Grateful Dead Music Forum

Anybody have experience with any of the other envelope filters from Electro Harmonix, besides the green Q-Tron? They have a Q-Tron Plus that looks to be the same, but with an effects loop. They also have a Tube Zipper and a funky sounding one called the Riddle.

Use the search function. EH envelopes have been discussed before.

Thanks, yes, I've searched and read quite a bit before I posted. I found plenty on the qtron, mini q and micro q. I was most interested to see if anybody had used the Tube Zipper or Riddle, both of which had no posts. There's plenty on the EH website and harmony, but nothing that indicated how these compared to the Q Tron. The Tube Zipper looks particularly interesting because it has two 12AX7's and allows you to add in a little dirt. But if the envelope doesn't allow you to dial in a good Jerry sound, it wouldn't be worth it.

Obviously, the best way to find out would be to go to the guitar store and check them out. The closest one to me, however, is over three hours away.

KWRummie wrote:Anybody have experience with any of the other envelope filters from Electro Harmonix, besides the green Q-Tron? They have a Q-Tron Plus that looks to be the same, but with an effects loop. They also have a Tube Zipper and a funky sounding one called the Riddle.

Dont forget the Doctor Q !

I LOVE EH pedals but have never used any of the ones mentioned
I wonder if the Riddle is called that because its sometimes hard to dial in the sounds on EF's ?

Obviously, the best way to find out would be to go to the guitar store and check them out. The closest one to me, however, is over three hours away.

Looks like the perfect excuse for a road trip.

I bought a Riddle:Q-Balls for Guitar a few weeks ago. It sounds fantastic. I can get any kind of jerry sound out of it, plus many more added textures. I've been running a mu-tron octave divider behind it and it sounds oh so sweet. It may take some time to tame the riddle, but when you find the sweet spots, youll love it!

I liked my DoctorQ but it was just okay.

Didn't stack well with other other pedals.

Had kinda irratic behavior with guitar volume/tone controls

Check out the new Riddle by EH.

It appears to do what a Q-Tron will do, but also offers control over some really key parameters such as attack time, decay time, bottom frequency and top frequency of the sweep, Lo-pass, band-pass, hi-pass, sensitivity, and wet/dry blend. Very interesting....


Brad

Thank you Brad. I have been reading very many of your posts while taking notes and have gathered alot of very useful information. For that I offer a humble and hearty GARCIOUS! I have a Q+ that I kind of like. My one problem is getting the sound I like up down and across the fingerboard. I may love a sound I`m getting in the high F# on the high E string but it sounds less than marvelous to me at the 2nd fret on the low E. And vice-versa. Hmmm....wonder what song I might be jamming to. I was going to go with the Emma but I`m afraid I`ll have the same problem. More buttons! That`s probably the answer. So better to tweak your parameters with, my sweet! Plus I`m thinking of running 2 envelopers on my chain because I have one setting on the Q+ that really affords me a very rich, full, boosted tone.

Wow, I looked at the Riddle and like the idea of all the tweakability... 'will definitely have to try one out.
Effect/Dry outs. Expression pedal??? (and here I've been using an Espresso pedal all this time ).
I hope they have one in stock at my local GC...
30 day free rental program here I come!

Kennay,

I find that getting the guitar tone and pickup setting right is what it takes for a balanced envelope filter response. I have the best luck with my middle pickup on and the tone knob fully bright. Obviously since an envelope filter pedal is triggered by the voltage of your guitar signal, you MUST keep the guitar volume going into the filter pedal fixed and constant. Once you set the threshold for the envelope to trigger correctly, then it's really a matter of picking control. I find with the Q-Tron or a Mutron that I can get it perfectly dialed in so that the lowest notes and the highest notes all trigger evenly. If I don't have the tone wide open or if I have the wrong pickup selected, then I can't get it to respond right.

Brad

Great info. Interesting thing about the Riddle is that it does not have an up/down sweep switch. Instead, it has separate start and stop knobs to control the sweep up or down and the starting and ending frequencies.