Tech 21 Fly Rig 5, anyone tried one of these

[bwgintegra]

Looks like a cool unit to use in front of a clean or semi dirty type amp. I stumbled across this after watching a Richie Kotzen rig video that Total Guitar did. Looks like some people have got them but released not to long ago.

http://www.tech21nyc.com/products/sansamp/flyrig.html

 

[The_Kid]

I just got mine, most places are out of stock that I found. The clips all sound great....I bought mine as a backup/practice unit. I havent had a moment to plug into it yet....but a fellow guy on the Fractal forum got one and he raved about it. I trust his opinions quite a bit as his clips all sound pretty awesome.

I will say its quite a bit smaller than I imagined even looking at pictures. If you have a 4.5" smartphone, its like 2 1/2 of those put end to end.

 

[Badronald]

I can't understand how anyone can call their unit an all in one without a tuner.

Just a little LED showing the letter and a mute when you hit it.

That would be a home run.

Otherwise I'd still have to have another pedal. We're not all Richie Kotzen and can't hand a guitar to a tech for tuning between songs.

 

[guitup too]

Snark?

 

[Badronald]

Snark?

??

 

[RG955TT]

Snark clip on headstock mini tuner

 

[strungup]

I think the unit is great. I bought it as back up for gigs. It is better than I expected and now use it for all of our practices running it straight into the board. I might not even bother with amps at gigs either.

 

[SkyhighRocks]

It looks cool but is it mainly for lighter rock tones? Meaning, can it do 80's metal, etc? Also, is there a way to run effects into it like a normal amp? (front, loops, etc)

 

[XSSIVE]

It looks cool but is it mainly for lighter rock tones? Meaning, can it do 80's metal, etc? Also, is there a way to run effects into it like a normal amp? (front, loops, etc)

I was curious about that too and saw this vid...

It does it but because I'm sloppy, pick light and like extra gain to hide that I hope they do a more hot rod version of it at some point lol.

 

[strungup]

It looks cool but is it mainly for lighter rock tones? Meaning, can it do 80's metal, etc? Also, is there a way to run effects into it like a normal amp? (front, loops, etc)

I think it does 80's metal great. It also plays nicely with pedals. I have tried pedals in front of the unit and after. There is no loop, but you also have to put it in perspective. For $249 It has distortion, clean boost, reverb, tap tempo delay, and the sans amp option for direct in the board. They all sound great and it fits in you guitar case or gig bag easy enough. I think it's pretty awesome. I have pedals on my board that cost more than this whole thing does.

 

[Buckeyedog]

It looks cool but is it mainly for lighter rock tones? Meaning, can it do 80's metal, etc? Also, is there a way to run effects into it like a normal amp? (front, loops, etc)

I think it does 80's metal great. It also plays nicely with pedals. I have tried pedals in front of the unit and after. There is no loop, but you also have to put it in perspective. For $249 It has distortion, clean boost, reverb, tap tempo delay, and the sans amp option for direct in the board. They all sound great and it fits in you guitar case or gig bag easy enough. I think it's pretty awesome. I have pedals on my board that cost more than this whole thing does.

Exactly. I have one on order now. You can use it in front of a plexi/amp like Richie Kotzen as an OD/Delay pedal or use the sans amp for direct to mixer. Run it into the effect return of an amp as well. Seems like a cool little unit.

 

[bwgintegra]

Thanks for the input guys. I defiantly think this pedal would be good for clean to semi clean single channel amps like a plexi or fender. That way you can take for effect of the delay. Curious to how it sounds just going into a PA system. I think for the price it would be a great option or backup for a gigging musician.

 

[reverymike]

The Kotzen version coming out has a tweaked OD section. I'll be interested in checking it out!

 

[bigdaddyd]

I can't understand how anyone can call their unit an all in one without a tuner.

Just a little LED showing the letter and a mute when you hit it.

That would be a home run.

Otherwise I'd still have to have another pedal. We're not all Richie Kotzen and can't hand a guitar to a tech for tuning between songs.

What tech? The few times I've seen Kotzen with his solo band, he walked off his little bus/van with one guitar in his hand, his girl in his other and futzed with his rented gear at the venue. He had no tech. His tuner is built into his guitar. He played that one guitar the whole show. He had a few pedals. I don't think he even had another guitar with him. If he did, it wasn't being carted out, wasn't on stage and wasn't back stage when I met him.

 

[Badronald]

Cool. Understood.
I just saw him with the Winery Dogs. Had big bus and a few guys walking around.

Regardless someone mentioned the tuner thing.

Personally I dont want one of those things on my headstock. I'd just use a pedal tuner.

 

[reverymike]

Kotzen has a tuner built into the base of his volume knob - pretty sweet, and stealthy.

 

[SFW]

I'm actually very interested in one of these as a backup.

 

[strungup]

I'm actually very interested in one of these as a backup.

I think it makes a perfect backup unit. It is really small it takes up very little space and doesn't really add any weight. I have tried other back up options, second amps, different modellers, digitech rp1000, line 6 hd 500, eleven rack, kemper. Some of them sounded better don't get me wrong but they were all more effort/weight/time/money. Most of the time I just didn't bother bringing a back up unless it was a really important gig.

The fly rig 5 doesn't really add any weight/time/hassle to my set up. I found a great sound in seconds the first time I plugged in. Plus since I had space on my board I added an aby switch after my normal front of the amp pedals on my pedal board. A channel out to my amp and B channel out to the fly rig 5 (off my board) and straight into the board. If something happens with my amp I can have sound in a second just by switching from A to B other wise I wouldn't even know its there. For giggles I have also played a few songs using just with the fly rig 5 instead of the amp and I could easily play a gig with it alone and be happy with my sound. Running it this way I still have my wireless, tuner, wah, overdrives in front of either the amp or fly rig 5 depending. I have even run both the amp and the fly rig at the same time for a bigger solo boosts. It doesn't take up much space in my bag, Doesn't take me really any extra time to set it up for an instant back up, Plus it sound good and its only $249.

 

[sbeirnes]

Is there any way to defeat the cab sim? I would like to use it as a preamp into a power amp/cab or into the effects return of an amp. Trouble is, the built in sim will be on top of the real cab.

Has anyone tried using it the way I am thinking?

In a perfect world, it would have two outputs . One to go straight to the FOH (with cab sim) and a second output without the sim that I can use as described above for my on stage sound/monitoring.

 

[strungup]

Is there any way to defeat the cab sim? I would like to use it as a preamp into a power amp/cab or into the effects return of an amp. Trouble is, the built in sim will be on top of the real cab.

Has anyone tried using it the way I am thinking?

In a perfect world, it would have two outputs . One to go straight to the FOH (with cab sim) and a second output without the sim that I can use as described above for my on stage sound/monitoring.

If you are using the fly rig 5 with an amp just don't click on the sans amp section. In its current form you can't do both but you probably could use it with a power engine 60 as a monitor and from that to the PA or something similar. I have used it into the effects return section on an amp but still use the sans amp part if the fly rig is my preamp. It sounds better. If I was going into the front of the amp I wouldn't use the sans amp feature.