Issue with Beat Buddy and Ditto Looper

BeatBuddy Bugs/Help
#1

I’m having an issue with how I’m trying to use the BB and my Ditto looper. I’ve decide that for my workflow I want to have the looper running after the Beat Buddy so I can record the drums into it and then overdub with rhythm, etc.

Anyway, for some reason, when I try to record a loop with the Ditto placed after the Beat Buddy I get a loud wash of white noise in any loop I record. This happens whether I’m recording drums from the BB or just using the looper on its own.

It doesn’t happen with the Ditto anywhere else in the pedal chain, only if the BB is before the Ditto. It’s pretty loud, too — almost as loud as whatever I’m recording. Take the BB out of the chain or just place it after the Ditto and once again the Ditto is dead silent.

Any thoughts here? It unfortunately makes this effect order unusable for me, which is kind of a drag.

#2

First thing that comes to mind is power supply. Both the Ditto AND the BB are very touchy with this. Try isolating grounds (different supplies sockets, etc).

If it’s not that it’s beyond me. Really.

#3

Thanks for the reply. I’m using a Voodoo Lab PP2+ for most of my effects. The Ditto is plugged into that. I have tried the BB three different ways so far:

  1. using the included power supply plugged into the PP2 courtesy outlet
  2. using the included power supply plugged into a completely separate power strip outlet
  3. plugged directly into either outlet 5 or 6 on the PP2 (only 250ma, but it fires up and works perfectly even without the 300ma that the BB is supposed to require)

No difference using any of these methods. The white noise is there in all instances.

I’m at a loss. The Ditto has never had this issue with any pedal in front of it.

#4

Try using the headphone output then. The ditto is line level friendly (I have one, and TC says it is, I know that).

Of course there’s the Ditto’s ‘true bypass’, but you could just turn down the BB. Since both are digital it should be doable.

#5

Thanks for the idea. I don’t have a 1/8" to 1/4" cable here, and to be honest, I’d rather not go that route if possible. I’d rather just use it as a normal pedal in the chain if I can.

Hopefully someone from BB will chime in. I emailed support earlier in the week and haven’t heard anything back, so here’s hoping they monitor things here.

Not to put you out, but if you ever get a spare 5 mins and could check out my scenario with your Ditto, I’d be very grateful. I’d at least like to know if it’s a typical BB/Ditto interaction or something going on with my pedal.

Thanks again.

#6

Hi

It will take a couple days for me to do this as it’s at another location but I would be getting it anyway. I am also curious.

#7

Well, I went to a local shop today and tried the Beat Buddy with both a Ditto and the EHX 360 Looper. Their Ditto did the same thing as mine, but the 360 seemed to work fine with the BB so I bought that, and it’s working out nicely so far.

I think the thing with the BB is that it has a pretty hot buffered output. In my setup, just having it in the signal chain (not engaged) results in a pretty substantial gain boost. I tested that today using a Keeley true bypass looper pedal. So it must be something about the buffered signal (impedance or whatever)that the Ditto just doesn’t like.

#8

I too have the ditto looper and the beatbuddy. I can’t afford to be spending another $400+ on a new looper with midi-sync, and would like to get this to work. I’ve been looking for hours and can’t find an answer on how to set this up. My equipment is as follows: beatbuddy, guitar, yamaha guitar amp, monitor speakers, ditto looper.

#9

The type of jacks used on the Beat Buddy are quite loose and the output jacks sometimes do not make good contact and I had the same “White Noise” problem when I first got the Beat Buddy. I really didn’t ratify the problem but I have been really careful to make sure that the plugs make good contact in the pedal. I looked at the jacks and they have spring loaded type of mechanism and you can’t fix them. Try moving the leads when you have it turned on to see if the noise stops or is sporatic. If wiggling the plugs or cable causes the noise to stop then I would have a close look at the jacks in the Beat Buddy. I don’t know if it would be a hard thing to replace them since they are soldered onto the circuit board. Those type of jacks are used in a lot of equipment from foreign countries unfortunatley. Once I mounted the BB pedal onto my pedalboard and stabilized it, I don’t have anymore problems with the noise. I did have to remove a couple of pedals that caused some problems and I think it was because they had a “Time Generator” inside like a looper pedal and a flange pedal. These type of pedals put noise back into the power supply and causes trouble with the rest of the pedals. You might also check and change the power supply. The “1Spot” wall warts have caused me all kinds of problems so I removed all of them. It could be that the two pedals conflict with each other so I guess you would have to make a choice on which one. I had to remove two Boss RC-2 pedals because they were generating a “High Frequency” throughout the pedalboard and all the rest of the pedals. I really hated to remove them because they are the only ones that were decent from Boss. I made a lot of loop rhythm tracks with them even though they had limited drum sounds. I hope you find a solution to the problem. Like I said, there are some pedals that just don’t work together and this may be the case. I have heard that the Ditto pedals cause problems with other pedals. My looper is a JamMan Delay by Digitech and it works very well with the Beat Buddy after I made a stereo volume/tone control box to antennuate the strong signal coming out of the Beat Buddy. It is really hot. Hope this info helps.
Sincerely, Fingerstylepicker.

#10

Thanks for the reply Fingerstylepicker. You mentioned using the JamMan looper alongside the BeatBuddy. Were you able to achieve an auto sync (midisync) between the loop and the drum beat? I thought I read somewhere, that there is a device you can use alongside the JamMan to give it midi-sync capabilities, yet a bunch of folks were saying that it didn’t work very well. I just can’t see spending $400+ on a Boomerrang or Infinity pedal. What I ended up doing was recording my beatbuddy drums into my ditto looper, and then just adding layers from there. It fixes the out of time issue at least.

#11

@BAN Not to minimize your issue, but I’m curious as to why you would put the BB before the ditto? Do you really need to record the drums into the looper? I mean, they’ve already recorded. :wink:

I am using a BB to provide the midi clock , and start/stop/switch commands to a Ditto X4. But the actual sound of the BB goes to some nice full range speakers. It doesn’t belong going where the guitar signal is going anyways.

#12

I Have the same problem. I try a direct box between the unit and it did solve the problem.
So it’s an impedance problem.