Behringer VM1 -- clone EHX memory man !

I just got one of these a few days ago; paid $140 Australian with postage - Deluxe Memory Men sell here for $400+ new. The VM1 actually runs on 9v - it has a 100ma 9v adapter included. There is a picture that's floating around on the net which shows it with an 18v-labeled jack but that may have been a prototype. What I have written here is more a review and quick peak just to get the topic started. I hope someone finds this marginally useful.

First of all the thing weighs about 1kg and has rather tight feeling pots - unlike a few other Behringer Vintage models. I've never owned a Deluxe Memory Man, so I can't compare them directly but the Behringer sounds alright - very analogue and spongy - maybe bordering on muddy at times. The vibrato is more usable than the chorus feature - though they both simulate tape warble, but the chorus is too detuned after 1 on the dial to my ear. The Time Machine sounds pretty cool on clean and dirty stuff and the preamp section gives you a nice, crisp, fat sort of boost when it's put in front of a dirty amp. The delays themselves are best described as lo-fi. After about 7 on the delay dial (about 300ms) things get pretty murky. The pedal distorts in a nasty way if you turn the level and repeats up too high. Backing off on the level helps a lot with this. I really enjoyed playing my Strat clean with about 300ms of delay and a touch of vibrato - got some nice Tommy Bolin Echoplex-type sounds when I dialed in a bit of OD. Self-oscillation happens after 5 on the feedback/repeat knob and it could really destroy your speakers. I have 400-500w Eminence PA speakers in my two 65w amps and I was worried about the violence of the oscillations and quickly backed off on the knob.

The quirks with the pedal are in bypassed mode. The led stays on, although more dimly, when you hit the footswitch to disengage the effect and the sound still seems to be influenced by the preamp section of the pedal; although the level knob doesn't effect the volume and the output sounds a little thinner. The led is brighter when you engage the effect and you know when it's on because the level of the preamp has a fair whack of boost and fatness to it after 3 on the level dial. You can also turn off the effect with a switch on the back and this leaves you with what sounds like a passive bypass - the pedal will in fact pass a signal without any power - and it sounds the same when the switch is off; but in this mode there is a fair bit of tone suckage - it's certainly thinner and dead sounding to my ears. But, this is mainly an issue for me and my rig because I am splitting the signal between two amps and I really need an active/buffered bypass to preserve my guitar signal. I've yet to do much one amp testing yet. The Time Machine does do some very nice reverb-types of sounds though, and I'm probably going to hook it up into my recording pedal board, as my little recording amp needs a bit of random echo at times.

It's not really what I'd hoped for, just because of the tone suckage when bypassed - I need a better buffer to split my signal. I think this pedal will work best as an "always on" unit with one amp (either in the fx loop or in front), so you can get the boost from the preamp section - this part of it sounds really good. The unit is also very heavy and seems quite sturdy.

I have actually been using a Behringer DD100 digital delay to split my signal to my amps and the Time Machine just can't do this job properly - so the DD100 will be staying on my board for a while - I don't often use the DD100 for delays; it's mainly just an active splitter box. I also have the Behringer VD400 ($50 AU) which is (apparently) a copy of the the Boss DM-3 - this is a great analogue delay (with a good bypass) and I use it for slapback - in addition I use a Moen Pretty Dolly ($80 AU) for medium length echoes and that's analogue-voiced but based around a digital chip - it sounds a lot clearer than the Time Machine to me. I'll still be using the Time Machine for recording though - it does sound good when it's on - just don't turn it off or bypass it if you're running in a dry/wet setup and you're using it as a splitter. Or put it in a true bypass looper perhaps. I still think it's a bargain and eventually there may be some mods that could improve things about it.

The main chip is a Cool Audio V571M Y7N9UA
I can also just make out 3 other smaller 8 pin chips labeled: 4558 ED82.

Moi, je trouve que ça ouvre à la possibilité d'en avoir plusieurs plutôt qu'une seule… Genre une pour mettre en tout début de chaîne, avant compresseur et satus et autres pour obtenir d'autres sonorités (pour l'instant je dois me limiter à mettre une Big Muff en fin de chaîne, c'est déjà ça mais un peu pauvre), puis ça permettrait d'en cumuler deux, ou d'avoir deux réglages différents (pour pas devoir passer son temps à triturer les potards, ce qui est mon cas)… Mais bon…

le vide à l'intérieur fait encore plus schmet

Celle-là, je suis pas sûr que les Français comprennent .

Sinon Zepot, dis-toi que ça permet à pleins de gars qui n'ont pas forcément 260 euros à mettre dans un vrai MM (c'est quand même abusé, j'avais acheté le mien neuf 160 euros) de toucher une part du mythe .

On peut la trouver chez Thomann ou pas? je vois rien ou c'est mes yeux.

Je sais bien, mais je préfère donner ma thune (et pourtant j'en ai pas beaucoup, surtout en ce moment) à EHX, je suis fan de cette marque !