into a wonderfully compact mini pedal. Can it compete with the original or is it maybe even better? Let’s find out.
After the Plexi-Drive Mini and Belle Overdrive, another distortion pedal in mini format from Wampler comes here. It is made in the USA and is of course based on the legendary ProCo RAT circuit from the 1980s. It delivers the typical high-gain fuzz sounds in a nice and compact package.
At first glance everything is as usual: controls for distortion, volume, and filter, with the latter controlling the high-end roll-off. This of course works counter-clockwise with maximum and clockwise with minimum high-end. (Couldn’t that at least have been adapted to differentiate itself from the original?)
The two mini-toggle switches are new. The Gain switch offers three-stage gain control. In the middle is the standard setting, to the left and right of it you get even more gain with a slightly different character (Has anyone ever wanted more drive from a rat ?!) With the voice switch, you can choose between two sound options that the Subtle changes to the compression and clipping of the signal.
The Ratsbane can be operated with either 9 V or 18 V, although it sounds best at 9 V and doesn’t like anything above 18 V. With a current price of $149.97 on the Amazon.com website, it is more expensive than the original, especially since ProCo recently announced an incredibly cute compact version with Lil Rat. After all, you are now spoiled for choice between two high-quality rats.
Recently, Universal Audio introduced three new guitar effects pedal devices that have in common is an extremely solid-looking housing with six controls, three switches, and two foot-switches. They also have preset/live modes, analog dry-through, stereo/dual-mono operation, and true bypass with silent switching (can be switched to buffered bypass via the UAFX control software). Other additional downloadable effects can be installed via USB Type C in the future.
