Source Audio Collider
Delay and Reverb combination pedals are becoming more common. With board real estate becoming more precious every day due to the difficulty and expense of travel, these pedals are not only popular, but necessary. Source Audio, known for their excellent quality and innovation have responded to this demand and given us the Collider. This pedal combines Source Audio’s exceptional Ventris Reverb and Nemesis Delay into one conveniently sized and intuitive pedal….that absolutely dominates. Among delay-reverb combo pedals, the Collider is KING!
External Control: EXP/STEREO OUT/EXTERNAL TAP/ONBOARD TAP/MIDI/HUB
Cost: $$$
HornFX Review
Complexity: High
Interface: 4/5
The interface of combination pedals such as these can be a challenge to design, and have the potential to be a difficulty to use. The Collider manages to combine two quite complicated pedals, yet make the result easy to use and understand. The design is suprisingly intuitive. There is a switch on the lower right of the pedal that toggles between reverb and delay, changing the function of all of the knobs to one effect or the other. There is also a convenient middle setting on the switch that locks the pedal so that accidental knob adjustments will not change the sound if you want to stick with the patch you have engaged. Much like its parents, the Ventris and the Nemesis, this pedal’s 7 knobs are simple to understand, even when switching from reverb to delay and back. Its color coding adds a level of convenience as well. Presets are easy to call up and the subdivisions switch give you more access to precision delay times. Overall this pedal, considering its potential complexity and staggering range of capability, is easy to use, even for a novice. There is easily mastered usability, even in its more subtle features, like the combination delay/tap foot switch. This switch can act as a tap tempo when the delay is engaged. Simply give it a couple short taps, and your tempo will be set, with red flashes overlaying the green light that indicates the delay is engaged. Simply give the switch a brief hold to turn the delay off. This combination switch feels intuitive and can be mastered quickly. Of course, as with all new Source Audio pedals, the secondary interface, the Neuro App, adds another layer of exceptional control and easily understood usability.
Versatility: 5/5
This pedal is insane. It takes the main elements of one of the most versatile reverb pedals and one of the most versatile delay pedals, and puts it all into one. Not only can this machine create an almost infinite combination of delay and reverb sounds, it can also do either dual delay or dual reverb patches! There is seemingly no limit to what the Collider can do. Its limitless potential is truly unlocked when you use the Neuro App to edit patches. The app unlocks a simply understood yet incredibly vast world of possibility and can keep you enthralled and exploring for ages. From a wide range of the simplest and most conventional reverb and delay sounds, to wacky and wild settings for both effect types, the Collider is a versatility MONSTER!
Reproduction of sound: 4.5/5
This pedal, especially when used with the app, has an amazing amount of control over the reproduction of your sound. It will give you pristine tonal reproductions on the delay and reverb types that call for it, and will beautifully alter, distort, and manipulate your tone when needed. This pedal really can do it all. Its tonal capabilities are seemingly endless and can give you freedom to truly explore the full range of reverb and delay possibilities.
Live application: 4.5/5
There are few pedals that are better suited for live use. Of course, its ease of use is a major factor in its high score in this realm. But more practical and impactful are the pedal’s size and and combinative capabilities. The search for smaller and smaller pedals of high quality is on. People need smaller gear to travel with to offset increasing costs and to create more convenience. First and foremost, this pedal combines the two most logically combined effects, reverb and delay. Pedals like the Eventide H9 are capable of amazing things, but they allow to choose from various effects that are usually not seen in the same part of the signal chain. Having your harmonizer effects in the beginning of your chain is common, and having delay at the end is almost a rule. So for a pedal like the H9, that has both of these options, signal chain can be a challenge. The Collider does not have this issue. Like all reverb-delay combo pedals, it takes two effects that are almost always next to each other, at the end of the chain, and therefore are perfectly suited to be combined. Not only is it convenient from the signal chain perspective, but this pedal is quite small considering its capability. At just 4” x 4”, this little machine is smaller than two standard sized stomp-boxes side by side, and provides more sonic value per square inch than almost any other pedal we know of. The live application is further enhanced when MIDI control is brought into the equation. If you are already running MIDI control on your pedal setup, you can integrate the Collider seamlessly into your setup, and have ultimate control over its massive array of possibilities. Simply put, the Collider is incredible, and would be a worthwhile purchase for ANY pedal user.
Audio
Input Signal - Tenor Saxophone
Input Signal - Trumpet
Product Information
Design complex soundscapes in seconds with the Collider Delay+Reverb. We hand-picked 12 standout delay and reverb effects from our award winning Nemesis Delay and Ventris Dual Reverb, and put them together in one compact housing with massive power and dead simple control. The Collider’s intuitive control surface makes it easy to mix-and-match any two-engine combination of delay and reverb. Dual footswitches provide individual Engage/Bypass control over each effect, making it a perfect choice for live performance.
The Collider offers an exceptional collection of rich, spacious tones, including realistic reproductions of vintage Analog, Tape, and Oil Can Delays, classic models of Spring and Plate Reverb, natural replications of large and small acoustic spaces, and an intriguing and highly musical selection of “unnatural” tones including a tripped-out Reverse Delay and an other-worldly Shimmer Reverb.
Collider takes supremely high-end delay and reverb effects and offers them in a sleek and powerful design with massive processing muscle and clean functionality. The Collider features two completely independent 56-bit signal processors, essentially housing a high-powered reverb AND a high-powered delay pedal in a single box. This means that it is possible to create magnificent tones with any two-effect combination of delay/reverb, delay/delay, or reverb/reverb.
This extremely versatile pedal offers a long list of useful features, including analog dry through, stereo inputs and outputs, the option of true or buffered bypass, 8 user presets (or 128 with MIDI), full MIDI functionality, delay tap tempo, reverb hold (a.k.a. "freeze"), external expression capabilities, external preset switching capabilities and extra editing and signal routing options via the Neuro Desktop and Mobile App Editors.
Neuro Editing System
The Collider Delay+Reverb is a supremely powerful pedal on its own, but the Neuro App for mobile or desktop offers a higher level of flexibility. The Neuro Desktop Editor and Neuro Mobile App are free downloads for iOS, Android, Mac, and Windows. Neuro offers a useful set of hardware options, alternate routing options, and an intuitive sound editing interface for creating presets. After editing your preset, burn it directly to the pedal and access it easily without reconnecting the Neuro App.
12 Hand-Picked Delay + Reverb Engines:
Room Reverb: The ROOM engines capture the ambient reverberations of a real acoustic space. The ROOM engine can summon a variety of room sizes from a warm and intimate household room to a larger theatre sized space.
Hall Reverb: Patterned after the lush sounds of studio rack units from the 80s, the HALL L engine is distinguished by its highly diffuse tones and glorious blooming characteristic.
True Spring Reverb: Source Audio’s Chief Scientist, Bob Chidlaw, worked long and hard to perfectly capture the sweet idiosyncrasies of a vintage spring reverb tank. The result is an exceptionally realistic effect with the unmistakable “drip” heard in vintage spring reverb equipped amplifiers.
Plate Reverb: This authentic sounding reverb engine is a spot-on simulation of the highly diffuse effect synonymous with vintage plate reverb units of the 50s and 60s.
Shimmer Reverb: This pitch shifting reverb engine mixes traditional room sounds with octave-up reflections for an angelic reverb effect.
E-Dome Reverb: The cavernous E-DOME (a.k.a. “Enormo-Dome”) produces long, lush reverb trails that linger for days. Invoke the sound of massive, arena settings with the Ventris Reverb’s largest room simulation. This one is huuuuge.
Swell Reverb: Creates smooth, amorphous volume swells. This engine applies a volume swell effect to your instrument’s dry signal, which is then fed into the reverb effect for super-long and ambient clouds of sound. This effect is great for creating soft, atmospheric chord pads.
Digital Delay: A pristine and unfiltered digital repeats.
Analog Delay: This delay engine reproduces the characteristic dark sound of bucket brigade analog delays.
Tape Delay: A detailed re-creation of classic moving-head tape delays. Repeats are bandwidth limited and have artifacts characteristic of tape delay, such as filtering, preamp saturation, noise, wow and flutter.
Reverse Delay: A classic reverse tape sound that became popular in 60s psychedelic rock. The TONE knob can create several overlapping reversed delays that fade in and fade out regularly to create a pulsing tremolo effect.
Oil Can Delay: This is a dark, jangly, warbling and distorted delay inspired by old oil can designs that previously appeared in the “Extended Delay Engines” on the Nemesis.
neural editor features
Connect the Collider Delay+Reverb to the Neuro Mobile App (a free download for iOS or Android) and explore the power of effect downloading, customization, and sharing that comes with every Source Audio One Series pedal.
Customize Effects — Make deep editing changes with a wide range of additional parameters.
Save and Share Customized Presets — Once you’ve fine-tuned an effect, save it to your personal effects collection and share it with the growing community of Neuro users.
Download Presets — Explore Source Audio’s ever-expanding, library of free effect presets.
Simple Connection — The Neuro App connects with the Collider Delay+Reverb via the mobile device’s headphone jack and stereo Input 2 on the pedal. A Neuro App connector cable (1/8” to 1/4”) is included with the pedal.
specifications
Includes 9v DC power supply (300mA / Negative Tip)
Includes 1/8” to 1/4” cable for Neuro Mobile App connection.
Power Consumption — 300mA
USB port — Connects to Mac or Windows PC for MIDI control of firmware updates.
Brushed anodized aluminum housing.
Dimensions: L: 4.5 in./11.4cm x W: 4.5 in./11.4cm x H: 2 in./5.1cm (including knobs)
Wieght: 1 lb./0.45 kg.
pedal features
Stereo Inputs & Outputs – Create a lush stereo spread with true stereo inputs and outputs
Dual Processing – Features two completely independent processors – essentially providing two high-powered pedals in a single enclosure.
Analog Dry Through – When utilizing either delay or reverb, your signal still has an analog dry through path.
Universal Bypass – Select between true bypass, buffered bypass, or soft bypass with reverb trails. The Collider features high-quality signal relays for true bypass and transparent buffers for analog bypass.
Compact Design – The extruded anodized aluminum housing, with its slim profile and small footprint, is built for the rigors of the road.
128 Presets – Save your favorite sounds with the touch of a button. Save up to 8 presets recallable with the pedal’s onboard controls, plus a total of 128 presets recallable with an external MIDI controller.
Dual Delay or Reverb Control Set – The Neuro Mobile App and Neuro Desktop Editor provide access to “unlock” either side of the pedal, giving you access to the opposite side regardless of the switch position, meaning it is possible to use Collider as a Dual Delay pedal or a Dual Reverb pedal, and to switch the order of the effects.
Tap Tempo – Tap in the delay time with the onboard tap tempo switch. Beat divisions include quarter notes, dotted eighth, and triplets
Reverb “Hold” Mode – Hold or “freeze” your reverb trail by holding down the REVERB switch when reverb is engaged to create a massive, ambient wall of sound, or a pad to play on top of.
Knobs “Lock” Switch – Flip the KNOBS switch to the center position to lock your controls in place, protecting your settings from accidental bumps in a live setting.
Complete MIDI Functionally – Send MIDI program change (PC), continuous controller (CC), or MIDI clock messages via the 5-pin MIDI DIN Input (also includes a MIDI Thru jack) or the USB port.
Expression Control – Easily configure the Collider to work with a variety of expression pedals and footswitches for various external control options
Discover Knob Positions – Ever wondered where the knobs were set in another preset? With "Knobs Action After", you can discover these knob positions by rotating the knob until you see the Control LED flash.
midi features
Preset Saving / Program Change (PC) Messages — Save up to 128 effect presets recallable with MIDI PC messages.
MIDI Clock — Sync your delay time with external MIDI clock messages.
MIDI Continuous Controller (CC) Messages — Control multiple knob parameters simultaneously with MIDI CC messages. Program your CC messages to control any combination of knob parameters (as well as output level) and map an independent depth and direction path for each.
USB Port — Send MIDI program change, continuous controller, and clock messages to Collider via its USB port.
Multi Pedal Scene Saving with the Neuro Hub — Connect Collider (along with up to five One Series or Soundblox 2 pedals) to the Neuro Hub and create 128 multi pedal scenes complete with expression control, recallable via MIDI program change (PC) messages.
External Expression Control — Connect the Neuro Hub to any Source Audio expression pedal, Hot Hand 3 Wireless Effects Controller or third party TRS (Tip Hot) expression pedal and assign expression control to any combination of knob parameters.
Product Information from the Source Audio website