It's fantastic creators like you give us this information. The Boss channel is laughable at best. These companies have no reason not to put up full tutorial videos. It's very frustrating looking through so many videos to find the one or two which make sense. Appreciate the time ✌🏼
Thank you very much! It works perfectly with my Boss ES 5 into my PRS MT15. I was afraid I couldn’t use my Reverb and Delay via the FX Loop. Keep up the good work! New sub here.
I've never worked with a pedal board controller.. Now I got myself a Boss ES-5. I want to connect a Boss SY-200 with Midi then 6 analog effects (I will probably have to make 2 effects in a loop) Won't be a stereo setup, I have a Bogner Atma via a Friedman 1x12" Cab A Tuner, a Wha and a Volume Pedal. What you show here is really AWESOME !!
@@alwaysandy_ It is ...it is XD haha omg... Now I got the Boss device (from a guitarist, used, great condition) and I bought an extra power supply and midi cable.. I thought I got it all together now. Now, the patch cables do not fit XD, Now I'm sitting in front of the screen again and looking for suitable cables on the Internet.. Mummy !
Great video! So happy I found this because I was trying to find something that does this. When running the fx loop of the amp through loop 3 on the ES5, is there anything special internally on the ES5 you need to set to make this work?
Great tutorial! Is it possible to just use a loop switcher for only modulation and leave out everything else on your board? I have an effects loop that I just want to have more control over with a switcher.
Hey came across your video trying to do the same thing for my one amp setup so I can have my synth pedal and drive in the front of amp and then have my chorus and delay/reverb combo in the fx loop. Is there anything I should know to make this work other than having the loop 3 on the ES-5 always on?
Great video I’m using loop 3 for my amps fx loop but when I engage loop 4 I loose volume and when I engage loop 5 I loose even more volume any suggestions ?
Hooked up 4cm using loop 4, and having delay, reverb and a lead boost in loop 5. Whenever I engage loop 5 everything goes silent. Checked everything, power, patch cables and I'm convinced I hooked everything up correctly. Can't figure this one out. Some setting somewhere I've missed?
Btw if I reverse the cabling (delay/reverb before the loop with 4cm) everything works fine, but then everything's in front. Put anything behind that loop and no sound when engaged. Stumped.
Hello. If you put the amp effects before the Efx loop switched loop. I.E. compressor, fuzz or boost. If there respected loop is active. Does it color the signal going to the downstream effects loop signal? Also what is the added flexibility with the 4 cable method? Thank you
The effects in the amps fx loop(back of amp) affect the sound of the amp. The effects before the input (front of amp) color the sound of the amp. Therefore they will indirectly color all sound. 4cm allows you to use a loop switcher with front/back.
I have a Helix for modulation FX where I would sometimes want to use it before the amp or sometimes in the FX loop. Can I set signal chain location "within" the 4-cable method per patch on the ES-5?
Yessir it’s in the video like everything before the loop will go to the front and after everything to the back. It is a physical connection though so if you’re talking about wanting to run the same unit sometimes in the front and sometimes in the back you’d need some sort of Y situation sending them to both loops.
Isn’t your own pedalboard fun? 😂. I just was setting up my pedalboard ( 11 pedals) recently and what a trip , even miss a connection after 7th pedal :( , wouldn’t make a sound after power up :( ... Back to the drawing board. I’m enjoying your videos, keep them coming when you can ..
This is a stupid question, but I need to ask. Was never into pedals much and was just using an overdrive pedal in front of the amp. Well now I have a delay and a chorus pedal that I have not used yet. The only way I can do it now would be having the tuner and overdrive in front of the amp and the delay and chorus going through the loop. Problem is a have a little pedal board that I purchased just for this purpose but I really do not want to have two cables for just the tuner and overdrive and two more going into the loop as it just makes it all a mess. I am sure you have a better solution as it seems stupid but I am sure it will work just fine. Just want less clutter if possible. If I had my way I would just have them all in front of the amp and be done with it BUT I have a Laney L5T-112 and it does not have enough clean headroom for that with a single ended 5-watt amp. I have listened to many people playing with everything in front but (Just me) it sounds like trash TBH. Would like to get rid of as many cables as possible. Any better recommendations? OR am I just getting older and like things simple?
No it’s a valid question. There’s no trick, you’re running 4 cables to your amp. 5 if you’re like me and switch channels via midi or channel switch from board. Wire ties. Buy a 100 pack in various sizes. New best friends. 😬
Buy a box of split 1/2" cable loom from NAPA or Amazon and put all your cables in it. It will combine them in to one nice cable and make it look like you have big cable coming from your pedal board. Also, wrap some electrical tape about every 12" to keep the loom together so your cables stay inside it. Have fun!
I am going to try this on my es8 as I cant enable/disable the fxloop on my synergy syn-2. Thank you . Would be gr8 if you could provide a drawing with the connections.
I’m pretty sure the es8 will do front/back of amp etc natively. But for a diagram just google it, there’s lots of image diagrams of the 4 cable method. 🤘
@@alwaysandy_, thanks for getting back. You have to create a parallel connection in the settings of the patch so the pre-loop signal that skips the loop sounds clean in the dry amp (the bogner in your case) - or maybe I had a polarity issue and you didn't, but when I tried what you did it sounded terrible until I did that. P.7 of the manual of the ES5 for anyone having this issue
In order to get to know the device first, I thought to myself, first of all, only connect two loops and try to make the first presets with them ..(I don't have enough suitable cables anyway)
Question, I'm using the effects loop on my Marshall for a chorus and delay and want to also use just the return for my Boss DS-1, is it possible to split the return to make this happen? Basically what I'm trying to do would need 2 returns and wonder if splitting the return with a 1 into 2 cable would work? Thanks!
Good question! Have you tried? I don’t 100% get what u wanna do but signals should in fact blend together with no problems if the goal is simply to split off some signal fir a y situation. Let us know!
Thanks for the effort Andy! Quick question; d0 you remember what you did with the tuner out? I'd just as soon put my Boss TU-2 in front of everything. It has its own buffer so if the tuner jack can be used for something extra, it would be nice to have that in the arsenal. Sorry, quick question two; do you ever use a Boss GP-10 as a pedal or loop? Cheers, Skip
My tuner out is empty sadly. Since I use the two buttons as bank up/bank down that takes away the tuner ‘button’ so mine is just inline. If you do something creative with it let us know!!!
Hello Andy , new subscriber here, and I was wondering if you can do a video on the different types of cables and if they have any effects on the tone whether you use audio cable or instrument Cable in the effects Loop?
Heyo! I’m not the best person to do a cable video. I use whatever is around that sounds ok when I plug it in. To me they’re either good or bad, and I’ve not ever been in a situation where I thought “man this cable sounds great”. I use a fatter gold connectors cable mostly that I’ve had for year. Like a mogami or something. I don’t even know! Cheers!
I only have one amp and 2 pedals in front (more coming) and 4 in the loop ( you guessed it, more coming), so I'd put all the pedals in front of the amp in loops 1 through 2 then, and have the guitar go into the input of the switcher, with the amp getting it's signal from the send of loop 3, the fx loop send goes to the return of loop 3, then loop 4, 5, 6 and 7 become the 4 pedals I got in the loop, and the send / output from the switcher goes to the return of the looper? So for my overdrive, distortion (front), amp (amp), delay, modulation, reverb and another delay I'd need something that would be able to do 8 loops?
Oh for sure you’ll want the ES-8 or something larger. The split between front/back can go anywhere you want it. If u have two pedals in front you’d split on loop three, but I think u get all that. Cheers!
I’m not getting any sound from the amp even after hooking up the pedals and following your instructions for 4 cable method. Where could I have gone wrong?
So if I get this right that means I'm losing a switchable loop for a pedal using this method? As in, I can only have 4 pedals I can use the switcher to turn on and off since I have to use one of the loops for the 4 cm? I mean barring MIDI of course
Correct. In order to pull off front of amp and back of amp effects at once, you need a loop to accommodate that ‘feature’. So if your looper rig has 4 loops that equates to 3 effects; 5 loops = 4 and so on. Hope that helps! Good luck!
@@alwaysandy_ cool thanks for replying, I thought so but just wanted to hear it again. It will, I'll probably be saving up for an ES-8 since I have 5 pedals i want to route this way. Thanks again for replying and super informative video!
@@punkmusicmetal Just an FYI, the ES8 is designed for the 4 cable method, and has a special port for such, where the ES-5 wasn't designed this way. It was made to be either front of amp, OR the FX loop, not both. He just found an (awesome!) work around. But if you have 5 you wanna use, or more, the ES8 is perfect for that, AND less work.
Andy Harper have you tried the g string decimator 2? It’s the only one I have got to work and I use an evh 5150 3 gain to the max. The noise gate has a built in loop.
I noticed es5 Manual doesn’t mention anything about doing a 4 cable method. But the es8 does by only using the volume loop…not any other loop like what you’ve done here .🤷🏼♂️ Maybe it not advised by Boss to do this ?another question is why do they only advise on only using the volume loop on the es8? 🤷🏼♂️ Thanks for the vid 👍🏻
So I’m pretty sure with the ES8 you don’t need to do the 4 cable loop because it’s built into the mixer etc already. I may be wrong but that’s in my head. I’d assert you can still 4 cable loop it tho. Cheers!!
Fantastic explanation. Content like this is pure gold.
Awesome glad it helps!! Cheers! 💥🔥
Most important video I have ever seen on loop switchers how to use it with the FX loop!!! Great stuff thank you so much!
Thanks for watching! Happy you found it useful.
It's fantastic creators like you give us this information. The Boss channel is laughable at best. These companies have no reason not to put up full tutorial videos. It's very frustrating looking through so many videos to find the one or two which make sense. Appreciate the time ✌🏼
Thanks dude! Glad it helped!
Thank you very much! It works perfectly with my Boss ES 5 into my PRS MT15. I was afraid I couldn’t use my Reverb and Delay via the FX Loop. Keep up the good work! New sub here.
🤘🤘🤘
I've never worked with a pedal board controller..
Now I got myself a Boss ES-5.
I want to connect a Boss SY-200 with Midi
then 6 analog effects (I will probably have to make 2 effects in a loop)
Won't be a stereo setup, I have a Bogner Atma via a Friedman 1x12" Cab
A Tuner, a Wha and a Volume Pedal.
What you show here is really AWESOME !!
Well that all sounds super fun! Good luck!🔥🍻
@@alwaysandy_ It is ...it is XD
haha omg...
Now I got the Boss device (from a guitarist, used, great condition) and I bought an extra power supply and midi cable..
I thought I got it all together now.
Now, the patch cables do not fit XD,
Now I'm sitting in front of the screen again and looking for suitable cables on the Internet..
Mummy !
@@ThrashRoC ahhhh yes welcome to the club 😂😆
Great video! So happy I found this because I was trying to find something that does this.
When running the fx loop of the amp through loop 3 on the ES5, is there anything special internally on the ES5 you need to set to make this work?
Nah there’s no extra settings. 🍻
Eureka!!! That’s work !!! Thanks man you make my day !!!!
Your knowledge is Awesome
Knowledge is awesome. Thx!🔥💥
Great tutorial! Is it possible to just use a loop switcher for only modulation and leave out everything else on your board? I have an effects loop that I just want to have more control over with a switcher.
Sure go for it. 🍻
Hey came across your video trying to do the same thing for my one amp setup so I can have my synth pedal and drive in the front of amp and then have my chorus and delay/reverb combo in the fx loop.
Is there anything I should know to make this work other than having the loop 3 on the ES-5 always on?
Nope. Take off 💥
Sir, can you save the Marshall DSL40CR channel/voicing + other pedal as patch?
No
Thanks! This was super helpful!
You're welcome! Glad I could help.
Great video I’m using loop 3 for my amps fx loop but when I engage loop 4 I loose volume and when I engage loop 5 I loose even more volume any suggestions ?
That doesn’t tell me much. The whole board goes thru the effects loop….maybe ask again!
Hooked up 4cm using loop 4, and having delay, reverb and a lead boost in loop 5. Whenever I engage loop 5 everything goes silent. Checked everything, power, patch cables and I'm convinced I hooked everything up correctly. Can't figure this one out. Some setting somewhere I've missed?
Btw if I reverse the cabling (delay/reverb before the loop with 4cm) everything works fine, but then everything's in front. Put anything behind that loop and no sound when engaged. Stumped.
Solve it yet? Something must be off…
@@alwaysandy_ Afraid not. Will give it another go and see if I can solve this. Probably something really dumb somewhere.
Hello. If you put the amp effects before the Efx loop switched loop. I.E. compressor, fuzz or boost. If there respected loop is active. Does it color the signal going to the downstream effects loop signal? Also what is the added flexibility with the 4 cable method? Thank you
The effects in the amps fx loop(back of amp) affect the sound of the amp. The effects before the input (front of amp) color the sound of the amp. Therefore they will indirectly color all sound. 4cm allows you to use a loop switcher with front/back.
I have a Helix for modulation FX where I would sometimes want to use it before the amp or sometimes in the FX loop. Can I set signal chain location "within" the 4-cable method per patch on the ES-5?
Yessir it’s in the video like everything before the loop will go to the front and after everything to the back. It is a physical connection though so if you’re talking about wanting to run the same unit sometimes in the front and sometimes in the back you’d need some sort of Y situation sending them to both loops.
Isn’t your own pedalboard fun? 😂.
I just was setting up my pedalboard ( 11 pedals) recently and what a trip , even miss a connection after 7th pedal :( , wouldn’t make
a sound after power up :( ... Back to the drawing board.
I’m enjoying your videos, keep them coming when you can ..
Cheers mate!💥🤘
Good job, man!
This is a stupid question, but I need to ask. Was never into pedals much and was just using an overdrive pedal in front of the amp. Well now I have a delay and a chorus pedal that I have not used yet. The only way I can do it now would be having the tuner and overdrive in front of the amp and the delay and chorus going through the loop. Problem is a have a little pedal board that I purchased just for this purpose but I really do not want to have two cables for just the tuner and overdrive and two more going into the loop as it just makes it all a mess. I am sure you have a better solution as it seems stupid but I am sure it will work just fine. Just want less clutter if possible. If I had my way I would just have them all in front of the amp and be done with it BUT I have a Laney L5T-112 and it does not have enough clean headroom for that with a single ended 5-watt amp. I have listened to many people playing with everything in front but (Just me) it sounds like trash TBH. Would like to get rid of as many cables as possible. Any better recommendations? OR am I just getting older and like things simple?
No it’s a valid question. There’s no trick, you’re running 4 cables to your amp. 5 if you’re like me and switch channels via midi or channel switch from board. Wire ties. Buy a 100 pack in various sizes. New best friends. 😬
@@alwaysandy_ I appreciate it and thank you for being kind BUT if I just would have thought about it for a minute it was indeed a stupid question.
Buy a box of split 1/2" cable loom from NAPA or Amazon and put all your cables in it. It will combine them in to one nice cable and make it look like you have big cable coming from your pedal board. Also, wrap some electrical tape about every 12" to keep the loom together so your cables stay inside it. Have fun!
@@Chuckatory Sounds like a good idea and I appreciate it very much!
I am going to try this on my es8 as I cant enable/disable the fxloop on my synergy syn-2. Thank you . Would be gr8 if you could provide a drawing with the connections.
Rui Buíça you don’t need to do this with the es8... it has a volume loop for this purpose.
@@cardbored_ i am actually gonna do other way , midi way. So i will have my pedalborad effects in front and use midi to change amps and fxloop
I’m pretty sure the es8 will do front/back of amp etc natively. But for a diagram just google it, there’s lots of image diagrams of the 4 cable method. 🤘
Hey man, thanks for this video. I just want to add that you have to split the signal in settings or the preamp stuff sounds like caca.
Not sure what you mean....
@@alwaysandy_, thanks for getting back. You have to create a parallel connection in the settings of the patch so the pre-loop signal that skips the loop sounds clean in the dry amp (the bogner in your case) - or maybe I had a polarity issue and you didn't, but when I tried what you did it sounded terrible until I did that. P.7 of the manual of the ES5 for anyone having this issue
In order to get to know the device first, I thought to myself, first of all, only connect two loops and try to make the first presets with them ..(I don't have enough suitable cables anyway)
Question, I'm using the effects loop on my Marshall for a chorus and delay and want to also use just the return for my Boss DS-1, is it possible to split the return to make this happen? Basically what I'm trying to do would need 2 returns and wonder if splitting the return with a 1 into 2 cable would work? Thanks!
Good question! Have you tried? I don’t 100% get what u wanna do but signals should in fact blend together with no problems if the goal is simply to split off some signal fir a y situation. Let us know!
@@alwaysandy_ , no loss of signal and so far works great. it's a bit stronger out front but more noise also, thanks, you are helpful folks!
Thanks for the effort Andy! Quick question; d0 you remember what you did with the tuner out? I'd just as soon put my Boss TU-2 in front of everything. It has its own buffer so if the tuner jack can be used for something extra, it would be nice to have that in the arsenal. Sorry, quick question two; do you ever use a Boss GP-10 as a pedal or loop? Cheers, Skip
My tuner out is empty sadly. Since I use the two buttons as bank up/bank down that takes away the tuner ‘button’ so mine is just inline. If you do something creative with it let us know!!!
And no I haven’t used one of those at all.
Hello Andy , new subscriber here, and I was wondering if you can do a video on the different types of cables and if they have any effects on the tone whether you use audio cable or instrument Cable in the effects Loop?
Heyo! I’m not the best person to do a cable video. I use whatever is around that sounds ok when I plug it in. To me they’re either good or bad, and I’ve not ever been in a situation where I thought “man this cable sounds great”. I use a fatter gold connectors cable mostly that I’ve had for year. Like a mogami or something. I don’t even know! Cheers!
I'm running a boss gt 1000 core with my es5 can I do the 4 cable method on gt 1000 core?
I don’t know. Is it configured like an amp with an input, tone generator and effects loop? If so, yes.
I only have one amp and 2 pedals in front (more coming) and 4 in the loop ( you guessed it, more coming), so I'd put all the pedals in front of the amp in loops 1 through 2 then, and have the guitar go into the input of the switcher, with the amp getting it's signal from the send of loop 3, the fx loop send goes to the return of loop 3, then loop 4, 5, 6 and 7 become the 4 pedals I got in the loop, and the send / output from the switcher goes to the return of the looper? So for my overdrive, distortion (front), amp (amp), delay, modulation, reverb and another delay I'd need something that would be able to do 8 loops?
Oh for sure you’ll want the ES-8 or something larger. The split between front/back can go anywhere you want it. If u have two pedals in front you’d split on loop three, but I think u get all that. Cheers!
@@alwaysandy_ Very nice, thank you! :) Looking at a Moen GEC9, it's a bit friendlier priced than the big boss unit.
@@RJW14 sweet looks like a great unit! Good luck!
I’m not getting any sound from the amp even after hooking up the pedals and following your instructions for 4 cable method. Where could I have gone wrong?
Maybe mixed up send/return somewhere.
Question, I have a noice reduction with two channels. Where does that go in this setup ?
Generally I place such devices first before everything. Cheers!
What if you just want to switch back and fourth from the inputs of 2 amps
Get an a/b or a/b/y switch.
How about if i only have 1 amp with fx loop?
Only one amp is perfect. 🤘
So if I get this right that means I'm losing a switchable loop for a pedal using this method? As in, I can only have 4 pedals I can use the switcher to turn on and off since I have to use one of the loops for the 4 cm? I mean barring MIDI of course
Correct. In order to pull off front of amp and back of amp effects at once, you need a loop to accommodate that ‘feature’. So if your looper rig has 4 loops that equates to 3 effects; 5 loops = 4 and so on. Hope that helps! Good luck!
@@alwaysandy_ cool thanks for replying, I thought so but just wanted to hear it again. It will, I'll probably be saving up for an ES-8 since I have 5 pedals i want to route this way. Thanks again for replying and super informative video!
@@punkmusicmetal Just an FYI, the ES8 is designed for the 4 cable method, and has a special port for such, where the ES-5 wasn't designed this way. It was made to be either front of amp, OR the FX loop, not both. He just found an (awesome!) work around. But if you have 5 you wanna use, or more, the ES8 is perfect for that, AND less work.
Are you running a noise gate anywhere in your chain?
no i haven't found a noise gate i like a lot. I'm just quick on the foot. 🤘
Andy Harper have you tried the g string decimator 2? It’s the only one I have got to work and I use an evh 5150 3 gain to the max. The noise gate has a built in loop.
Where would i stick my looper pedal?
Anywhere. Experiment.
I noticed es5 Manual doesn’t mention anything about doing a 4 cable method. But the es8 does by only using the volume loop…not any other loop like what you’ve done here .🤷🏼♂️
Maybe it not advised by Boss to do this ?another question is why do they only advise on only using the volume loop on the es8? 🤷🏼♂️
Thanks for the vid 👍🏻
So I’m pretty sure with the ES8 you don’t need to do the 4 cable loop because it’s built into the mixer etc already. I may be wrong but that’s in my head. I’d assert you can still 4 cable loop it tho. Cheers!!
@@alwaysandy_ check out this video by Sef and Boss. explains 4CM very well for ES-8 ua-cam.com/video/kVmtLAdIvtQ/v-deo.html