Strymon Deco Reviews

Magic to tone

I was a bit sceptical getting this pedal but after using it for months I can say it is more versatile than it looks like to be. I use it in home studio setup linked to audio interface loop to get tape tones, I can plug it to effects loop or use it in front of the amp. It really can be overdrive pedal, modulation type of effect or just bring the tape tone.

Killer pedal & a great service!

Absolutely killer pedal and amazing customer service!

One sided

The left side gives a really fantastic saturation effect with a warm drive sound for some grit. However I found the right side modulation especially the flanger was just not suitable and I ended up selling it. A pity because Strymon pedals in general are amazing especially the Flint and El Cap.

Strymon has done it again!

I have plenty of Strymons and this one is very peculiar as I use it for recording exclusively. The saturator part makes everything come alive - vocals, keys, bass, acoustic and electric guitar. The doubletracking has so many interesting effects packed into it - slapback, chorusing, flanging and the 3-way toggle switch might give you some interesting ideas on how to pan/position the instrument in the mix. I consider it an invaluable asset in the studio.

Excellent Pedal

Very cool pedal, great sound, compact size, excellent gain staging.

It has many applications but so far I used it only with synths and drumcomputers. The size format, price point, color scheme, controls and overall feel makes this a very cool pedal to add to your rig. Like all the Strymons, reccomended!

Will I ever switch this pedal off?

It's often said that gear will never make you sound better than you are. It's all in the fingers. And this is true, the one and only exception I've ever come across being the Strymon Deco.

I mainly use the left side, adding saturation to edgy cleans, and it really does make me sound better than I am. The harmonic richness the pedal adds is subtle, but amazing. Switch it off, and you notice it's gone. Then your foot goes back down and switches it back on again, perhaps to never switch it off.

The way I'd put it is that a nicely dialed-in guitar without it probably gives me a thrill 90% of the time, but then I hear the odd chord or note where the tone sounds too bright, or too dull. Switch on the Strymon and the 90% that was already good sounds better and most of the 10% I didn't like is gone.

There's lots to play with on the right hand side as well, but to be honest, edge of breakup cleans are mostly what I want, so I sometimes use the right hand side as a chorus, which is nice in that it's a good chorus that saves me an extra pedal.

The chief con is the price. I would say it's worth it in terms of the value it adds, but it is expensive.

more versatile than expected

Bought the Deco innitialy to sensibly create a stereo image, switching to doubliing effect on the favorite in my guitarrig, as an always on effect,

I discovered the real power of the deco since I put it in an aux of the FoH mixingdesk (my "daytime" job), Try using a slightl woblng chorus-setting to your rev send ( pre-fader). mixing the deco-signal to taste.

I tend to keep the deco returnn at low levels, in favor of being able to ad delay through another unit. Does work also with longer time-settings, though the deco hets more audible. REMINDER: Switch the deco to studio-levels if using it in this way (page 9 / manual)

Une tuerie

Cette pédale a peu de limites dans son utilisation.

Jouant du rockab', je l'utilise personnellement pour son slapback, qui est fabuleux ! Et j'utilise le côté drive comme preamp/master volume. Je pousse mon Pro Junior presqu'à fond, et je baisse le volume sur le preamp pour garder mon son plutôt clean.

Le preamp rend le son un tout petit peu plus beau et précis (très légère compression venant du drive).

Le chorus est également splendide.

Je n'utilise pas vraiment de Flanger, donc ne peux pas vraiment juger.

Placée en bout de file, elle rajoute cette petite touche magique au son général (comme quand on passe dans un enregistreur à bande).

One of my favourite pedals. Very nice for Lofi stuff. A versatile pedal overall, also nice for slapback delay and for stereo widening (one of my favourite features). Also nice for tape saturation. A winner in my book.

Great effect for hardware synth

I bought the strymon deco to 'spice up' the sound of some of my hardware synth. It is a dual band emulator with separate controls over the volume, the saturation and the dual-band emulation. There are also some 'hidden' control for more fine tuning.

The fact that you can push up the gain with a separate control for the saturation, coupled with the dual-band emulation and the fact that the unit can work in stereo make the strymon deco a unit of choice for synth that are a bit harsh or digital or with inconsistent (or weak) output level.

Fantastic tool for the studio and stage

I bought this pedal primarily for it's tape doubling capabilities in a home studio environment. When run in a stereo setup this pedal delivers fantastic sound quality and can do a ton of different tape effects - from a slight fattening up of the tone, to tape chorusing, slap-back delays and even a limited tape delay.

The quality of this doubling is much better than other similar products I've tried, although perhaps a bit more subtle as well. Perhaps that's the actual reason for it's success though.

The other side of the pedal, the tape saturation emulation, also works really well. I don't think it can really be used as an actual overdrive, but post-amp it adds a very nice grit and smoothness to the tone.

I would have preferred if it came with support for stereo input through two TS connections, but with the right adapters and an internal dip switch you can make it accept a stereo input signal through a single TRS cable.

Some will find this a bit expensive for its subtle effect, but if you understand what you're buying and are willing to pay the price I don't think you'll find it any better!

Pricey but worth every penny

This is a very singular pedal, with a likely small target audience. It's not supposed to be a tape delay/echo,chorus/flange/etc, even though it does those things. It's supposed to literally be the tape deck itself, allowing the user to employ the aforementioned studio techniques to get all those classic sounds. I use it as a combined drive/echo pedal, giving me two effects in one box. I bought it specifically for use with a group that's heavily influenced by very old music, so didn't want effects that sounded any later than the 70s and this did the job perfectly. The tape saturation sounds fantastic, I use it just to push my clean guitar over the edge on certain songs. The echo is also great, though some might prefer to use it for a slapback or chorus/flanger. If you have the money and are into old school tones, this is a must-try pedal.

Simply great!

I waited a while to write this review to gain some experience and use out of the Deco. At this point, after 9 months of regular use, I'm still very happy with the pedal.

It sounds GREAT - the delay is warm and really captures the sound of a great, short tape delay. The modulation features really bring the delays alive. I use it live to double my acoustic guitars to thicken them up a little, and the using the favorite switch feature (you can build your own switch much cheaper than what the Strymon one costs), I switch it to a slapback echo for use with my electric.

The tape saturation feature is also great - at mild settings it adds a subtle texture to the tone that makes verything sound better - I even use it on my acoustics. Cranked up you get a fuzz sound which is odd but useful on occasion.

The chorus and flange sounds from the unit are also great! I love the auto-flange feature that you can kick in by holding down the bypass button and use it live ocassionally.

Highly recommended.

I used it more for the natural onboard overdrive (tape saturation) than for the echo section. But it's like to be in a studio, with a real tape. Fat sound, vintage vibe, not so much settings (f.ex. with El Capistan) and great Strymon quality.

Surprisingly versatile

This pedal is much more useful than you might expect:

The saturation / compression side allows for everything from a slight harmonic boost to a full overdrive. As an added bonus, it can act as a clean boost using the output level control. I leave it on and dial the saturation between slight and high depending on the tone I want.

The tape delay side gives lovely single delay effects, but can also produce flange and chorus as well as a very fast slapback delay, all by changing the offset between the two virtual tape decks. A wobble control introduces a bit of random noise, so you can use this to just subtly thicken your sound, or as a full on delay pedal (only a single delay, but often that's enough).

Build quality is what you'd expect at this price, it's worth noting that you'll need a decent high current power supply if you're adding this to a board, I was trying to run this and an Eventide H9 off a Voodoo labs ISO5 and it can't do both - if you don't give enough juice you get an unpleasant hum from the Deco.

This is the only pedal I'll take to jam sessions, it can make pretty much any amp come alive (and I've played on some real shockers), and the option to put a time related effect on, quickly and easily, is fantastic. So, simple on first appearance, but capable of a lot of very powerful sound enhancement.

Very flexible pedal!

I usually run this at the end of the chain. I mostly use it for a very short and subtle always on-delay in 'bounce'-mode,with two repeats. It sounds warm and very "analog" and somehow enhances the sound in a beautiful way. By turning the big knob on the right (which is easy to do by foot), Deco's behaviour is able to do a bit longer delays, very nice chorus and flanging sounds. The latter are also accessible by holding the right switch down. The settings change then in the same way as if you would slowly turn the 'lag time' to the left until 'through zero'.

The left side of the pedal can be a very good clean boost. On higher 'saturation' levels, the sound gets thicker and more compressed, and at maximum the pedal is capable of a very useful smooth overdrive sound, which doesn't seem to cut or boost any frequencies.

If I had to mention negative points apart from the price: Its digital, so you're going to need a proper power supply. Also, you'll need to read the manual to find out how the secondary functions work.

One of my favourite pedals!

Unique pedal

This pedal probably isn't everyone's idea of a worthwhile investment. It is expensive and you will find other, similar effects elsewhere; although maybe not in one, high quality machine like this. Personally, for recording, I can see myself using this most of the time. It's great for splitting a mono guitar signal into stereo and the sounds it can produce, from subtle, velvety saturation to fairly extreme and unique flange and chorus sounds (and a lot in between) also with some short one or two repeat echo, are luxurious in texture. A high quality pedal with a plenty of versatility.