424 Gain Stage

The 424 Gain Stage gives all the elastic, lo-fi tone you get from plugging a guitar rig straight into a Tascam® Portastudio® 424. Now in pedal form, you can easily integrate the rubbery clean tones, high head room, and smashed out fuzz that's being repopularized by today's emerging guitarists.

In this historically accurate recreation, we perfectly replicated the original 424 MKI® circuit using the original UPC4570 and NJM4565 op-amps and all the original controls, which is crucial for recreating the unique character that makes the old units sound so good. The Portastudio's® gain controls can be further refined with the Bass and Treble EQ settings. In addition, our unit offers a ¼" output alongside a balanced XLR output (DI out) for ultimate flexibility.

The 424 Gain Stage can be used as a DI and give you the exact same unparalleled gooey texture and lo-fi fuzz you get when plugging directly into a 424®. It can also be used with an Amp, as plugging a Portastudio® into your amp was quite a feat. Integrating the tone of the 424 with the saturation of your favorite amp adds a whole new quality to the tone and gives the ability to stack it with your other pedals. Use it as a gain stage to boost your signal, a unique and colorful new overdrive sound, or push the gain knobs into full-on overloaded and broken fuzz.

• Volume: Output volume, on the Portastudio 424 this is the Master fader.

• Gain 1: Amount of preamplification added to input signal, on the Portastudio 424 this is the Trim control.

• Gain 2: Volume level of the second gain stage, on the Portastudio 424 this is the Channel fader.

• Bass: Cuts or boosts bass frequencies.

• Treble: Cuts or boosts the treble frequencies.

• Jack input and output.

• XLR output: Balanced output for use as a direct-out.

• Ground Lift: If you experience a hum/buzz, use this switch to lift the ground.

• Power: Requires standard 9V DC.

• Silent, soft-touch switching with buffered bypass.