Help. What effect am I playing through?

[YouMa]

Just after a bit of know how really. Much appreciated. I have never really played through effects. Recently acquired an old Alesis quadraverb which is a great bit of kit for guitar reverb. Anyhow stuck bass in one night and sounds amazing. The setting is called stereo spread. Thing is it seems to have also tidied up my playing there are no noises the volume is even when I slap. It almost feels like like notes have a very slight delay when playing and a bit like notes are being sucked out of fingers. I have a feeling it might be a noise gate? Or compressor? Any ideas?

[SH73]

I am not a big fan of effects in the bass, maybe a DI pedal or small compact TC compressor. Have you tried switching one off or do combinations to find the culprit. Maybe a different order of plugging may help. When I use guitar effect, I'd put noise gate as last after e.g. chorus, delay, reverb. Have you tried FX return?

[Newfoundfreedom]

Sounds like a compressor with the level turned up quite high. That would kill the initial loud slap of the note then phase back in as the volume decreases, causing the delay effect you're talking about. 

Edited January 29, 2023 by Newfoundfreedom

[Buddster]

I don't think there is an inbuilt compressor or noise gate (at least it's not one of the parameters you can edit). It's a reverb/delay/modulation piece of outboard gear. 

If its a Stereo Spread preset, there's probably phase shifting/chorus going on, widening the image. Are you listening in mono or stereo? If mono, perhaps you're only getting one side. Or, the mono is summing the stereo effect causing out of phase audio (which is used to widen the stereo image) to cancel out. 

 

If theres a slight delay, have you mixed in a dry signal or just listening to the effect? Chorus uses a modulated delay to create the effect so you maybe getting just the delayed signal.

In a studio situation, this unit would normally be a piece of outbard gear, feed by an aux send and you would also have a dry signal present. 

 

Hope that helps. Download the manual and get in to the editing section, find out what's being used.