Hi folks!
How are you doing, wherever you are?
Just a short update about the Digitech GFX1 Twin Tubes.
At the end, I succeeded in putting a 100% fully working unit together.
I picked up the battery holder from the other "broken" unit, removed the damaged holder, soldered the new one and installed the 4.5V battery: now everything works fine again.
I removed the 7025 Groove Tubes and replaced with common ECC83s JJs, since GT are too good for this thing and there's no difference in tone, whatever tubes one uses.
I've to say, to be honest, that I had better memories of these units, but I was wrong.
The overall tone is too compressed (even with compressor turned to off) and a bit too fizzy and fuzzy...
As a preamp, my MP1, JMP1 and PSA rip the Twin Tube in two very easily.
I placed in the MP1 a couple of Ei tubes that performs very well with no noise or microphonic and it plays awesome as I never heard it.
Digital effects? Well...no comparison with a Quadraverb or an Intellifex.
The only positive note is that the GFX1 is very quiet even with gain turned to max and the noise gate works really well (like the one on Quadraverb GT).
Now, the interesting note is that the unit that was intended to be "broken", looks not broken at all.
The previous owner changed one of the two transformers but he mounted the connector on the main board upside down.
Results: holy smoke!!! And smell, of course.
I reversed the connector and there's no smoke anymore, of course.
I anyway assume that some damage somewhere took place, because I start feeling a bad smell a few seconds after turning it on and the connector becomes hot very quickly.
Nothing strange seems to happen and the unit stays on...but I don't like that...the other one shows not these behaviors and it does not smell at all.
I will check and see if the unit can be repaired, but I think it can be.
I will then buy a new holder for the battery (I bought two) and most probably I will sell both the units and the original pedalboard.
It's funny to keep them alive, but I don't like them that much.