MXR '74 RI Phase 90 bypass question

[Marble]

I don't mind the '74 phase 90 not being true bypass, lacking LED or a power jack (they make superior tone), but how much high end, if any does the bypass of the '74 roll off? My maestro ps1-a is an epic phaser but it cuts off everything after something like 1khz (no high end clarity). Works great for rhodes though.

I can deal with buffers but not a lot of high end roll off.

[lspaulsp]

When did true bypass come in mid to late 8o's? I used several script MXR pedals.
So all my pedals I used for 25 years were not true bypass and I never noticed.
Gee go figure.

[mmolteratx]

It's not too bad, though it's heavily dependent on the rest of your set up.

[Marble]

lspaul, I don't think true bypass came around in production units boutiquers started really doing their thing in the late 90s or something. I can't say for sure though.

mmolteratx, I use an SG with really hot pickups (if they were wound with 42 awg wire the bridge pup would be at least 9.5kohms dc resistance) and the phase 90 would either be first or 2nd behind an mxr carbon copy delay with a boss tu-2 at the end into a marshall style amp with 4 10s.

But even if i just used that pedal its self, its high end roll off should be apparent if there is any. I take it there probably isn't much signal loss.

[chervokas]

lspaul, I don't think true bypass came around in production units boutiquers started really doing their thing in the late 90s or something. I can't say for sure though.

mmolteratx, I use an SG with really hot pickups (if they were wound with 42 awg wire the bridge pup would be at least 9.5kohms dc resistance) and the phase 90 would either be first or 2nd behind an mxr carbon copy delay with a boss tu-2 at the end into a marshall style amp with 4 10s.

But even if i just used that pedal its self, its high end roll off should be apparent if there is any. I take it there probably isn't much signal loss.

Three things...First, there were actually true bypass pedals basiclly from the start. The original Fuzz Face was a true bypass circuit, for example. But it was random, almost accidental. Not too much thought was being given to how the pedal's impedance was loading the guitar circuit (except, say, with the FF which works by loading the guitar) in bypass so you got a mish mosh of designs back in the day, but of course most were hardwired. First buffered bypass and later true bypass were both conceived as solutions to the problem of circuit loading by hardwire bypass pedals.

Second, I don't know what kind of capacitance and resistance there might be but the input impedance of the Phase 90 vintage reissue is 500K ohms so in terms of the impact of impedance loading in bypass, the tone probably won't be terribly different from, say, plugging into a buffered bypass pedal like a Tube Screamer with a similar input impedance.

Third, if you're concerned, why don't you just put the Phase 90 after the tuner? The TU-2 has, IIRC, JFET in/out buffers in bypass.