Reverb / delay in parallel or serial

Neither method is 'better', just depends what your trying to accomplish. Its like putting a phaser effect before or after distortion or the amp. It sounds different, but both ways can make cool sounds. What type of sound are you after ?

Thanks for all your answers ! I am not looking for a specific sound but trying to get a deep understanding of the AX8 unit and its effects and how to use them.

There is a 4 channel mixer at the end - how to give sense to it if not with parallel effects?
 
It can't... Impossible, because you are still combining reverb with dry. Therefore, the ratio is affected.

I feel like we are going in circles here. Maybe one of the effects masters will chime in and explain it better than I am.

Trust me, I was in the same boat as you until about a year ago...

Perhaps he is running the reverb block in parallel then directly to output, instead of it rejoining the main signal chain.
 
Great!

That's exactly what I get in both approaches. But I use the Level and not the Input Gain. I'm going to try with the Input Gain.
 
I've done it. Seems to be exactly what I wanted:

While in the Reverb block (parallel), setting Input gain to the maximum and using Level to add reverb doesn't work that good because reverb starts to be noticeable with that Level control well past 12 o'clock.

But if I set Level to the maximum and use the Input gain to add reverb, the whole run of the control is usable.

Much better for me.

Thank you very much.

Oh... I didn't try it in series. Let's check it.

Hmm... I don't like it.

Anyway, from now on, I'll use reverb in parallel.

Maybe delay too.
 
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The three approaches you just mentioned all sound the same if you match levels.

If you're adding delay in parallel with reverb, that's actually different from both in series because the delay repeats wouldn't have a reverb tail.
 
The three approaches you just mentioned all sound the same if you match levels.

If you're adding delay in parallel with reverb, that's actually different from both in series because the delay repeats wouldn't have a reverb tail.

They don't sound the same. In series I can't get a dry signal that keeps its level when I add a lot of reverb.

I tried delay in parallel and then reverb in parallel, but that idea of delay and reverb in parallel seems to be a good one. I'll try it. Thank you.
 
I saw that with the caveat that some pedals, firmware versions, and such did have slightly different “mix laws” so things didn’t always work quite as you’d

Right, and some blocks grab the LR input and process the wet in different ways. A reverb block in parallel used to give a different result then series, after level matching to account for Fletcher Munson. After I think 2.04, it makes no difference routing either way. I posted a preset once to demonstrate, won't make that mistake again. :eek: How does my lingo sound good Doctor?
 
My hearing is very good, in fact.;)

Men, it takes less time to check it by yourselves than it takes me to write this (again):

Put a reverb block, in series, at the end of the signal chain (well, I'm using Spring Reverb, maybe it only happens with it).

Then put the mix control to 0. You'll hear no reverb at all. Only the dry signal.

Then turn the Mix control to 100%. What do you hear? Yes; only the reverb. No dry signal.

As you turn up Mix, you get more reverb and less dry signal.

Now, if you're interested in it, put the reverb in parallel. Turn Mix and Level to 100% and Input Gain to 0 and start increasing that Input Gain. Or turn Mix and Input Gain to 100% and Level to 0 and start increasing that level.

What do you hear? Yes; as you turn up Input Gain or Level, depending on the way you choose, you get more and more reverb but the dry signal is always there, at the very same level.

That's the way things work in my AX8. Is yours different?

It looks easy, but it is.

Maybe there are other parameters that would make it act differently. I don't know which ones could be.
 
Now, if you're interested in it, put the reverb in parallel. Turn Mix and Level to 100% and Input Gain to 0 and start increasing that Input Gain. Or turn Mix and Input Gain to 100% and Level to 0 and start increasing that level.

What do you hear? Yes; as you turn up Input Gain or Level, depending on the way you choose, you get more and more reverb but the dry signal is always there, at the very same level.

That's true, you can't just turn the mix control in series and keep the dry level constant. What you can do is set mix to 50% and level to 3 dB to bring dry back to original level, then adjust reverb level with input gain instead.

All these adjustments do is put the wet and dry signals at some final level in one way or another. The values for series will look different from parallel but the result will be the same if done correctly. (One thing parallel can't do is 100% reverb, which is easy in series.)
 
That's true, you can't just turn the mix control in series and keep the dry level constant. What you can do is set mix to 50% and level to 3 dB to bring dry back to original level, then adjust reverb level with input gain instead.

All these adjustments do is put the wet and dry signals at some final level in one way or another. The values for series will look different from parallel but the result will be the same if done correctly. (One thing parallel can't do is 100% reverb, which is easy in series.)

That works really good!

Thank you very much.

The 3 dBs increase is very accurate.
 
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