Considering an Empress Effects ZOIA...

Is an Empress Effects ZOIA worthwhile?

  • Yes, it's complementary to the Axe FX III capabilities and a great creative tool

    Votes: 1 100.0%

  • No - it's redundant - you can do everything the ZOIA does in the Axe FX III

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Maybe - if the Axe III had the <whatzajammer(x)> function, it would replace the ZOIA

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    1
  • Poll closed .
xarkon

xarkon

Experienced
I'm considering an Empress Effects ZOIA. New toy shopping; it's an intriguing piece.

But is it worth the trouble, or largely redundant with respect to functionality already in the Axe FX III? Those who have (or have used) both - I'm looking forward to your responses and comments. (I have read the other thread in this subforum re the ZOIA. I have not read the behemoth thread on that other forum.)

TIA.


Dave
 
I had one. It's fun. But it's not that much fun. There's some things you can piece together that would not technically be that easy to replicate 100% with the Axe-Fx III. However, the usability is really poor IMO. Creating effects that are non-trivial is a lot of work and in the end I didn't find any reason to keep it.
 
I have no experience with the ZOIA, but I did recently procure a similar, and perhaps cooler, unit , the Poly Digit /Beebo
https://www.polyeffects.com/pages/poly_digit ... does many of the same things with a touchscreen .. @2112 Leon has been touting it and has several presets on it as well...plays very nicely with the FM3 and III in the loop.
 
I had one... It could be really cool but it's all done manually, and it's "deep".

If it had a GUI editor it could be very good. That would make programming a lot better.

I personally don't have the time to invest in that, so I sold mine.
 
If you like what it can do, get it. Canadian made, incredible abilities and can do a ton of stuff.

I have a feeling the user patches can provide some serious mileage.

I plan to get one eventually for the granular abilities, synth abilities and general "What weirdness can I come up with?"
 
Thanks for all the feedback. I have been concerned about the UI. It seems driven to fit an enclosure size and price point, rather than a user experience. Still on the fence about whether to get one, so just going to kick the can down the road for now.

bradlake said:
I have no experience with the ZOIA, but I did recently procure a similar, and perhaps cooler, unit , the Poly Digit /Beebo
https://www.polyeffects.com/pages/poly_digit ... does many of the same things with a touchscreen .. @2112 Leon has been touting it and has several presets on it as well...plays very nicely with the FM3 and III in the loop.
Click to expand...

Neat; however, this mostly seems to be a reverb unit?
 
The Poly is divided into two seperate environments - Digit, which is based around convolution processing and Beebo which focusses on modulation and synthesis. Each mode shares modules like delay, granular effects (Mutable Instruments Clouds), filters, controllers, eq and algorithmic reverb and you can have as many instances of each module as the CPU will allow (for example, running 24+ delays is possible).

Digit contains IR verbs and cabs while Beebo features dedicated modulation modules as well as a synth, drum sequencer, meta modulator (based off Mutable Instruments eurorack modules) and more weird stuff.

I've done a few videos with mine but barely touched on the functionality.

 
2112 said:
The Poly is divided into two seperate environments - Digit, which is based around convolution processing and Beebo which focusses on modulation and synthesis. Each mode shares modules like delay, granular effects (Mutable Instruments Clouds), filters, controllers, eq and algorithmic reverb and you can have as many instances of each module as the CPU will allow (for example, running 24+ delays is possible).

Digit contains IR verbs and cabs while Beebo features dedicated modulation modules as well as a synth, drum sequencer, meta modulator (based off Mutable Instruments eurorack modules) and more weird stuff.

I've done a few videos with mine but barely touched on the functionality.

Click to expand...


Thanks Leon. Another excellent video. Do you ever sleep?

So - are the two different pedals shown on the Poly Effects site - Digit and Beebo - really just the same pedal, running a unified set of firmware that provides both environments? (And provided in "two fetching anodized designer colors" ;))
 
xarkon said:
Thanks Leon. Another excellent video. Do you ever sleep?

So - are the two different pedals shown on the Poly Effects site - Digit and Beebo - really just the same pedal, running a unified set of firmware that provides both environments? (And provided in "two fetching anodized designer colors" ;))
Click to expand...
Yes. you choose which FW to load in the settings menu , goes back and forth easy -peasy .
 
xarkon said:
Anyone looked at these devices? (Apparently the latest one is not shipping yet.)
Click to expand...

For affecting 2 signals separately, I've also looked at Zoia, Digit, MOD duo x/dwarf, FM3, Neural QC.

From the FB group of users, Zoia is more limited - can't do pitch shifting well. Digit is in development. MOD and WC are still new. FM3 has proven great sound. Hard to say no to trying the FM3 if your turn is up.
 
Digit seems to be up and running, if @2112 videos are anything to go by.

I dunno that I would call a zoia limited hehe.

What exactly is it that you want the new toy to do?

I know proper glitch and poly synth (maybe) are the only things I'm personally missing.
 
Digit/Beebo is very much up and running. The only things that isn't too crash hot at the moment is the pitch shifter and pitch/CV, but I am used to the Axe-Fx III/FM3 which put everything to shame in that department. Granular/time stretch stuff is super fun and the Mutable Instruments based synth stuff is lovely.
 
2112 said:
Digit/Beebo is very much up and running. The only things that isn't too crash hot at the moment is the pitch shifter and pitch/CV, but I am used to the Axe-Fx III/FM3 which put everything to shame in that department. Granular/time stretch stuff is super fun and the Mutable Instruments based synth stuff is lovely.
Click to expand...

"When you've made the sale, stop selling" - my bandmates and I on tour after finding out the place we're sleeping in has a dog.

Leon perhaps you can clarify here for anyone looking around - if you have one physical unit, do you simply pay to download the firmware for the other unit and load it?
 
@Budda that sounds like my band albeit with cats :p

To clarify, when you buy a Poly unit you get access to both firmwares on the unit without having to pay or download anything else. To swap firmware you simply navigate to the settings menu and press "change to..." and then you have a different set of modules and presets.
 
2112 said:
@Budda that sounds like my band albeit with cats :p

To clarify, when you buy a Poly unit you get access to both firmwares on the unit without having to pay or download anything else. To swap firmware you simply navigate to the settings menu and press "change to..." and then you have a different set of modules and presets.
Click to expand...

Hides credit card excellent.
 
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