Deja Vu

[mahler]

Know that the Deja Vu is an analog digital mix, but can it go completely 100% analog.

Also some reviews would be nice!

 

[Yossi]

Not this again!!!

 

[mahler]

What'd I do still new here, why is there some thread that ended terribly like this?

 

[Yossi]

Sorry, just my bad sense of humor with the title Deja Vu.
My bad. Please don't take offense.

 

[mahler]

Oh ahah, wow I am SLOW, got it now...nice quip .

 

[DPiddy]

lol. Nice.

 

[frankfalbo]

You can sweep all the way to one side or the other. The dry signal is always analog of course. The BBD is noisier than the digital side, same as any BBD delay. I'll let others do the "reviewing".

 

[flampton]

Yeah my bro has it...I'm pretty sure it goes 100 percent analog. I have not played with it much. Maybe with the holiday break I'll have time to put it through some work. I really want to put something in its loop after I saw the red witch titan premiere video. I'm sure I can make some crazy stuff happen.

 

[frankfalbo]

The loop is a blast. Phaser, Flanger, EQ and Tube Screamer are the most obvious, but disgusting fuzz pedals, octaves, envelope filters, wahs, and combinations of the above are great too.

I like setting the delay time super short (like 5-15ms) and applying more overdrive and heavy EQ, generally favoring the low end. Then it's like you're playing, but there's a giant stack "woofing" in the background. That delayed, dirtied (which also means more compressed) low end is pretty fun.

 

[jmoose]

If the blend knob is fully clockwise then the delays are all from the BBD.

Or you could turn it back a little towards center to bring in some clarity... seems like 80% of the time the analog/digital blend is either at 10 o'clock or 2 o'clock. The straight up 50/50 has some weird phasing anomalies... but overall the blend knob allows for an incredibly versatile range of tones.

The modulation is decent... only the BBD is modulated... but it'll go from a slight shimmer, maybe a tape-echo like warble (though not really like a tape echo) all the way to a 'rotary' fake Leslie thing when its full up. That in itself adds some more versatility... with the delay time at minimum it can be used as a half-assed chorus box or as a decent Leslie simulator. Or add some real delay time to the "Leslie" thing, like a slap echo and its great for comping chords.

Anything else you want to know?

 

[A-Ro]

Sorry to resurrect an old thread but, what are your thoughts on this pedal in comparison to others?

 

[Kreiger]

I'm curious as well. It seems like a bizarre pedal design, really. Not many reviews out there either-


Also, something doesn't add up here. The pedal offers 2.6 secs of delay time, but is that digital AND analog? Does it have twenty BBD chips in it? And the looper function? That must be all digital? And while I'm at it, does anyone know if your dry signal gets converted to digital at all?

 

[Kreiger]

I've been checking out demo vids and whatnot and from I can tell the Deja Vu isn't an analog delay at all . . .

It's a digital delay with the option of running the signal through BBD chips to "dirty" it up (much like the SIB Echodrive used a tube to do the same). There's no other way to explain how you can get 2.6 sec of delay in analog mode, much less 20 sec in looper mode. I emailed Frank for clarification, but it sort of looks like deceptive marketing to me (unfortunately).

 

[Kreiger]

Well, I got a prompt, courteous response from Frank at Seymour Duncan. If nothing else they've got my vote for customer service:

There are a few key differentiators that you have to consider with the Déjà Vu. In the end it may not be right for you and that’s cool . .


We created the digital portion of the Déjà Vu from scratch. It is not a digital delay chip that you’ll find in other digital delays. It actually has more in common with a digital recorder than a digital delay. (It is NOT a DSP) It’s a digital chip with external memory chips. The result is a digital delay with no tonal or dynamic range loss. In other words, better than CD quality repeats with no compression or signal flattening. So the digital repeat that goes INTO the BBD is not like any you’ve heard before. The volume, dynamic range, and tonal content hitting the BBD is exactly what the BBD would have received from your original analog signal. Yes, the delay line has been A/D & D/A converted, but there are other tricks we do . . . Aside from the A/D/A conversion being cleaner than others, the headroom is key. If you’ve squashed the headroom going into the BBD, the BBD won’t clip the same, or do what it does. One trick is that we’re using a stereo A/D-D/A but we’re using it like dual mono. We dedicate one side specifically to the initial repeat. The note you play gets 100% of the attention from this single A/D, and is not “clogged up” by having to be shared with the repeats. Again, this is crucial for preserving the BBD’s characteristics when getting “hit” with your guitar’s tone, vs when it’s getting hit with its own repeats. The second half of the converter specifically handles the repeats only. Each time they pass through, they are re-fed through the BBD, so the degradation that happens in the BBD happens on the Déjà Vu, for real . . .


It’s not because I want someone to think we have magically created a 20 second BBD. They are laced with so much companding and pre & de emphasis just to control noise and signal loss that the repeats either sound very “boxy” and tight, or they’re so dirty that you can barely make out the note you played. They’re more like a “blat”, or extra dark. The Déjà Vu delivers the tone of a shorter analog delay, like a 300ms unit with one BBD chip, not stacking multiples together.


Frank

It was a long reply and I cut and pasted the relevant parts. Needless the say Frank did not try and dance around my question with PR-speak nor did he try and confuse me with fancy engineering terms. But he did clearly explain exactly how the Deja Vu is able to do what it does and I was so impressed by his response that I ordered one up!

Will it survive the at-home test? The full-band test? The analog vs. hybrid comparision? We'll see. If nothing else I give SD points for being creative and coming up with a pedal that really IS unique in a marketplace that has become VERY crowded the past few years. (No, I don't work for them or anything.)

Will update when I get my pedal.

 

[mahler]

Thanks Kreiger for the info! Keep us posted