VERY good review of this power supply. I just bought one and hooked it up today. I like it a lot! I love how some people are complaining about saving money because this is a Chinese company. Where do you think VooDoo LAbs gets most of their parts for their pedal power? I bet the people who complained also shop at Walmart...who also sells Chinese products!!! Thanks for the review!!
+Mike's Tips, Tricks & Reviews Please, the difference is not in the fact that it is Chinese... In the Voodoo Lab EACH output has it's own transformer, they are completely electrically isolated from each other and this is where a big chunk of the cost comes from. In inexpensive ones like this one, each output has its own voltage regulator but they all share their grounds and transformer. This does not mean that in your setup it will be necessarily noisier, but it does not prevent you from getting a ground loop, which is why the Voodoo Labs Pedal Power and such exists. It is the equivalent of plugging a bunch of wall warts into a power strip. Put a pedal in the FX loop and one in front of the amp and you'll have a nice 60Hz hum to play your solos on.
+Steve Benitah Being Chinese made DOES make a HUGE difference in price! Yes VooDoo Labs has an extra or 2...but when the price difference is 400% higher being built overseas IS the biggest reason.
As long as the power connectors are plugged in to the pedals and they have jacks plugged in to the inputs, flipping the bypass foot switches will make very little difference to the load. Bypass switches on effect pedals never turn the pedal power on or off. All you add or remove is a couple of milliamp's to power the LED's. If you really wanted to show that voltage remains stable with increasing load you either have to connect a variable load to one of the outputs and measure the voltage across it, or to show that one output is unaffected by load on the others, measure the voltage at one output as you gradually plug more pedals in to the other outputs. The circuit configuration of this power supply is - one switching regulator to provide the 18V in the plug top and a 12V switching regulator and a 9V switching regulator in the power brick. Each output has individual current limiting. They are not otherwise isolated from each other. They actually seem to work pretty well. The comments saying they are junk I would guess relate to faulty units. One possible flaw is that the input connector for the 18V into the brick is identical to and right next to, all the output connectors.
really excited to get this. Don't run too many pedals these days... so spending 100 bux on an MXR or whatever didn't sound too fun. I got this for like 27 dollars or something. Can't wait!
Guys I just received the power supply and it's great. I mean it's not a fuel tank but definitely works. Almost zero noise, even when using multiple distortion pedals, all outputs do their job, the polarity reversal cable works fine, honestly this is a pretty good power supply. A trick: if u use a 9v adapter on the 18 v input all outputs will turn into 9v, even the 12v ones. Also if u want to reduce the noise even more use a transformer-adaptor, I don't use the one that came with the power supply
Awsome Video. Thank you. Just bought one after seeing this. Guys are having noise issues, please try them using a battery just to make sure that all the noise are gone... It might be something else such as inexpensive cables, very high gain amp, radio, cell phone or other transmission? Good luck all:)
This supply isn't isolated, it's really no more isolated than a daisy chain. As long as you don't mix digital and analog pedals (and don't have ground loops), you should be relatively noise-free, the same as a daisy-chain. The difference between this and a true isolated supply is the isolated supply has the transformer in the box, so the transformer taps are isolated both + and - With these Chinese supplies, the transformer is in that wall wart, as with a standard daisy chain.
I hope everyone sees your reply. It in fact is NOT isolated. I bought one to try out, very bad at sharing pedal noise between pedals. Thought I would use this one for my dry analog pedals. Even that was bad. Every gain pedal shared its noise with the others, amplifying the noise with each pedal used. there are plenty of other import power supplies that do a better job. In fact my Voodoo Labs wasn't any better with noise, it's noise problem was just different, not due to lack of isolation.
In my experience, isolating power between pedals only matters if you have am mix of digital and analog pedals. I have stacked 5 overdrives and maxed the gain into an amp with max gain... 11 on everything. No noise gate on. There was 0 difference from using a regular RadioShack, 9v AC/DC adapter compared to a Voodoo Labs 4x4 in terms of noise. No change at all. I have repeated the test several times over the years (just did this 2 days ago), being told to buy expensive power supply units. No change in noise. No change in tone. The only change is using cheap batteries which sometimes sound better because of their voltage drops / sag / resistance. No. The Voodoo Labs with the dial does not mimic this well enough.. It only mimics the voltage drop, but not resistance changes etc (AnalogMan has a device that supposedly really mimics a battery though - the new version, not the old, the old version doesn't work so be careful which RUclips video you watch on this.. Also whether you like the effect or not is up to you). Noise is important to me. Not only playing in a live setting, but playing in a studio. When using a digital pedal, you can simply run the pedal off another adapter. Adapters include transformers, so they will be isolated from each other. One might think that the expensive units will also protect you from noise from dimmers etc. Not in any meaningful way.. Your pickups will pick the noise up no matter how many power conditioners and power isolation bricks you may use. Anyhow, in 25 years of banging on guitars, I haven't noticed a difference... Plus I rarely use digital pedals anyway (but I do use a Kemper). Any mains power issues I may have had have been taken care of by my power conditioner, but even without one, I haven't had any noticeable problems. I am very sensitive to this issue but the way, because I often stack 2 or 3 distortions/overdrives, including fuzz. Cables will also have noise and tone issues, but your mileage will vary. Thin cables with less shielding and jackets between the lead and the shield will pick up more RF interference and have handling noise. Capacitance/length of cable will change tone (a buffer will make the tonal change at least 90% less, but each buffer might have its own tone). Whether the tone change is something you like or dislike all depends. Some people like more capacitance to take the edge off of the guitar tone. To make things more complicated, each guitar will be affected differently. Overly bright and harsh guitars will like more capacitance, while muddy ones less. Put EMG's in your guitar and the cables matter even less. The EMG preamp is basically a buffer, which then pumps the tone through your cables, making the cables matter less.
I always notice that when these low cost pedal power supplies are reviewed that no one checks to see if there are in fact isolated power supplies, and to see if any humming or noise comes through the unit, this is why the isolated power supplies seem to start around $100 plus mark. I dont get it when someone has a fortune in pedals and pedal board cost and skimps out on a power supply for the cost? and if it hums and all the money spent on those pedals for sound were a waste.
I have this Caline psu on my pedalboard and it's great! No hiss or hum though its natural for dirt pedals but it depends on your power lines inside the building. Been using it for months. It's okay for me and I don't know about you guys!
I'm have to power 5 9volt pedals, I currently use a daisy chain and get a bit of noise, would this power supply be a better opinion or should I just stick with my daisy chain? (An isolated power supply would be too expensive at the moment)
Hi. I ordered one of these as I'm on a budget and I'm building my pedal board. Is this still holding up? And for all of the people writing negative reports, try changing the plug, as you see in the video he's using a Dunlop one and not the stock one. Just a suggestion. Thanks
Great review! I have an updated version of this supply and it works fine with bedroom and gig playing! @Grave Guitar please let me know if you would like to sell that Boss Mega Distortion pedal you do not use very often. I had one years ago and it was left at a practice spot and when I returned it was stolen. I would love to get another one. I learned my lesson and always bring my equipment home after every jam session no matter how long I have been jamming with the same people!
thanks for video. please let me know whether germanium fuzz runs safely and okay off your Caline power supply? it requires the opposite polarity, yeah?
This power supply doesn't have the same functionality with more expensive alternatives. The higher price tag comes from the isolation against ground loops. Caline is regulated and short circuit protected but not isolated.
There are a lot of misconceptions about isolated supplies and pedal supplies in general. If your pedal setup is noisy then, yes, of course you have problems. Generally, and I mean in almost all cases, this is down to problems in the pedals themselves no matter how much they prised out of your wallet to get your hands on them. It is always better to treat these problems at source instead of trying to just buy a piece of kit which will mask them. With adequate smoothing where it is needed and well thought out and implemented grounding there is no need for an isolated supply at all. If you have a ground loop then sort it out at source, in the interconnections. There is no reason for this to have to occur except when a pedal's grounding is badly designed in itself or when you don't understand what a ground loop actually is! If you have digital noise escaping onto your power lines and appearing in other pedals then you have very badly designed pedals too! There is no reason for digital noise to escape back into the power lines, a lot of top flight hifi equipment has digital and analogue in the same case fed from the same supply without any issue at all. But they take care in their designs to not allow a mix to occur. And radiated digital noise should have been dealt with too with correct pedal and cable screening. These power supplies are perfectly adequate for well implemented and laid out pedal boards and I would recommend them to anyone who will take a bit of care to not need to use them as a cure for other units' problems. I have used one since they very first appeared, I refused to pay the rip off prices more "advanced" units were charging as I know just how much (much?) there is in them, and they work great for me using a mixture of Sliderig, Dunlop Wah, Marshall Bluesbreaker overdrive and even a cheap RP55 digital multi-effects pedal, (as well as a couple of pedals of my own design). My pedal board is silent simply because I took care of the details and didn't just buy an expensive unit to cover them up. That is rather like buying an anchor to throw out of the window because your car brakes aren't working well enough. It may fix the problem and you stop, but just repair your brakes for Pete's sake. ;-) As an aside, one real improvement I recommend anyone to look into is to feed a supply of this type from a rechargeable 12V/15V/18V cordless drill battery. With a reasonable sized battery it can run for days without needing recharging. There are battery units (Makita BL 1840 is one example) which have headers available which can slip onto the battery and be made to cable the supply out. Battery DC really can help in problem cases.
Thanks for your comment. I'm a beginner and confused about the expensive ones, Vodoo, 1 Spot verses the budget ones. A couple of power supplies have a power adapter that is 12V instead of 18v. I don't know if that would matter. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
@@johnnygreenway3579 The idea of having an 18V supply is not better in principle than a 12V one unless you have pedals which have been designed to work better from a higher voltage than 9V. Many available pedals and some of my own designs have tolerance built in for higher than normal voltages and can actually work better with the extra headroom that this gives them. If you have a 12V pedal then you need to power the pedal supply from a higher than 12V supply. Some voltage is always lost in regulating the supply out. You can see that this power supply is fed from an 18V wall wart. That allows it to offer 12V regulated supplies as well as the normal 9V ones. The 18V output offered must be unregulated and I would guess is simply the 18V input fed through. This unit is exactly what I have used on stage for years without any issues ever even with fairly cheap pedals at times. I started with a Caline unit using their wall wart approach but I hate having cables running under my feet everywhere on stage so I now feed my board supply from a battery supply on the board itself. That comprises a plain old Makita drill battery with a special clip on head. It is charged before every performance but has powered my board at home for a whole day without needing a charge. It's similar to this, though mine was much cheaper: www.amazon.co.uk/Battery-Connector-Adapter-makita-Holder/dp/B08NP5RPRZ Using a battery means the supply is not grounded and floats so there is much less chance of any noise problem. This causes the pedals no problem as they are then grounded through the cable to the amp, and no that is not a safety hazard given the tiny amount of power floating around the guitar end of the setup, it is a perfectly feasible and safe thing to do. That is all you should need for a quiet rig. Properly designed pedals which are quiet and have good screening and grounding arrangements should be absolutely the norm. Unfortunately they are not. They are often a dog's breakfast of amateur design skills and the idea of paying £100+ for them is totally ridiculous. I have my own Klon Centaur clone design. The Klon is a great pedal (not $500,000 great!) but even it has design weaknesses and its power supply can definitely be improved nowadays with tonal improvements around the first pair of opamps. I claim no originality in the signal processing areas, mine is as original, but the power supply is completely redesigned to address a few areas. The PCB is a modern design with proper ground planes. Both opamps are being fed from realistic dual power lines. There are capacitors fitted to both power lines right at each opamps V+ and V- terminals, (how can you sell a pedal and not do that?) The signal earth line is separated from the screening and enclosure ground and connected to it through a low value resistor. The whole charge pump supply area is enclosed and shielded inside a simple grounded folded tin box fitted on the PCB. These are really simple steps to take but it appears very few designers do so. I wonder how many of them even know how much improvement can be made with such basic and cheap changes. "God is in the details!"
I ordered one yesterday, I've got two of those cheap multi adpater plugs for an ISP (noise gate) and a tubescreamer for power at the minute. Hopefully it will be less noisy than those.
Doesn't it have the virtual battery thingy? When a pedal likes a battery, they usually have the little virtual battery. The thing that attaches right onto the battery terminal. That's what the pros do.
I'm using 2 EHX pedal with this power supply "East River Drive" & "Crayon". I haven't had any issues since OD's and Distortions are normally below 100ma. I also used a EHX Memory Man with Hazarai under the 500ma 12volt and encountered no issues! Worked like a charm!
I have 9 pedals hooked up to it, including an EHX Silencer, and it works great. No noise at all and it lights up the pedalboard from the mounting below.
Somebody knows if this power supply make noise? The price says me that yes lol, just wanna know cus im interested to buy a new power supply and i dont have much money. Thanks in advance.
That's my question also. But I am using with no problem. Still there is hesitation. Because some Boss pedals (DD-8, OC-3 etc) officially demand 500 ma. I don't know whether I should replace it.
This is exactly the same as the AGPTEK CP-05 Guitar Pedal Power Supply 100% clone. It use a Switching Power Supply which might generate a ground hum in some guitar amp effect loop.It does generate a hum on my EVH 5150 effect loop. But it does not if I just use it on my pedal between my guitar and my amp. Beware...you get what you pay for.
***** Nevermind, now i see that most sellers on ebay offer versions for eu plug, hope itll work good but for the price ill not be disapointed even if it dont :D
This cp-05 is not isolated, but it is have regulated and protecting sirkuit which make better than usual daisy chain, why people compare this to daisy chain? Lol, it is better, if you want better than this and have isolated you need spend more money
it's not isolated. sorry. non of those cheap power supplies our isolated. I don't see how they get by with it. if it was truly isolated you shouldn't get any reading on your meter. watch a video where they do the same thing you are doing but they don't get no reading. so again you will not get a reading on a meter if it is a true insolated supply. now this company does offer a true isolated power supply. it's the 06 and the 08. and Ofcorse they cost a lot more then the 05.
Absolute waste of money. This thing produces continuous noise, crackling and squeaks from voltage spikes. It is so prominant that I'm sure a dj would sample the crap coming from my amp produced by this catastrophic abomination of a pedal power supply. A daisy chain is infinitely better than this. 0/10. Ps. Not real isolated.
+Martin Krauser I have tried every conceivable combination and avenue to reduce noise. including different wall sockets, different leads, different amps, analog only pedals and digital only. The best solution; Ditch this glorified daisy chain, bite the bullet and buy a real isolated supply. I bought a voodoo lab pedal power. With the exact same setup there is an outstanding difference. I get practically no hum, hence the certainty that the fault lies with this falsely labled, resource wasting product.
Have you checked your home's feng shui, though? Just kidding, cheap quality "control" strikes again. Apparently a gamble to buy one of these, I'll just try to make a DIY isolation with a transformer.
+Martin Krauser Judging by general consensus Im going to label this as a poor product rather than quality control. If you have the skills then why not? I just implore that you dont waste your money on this. Good luck!
I just got mine, DON'T BUY IT! It's noisy as hell, just unusable. I have a daisy chain of 5 pedals and it's still better than using this shitty brick. What a waste of money.
Don't be silly. There is no problem if the grounds are isolated. The problem with most cheap power supplies is that they are basically daisy chains in a box. The Vitoos DC is an exception, I believe.
I mean, if you mix a normal 9V analog pedal like Phase 90 or Carbon Copy and a really power-hungry digital pedal it might not end well, the digital should have it's own isolated output.
Yes. It can come from the same power supply, though. :) The problem isn't even the current drain, since if the digital pedal draws 200 mA and the analog drains 10 mA, they can work just fine on a 250 mA source. The real problem is that digital pedals very often do not shield the power ground, because the power ground is only there to power the chip. It mostly doesn't influence the audio signal at all, so it is cost efficient for producers to just ignore any noise leaking to power ground. But when you connect that same lead to power an analog pedal, oh boy. If I daisy chain a DigiTech Jamman Solo XT with an overdrive, I get to hear noises like with a dial-up modem. :D
This thing is a price of crap I got one a while ago and I've had nothing but trouble with it. It hisses every one and a while and one day a few months ago it just randomly stopped. Let me just tell you, you get what you pay for
You get what you pay for. These cheaper supplies are just repackaged daisy chains, and will not only cause hum and all sorts of other issues, but will probably kill some pedals. Buyer beware. Besides, best to support local industry who hang their proverbial brand hats on quality, rather than saving some $$$ for a Chinese company to get rich off the work of some poor people in a sweat shop. I don't normally write negative comments on RUclips vids, and your demo is quite good and all that, but if there's one thing I can't stand it's saving $$$ at the expense of everything else.
Rodger van Raalte I personally would much rather support American jobs, but unfortunately, American manufacturers have become so greedy that they actually think that it's okay for them to have all of their parts made in China and assembled here in the US by low paid illegal immigrants whom they willingly hire while cutting legal Americans out of jobs simply so they can pay the illegals much less and make even more of a profit for themselves before marking the price that they paid up 5000% from their own overhead and then passing the bill onto American consumers who are just trying to survive living paycheck to paycheck while these (now rich) jerkoffs arrogantly look down on us from their multimillion dollar mansions. I can no longer afford to be ripped off by arrogant assholes who seem to think that their shit doesn't stink when in fact, their products are quite often just as crappy (and sometimes even more so) than their foreign competition that only costs about 2 hours of pay to aquire, rather than almost an entire week's paycheck to pay for the rich man's next exotic sports car and steak and lobster dinner.
VERY good review of this power supply. I just bought one and hooked it up today. I like it a lot! I love how some people are complaining about saving money because this is a Chinese company. Where do you think VooDoo LAbs gets most of their parts for their pedal power? I bet the people who complained also shop at Walmart...who also sells Chinese products!!! Thanks for the review!!
+Mike's Tips, Tricks & Reviews Please, the difference is not in the fact that it is Chinese... In the Voodoo Lab EACH output has it's own transformer, they are completely electrically isolated from each other and this is where a big chunk of the cost comes from.
In inexpensive ones like this one, each output has its own voltage regulator but they all share their grounds and transformer. This does not mean that in your setup it will be necessarily noisier, but it does not prevent you from getting a ground loop, which is why the Voodoo Labs Pedal Power and such exists.
It is the equivalent of plugging a bunch of wall warts into a power strip. Put a pedal in the FX loop and one in front of the amp and you'll have a nice 60Hz hum to play your solos on.
+Steve Benitah Being Chinese made DOES make a HUGE difference in price! Yes VooDoo Labs has an extra or 2...but when the price difference is 400% higher being built overseas IS the biggest reason.
+Mike's Tips, Tricks & Reviews True, but there is really no contest between this and a Voodoo Lab quality wise. This is simply a fancy wall wart.
Does it still function properly after 3 years?
119FU who cares. I can buy 5 of them for the price of 1 voodoo lab
I’ve used that power unit to run my pedals, no issues at all!!!
Are your pedals all analog?
As long as the power connectors are plugged in to the pedals and they have jacks plugged in to the inputs, flipping the bypass foot switches will make very little difference to the load. Bypass switches on effect pedals never turn the pedal power on or off. All you add or remove is a couple of milliamp's to power the LED's. If you really wanted to show that voltage remains stable with increasing load you either have to connect a variable load to one of the outputs and measure the voltage across it, or to show that one output is unaffected by load on the others, measure the voltage at one output as you gradually plug more pedals in to the other outputs.
The circuit configuration of this power supply is - one switching regulator to provide the 18V in the plug top and a 12V switching regulator and a 9V switching regulator in the power brick. Each output has individual current limiting. They are not otherwise isolated from each other.
They actually seem to work pretty well. The comments saying they are junk I would guess relate to faulty units.
One possible flaw is that the input connector for the 18V into the brick is identical to and right next to, all the output connectors.
really excited to get this. Don't run too many pedals these days... so spending 100 bux on an MXR or whatever didn't sound too fun. I got this for like 27 dollars or something. Can't wait!
Guys I just received the power supply and it's great. I mean it's not a fuel tank but definitely works. Almost zero noise, even when using multiple distortion pedals, all outputs do their job, the polarity reversal cable works fine, honestly this is a pretty good power supply. A trick: if u use a 9v adapter on the 18 v input all outputs will turn into 9v, even the 12v ones. Also if u want to reduce the noise even more use a transformer-adaptor, I don't use the one that came with the power supply
your trick works? You haven't fried something? I will try it tonight
Craving For You s
I have one, works great! Use a different wall plug with it no noise works great!
Clear and concise video, giving me the info I was looking for - thank you
Awsome Video. Thank you. Just bought one after seeing this. Guys are having noise issues, please try them using a battery just to make sure that all the noise are gone... It might be something else such as inexpensive cables, very high gain amp, radio, cell phone or other transmission?
Good luck all:)
Hey man, that's such a nice review, thank you forma sharing!
Thank for share this vídeo. I would like to watch a isolation test of this Power supply. Regards from Brasil 🇧🇷🇧🇷
This supply isn't isolated, it's really no more isolated than a daisy chain. As long as you don't mix digital and analog pedals (and don't have ground loops), you should be relatively noise-free, the same as a daisy-chain. The difference between this and a true isolated supply is the isolated supply has the transformer in the box, so the transformer taps are isolated both + and -
With these Chinese supplies, the transformer is in that wall wart, as with a standard daisy chain.
I hope everyone sees your reply. It in fact is NOT isolated. I bought one to try out, very bad at sharing pedal noise between pedals. Thought I would use this one for my dry analog pedals. Even that was bad. Every gain pedal shared its noise with the others, amplifying the noise with each pedal used. there are plenty of other import power supplies that do a better job. In fact my Voodoo Labs wasn't any better with noise, it's noise problem was just different, not due to lack of isolation.
So there there a cheap isolated supply?
If you add a noise gate pedal to the end of your chain will that eliminate noise with a non-isolated power supply?
In my experience, isolating power between pedals only matters if you have am mix of digital and analog pedals.
I have stacked 5 overdrives and maxed the gain into an amp with max gain... 11 on everything. No noise gate on.
There was 0 difference from using a regular RadioShack, 9v AC/DC adapter compared to a Voodoo Labs 4x4 in terms of noise. No change at all. I have repeated the test several times over the years (just did this 2 days ago), being told to buy expensive power supply units. No change in noise. No change in tone. The only change is using cheap batteries which sometimes sound better because of their voltage drops / sag / resistance. No. The Voodoo Labs with the dial does not mimic this well enough.. It only mimics the voltage drop, but not resistance changes etc (AnalogMan has a device that supposedly really mimics a battery though - the new version, not the old, the old version doesn't work so be careful which RUclips video you watch on this.. Also whether you like the effect or not is up to you).
Noise is important to me. Not only playing in a live setting, but playing in a studio.
When using a digital pedal, you can simply run the pedal off another adapter. Adapters include transformers, so they will be isolated from each other.
One might think that the expensive units will also protect you from noise from dimmers etc. Not in any meaningful way.. Your pickups will pick the noise up no matter how many power conditioners and power isolation bricks you may use.
Anyhow, in 25 years of banging on guitars, I haven't noticed a difference... Plus I rarely use digital pedals anyway (but I do use a Kemper). Any mains power issues I may have had have been taken care of by my power conditioner, but even without one, I haven't had any noticeable problems.
I am very sensitive to this issue but the way, because I often stack 2 or 3 distortions/overdrives, including fuzz.
Cables will also have noise and tone issues, but your mileage will vary. Thin cables with less shielding and jackets between the lead and the shield will pick up more RF interference and have handling noise. Capacitance/length of cable will change tone (a buffer will make the tonal change at least 90% less, but each buffer might have its own tone). Whether the tone change is something you like or dislike all depends. Some people like more capacitance to take the edge off of the guitar tone. To make things more complicated, each guitar will be affected differently. Overly bright and harsh guitars will like more capacitance, while muddy ones less.
Put EMG's in your guitar and the cables matter even less. The EMG preamp is basically a buffer, which then pumps the tone through your cables, making the cables matter less.
I always notice that when these low cost pedal power supplies are reviewed that no one checks to see if there are in fact isolated power supplies, and to see if any humming or noise comes through the unit, this is why the isolated power supplies seem to start around $100 plus mark. I dont get it when someone has a fortune in pedals and pedal board cost and skimps out on a power supply for the cost? and if it hums and all the money spent on those pedals for sound were a waste.
I have this Caline psu on my pedalboard and it's great! No hiss or hum though its natural for dirt pedals but it depends on your power lines inside the building. Been using it for months. It's okay for me and I don't know about you guys!
How trustworthy is the 500mA output? I want to run my Line 6 M5 with it
I'm have to power 5 9volt pedals, I currently use a daisy chain and get a bit of noise, would this power supply be a better opinion or should I just stick with my daisy chain? (An isolated power supply would be too expensive at the moment)
Excellent review
Hi. I ordered one of these as I'm on a budget and I'm building my pedal board. Is this still holding up?
And for all of the people writing negative reports, try changing the plug, as you see in the video he's using a Dunlop one and not the stock one. Just a suggestion. Thanks
i suggest to buy a noise compressor or noise reduction pedal to those who want to reduce the hum problems
Great review! I have an updated version of this supply and it works fine with bedroom and gig playing! @Grave Guitar please let me know if you would like to sell that Boss Mega Distortion pedal you do not use very often. I had one years ago and it was left at a practice spot and when I returned it was stolen. I would love to get another one. I learned my lesson and always bring my equipment home after every jam session no matter how long I have been jamming with the same people!
thanks for video. please let me know whether germanium fuzz runs safely and okay off your Caline power supply? it requires the opposite polarity, yeah?
Do the polarity reversal cables work? Some reviews saying they don't :/
Cheers
Super helpful! Thank you!
Can you power a standard 9v pedal using the 500 mA out?
GOD Bless You 🎸🎸🎸
the 12 and 18volt are isolated..maybe, the 9 volts are not and share a ground.
This power supply doesn't have the same functionality with more expensive alternatives. The higher price tag comes from the isolation against ground loops. Caline is regulated and short circuit protected but not isolated.
You would be surprised at how much lying these big names do about isolation. Always check for yourself.
There are a lot of misconceptions about isolated supplies and pedal supplies in general. If your pedal setup is noisy then, yes, of course you have problems. Generally, and I mean in almost all cases, this is down to problems in the pedals themselves no matter how much they prised out of your wallet to get your hands on them. It is always better to treat these problems at source instead of trying to just buy a piece of kit which will mask them.
With adequate smoothing where it is needed and well thought out and implemented grounding there is no need for an isolated supply at all. If you have a ground loop then sort it out at source, in the interconnections. There is no reason for this to have to occur except when a pedal's grounding is badly designed in itself or when you don't understand what a ground loop actually is!
If you have digital noise escaping onto your power lines and appearing in other pedals then you have very badly designed pedals too! There is no reason for digital noise to escape back into the power lines, a lot of top flight hifi equipment has digital and analogue in the same case fed from the same supply without any issue at all. But they take care in their designs to not allow a mix to occur. And radiated digital noise should have been dealt with too with correct pedal and cable screening.
These power supplies are perfectly adequate for well implemented and laid out pedal boards and I would recommend them to anyone who will take a bit of care to not need to use them as a cure for other units' problems. I have used one since they very first appeared, I refused to pay the rip off prices more "advanced" units were charging as I know just how much (much?) there is in them, and they work great for me using a mixture of Sliderig, Dunlop Wah, Marshall Bluesbreaker overdrive and even a cheap RP55 digital multi-effects pedal, (as well as a couple of pedals of my own design). My pedal board is silent simply because I took care of the details and didn't just buy an expensive unit to cover them up. That is rather like buying an anchor to throw out of the window because your car brakes aren't working well enough. It may fix the problem and you stop, but just repair your brakes for Pete's sake. ;-)
As an aside, one real improvement I recommend anyone to look into is to feed a supply of this type from a rechargeable 12V/15V/18V cordless drill battery. With a reasonable sized battery it can run for days without needing recharging. There are battery units (Makita BL 1840 is one example) which have headers available which can slip onto the battery and be made to cable the supply out. Battery DC really can help in problem cases.
This is the answer we all are looking for.
Thanks for your comment. I'm a beginner and confused about the expensive ones, Vodoo, 1 Spot verses the budget ones. A couple of power supplies have a power adapter that is 12V instead of 18v. I don't know if that would matter. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
@@johnnygreenway3579 The idea of having an 18V supply is not better in principle than a 12V one unless you have pedals which have been designed to work better from a higher voltage than 9V. Many available pedals and some of my own designs have tolerance built in for higher than normal voltages and can actually work better with the extra headroom that this gives them. If you have a 12V pedal then you need to power the pedal supply from a higher than 12V supply. Some voltage is always lost in regulating the supply out. You can see that this power supply is fed from an 18V wall wart. That allows it to offer 12V regulated supplies as well as the normal 9V ones. The 18V output offered must be unregulated and I would guess is simply the 18V input fed through.
This unit is exactly what I have used on stage for years without any issues ever even with fairly cheap pedals at times. I started with a Caline unit using their wall wart approach but I hate having cables running under my feet everywhere on stage so I now feed my board supply from a battery supply on the board itself. That comprises a plain old Makita drill battery with a special clip on head. It is charged before every performance but has powered my board at home for a whole day without needing a charge. It's similar to this, though mine was much cheaper:
www.amazon.co.uk/Battery-Connector-Adapter-makita-Holder/dp/B08NP5RPRZ
Using a battery means the supply is not grounded and floats so there is much less chance of any noise problem. This causes the pedals no problem as they are then grounded through the cable to the amp, and no that is not a safety hazard given the tiny amount of power floating around the guitar end of the setup, it is a perfectly feasible and safe thing to do. That is all you should need for a quiet rig.
Properly designed pedals which are quiet and have good screening and grounding arrangements should be absolutely the norm. Unfortunately they are not. They are often a dog's breakfast of amateur design skills and the idea of paying £100+ for them is totally ridiculous. I have my own Klon Centaur clone design. The Klon is a great pedal (not $500,000 great!) but even it has design weaknesses and its power supply can definitely be improved nowadays with tonal improvements around the first pair of opamps. I claim no originality in the signal processing areas, mine is as original, but the power supply is completely redesigned to address a few areas. The PCB is a modern design with proper ground planes. Both opamps are being fed from realistic dual power lines. There are capacitors fitted to both power lines right at each opamps V+ and V- terminals, (how can you sell a pedal and not do that?) The signal earth line is separated from the screening and enclosure ground and connected to it through a low value resistor. The whole charge pump supply area is enclosed and shielded inside a simple grounded folded tin box fitted on the PCB. These are really simple steps to take but it appears very few designers do so. I wonder how many of them even know how much improvement can be made with such basic and cheap changes.
"God is in the details!"
Thanks for the info, is there any noise on the circuit?
I ordered one yesterday, I've got two of those cheap multi adpater plugs for an ISP (noise gate) and a tubescreamer for power at the minute. Hopefully it will be less noisy than those.
[a year passes] ...how did it go?
@@LichKingSkullWart 6 years later, any updates?
I might buy one too!
Is their a power supply that you can put batteries in or charge, for instance??? instead of plugging it in to an outlet.....
Doesn't it have the virtual battery thingy? When a pedal likes a battery, they usually have the little virtual battery. The thing that attaches right onto the battery terminal. That's what the pros do.
Thx bro
can i use this to carry my boss dd500?
Could I also plug a 9v powered pedal board light into this power supply?
Is it possible to power one of these with a Danelectro DA-1 9V Power Supply or do you need a 18v power cord?
Can i use a dc to dc step down buck converter on the 12v & 18v?and set it ro 9v?
I got some 9v pedals and a line6 delay on my pedalboard. how should I power them with this unit? which spot I should use for line6?
im goin to buy a replacement 18v adapter to minimize the hiss
it is quiet or noisy? I really want to eliminate the hum
this basically a Joyo power supply 2
Is this better than a daisy chain?
hello ... how do I connect a volume pedal 12V being that it has the positive center?
Boss, good day, I dunno if it can power up a boss me 33, a boss ve 2 and a nux loopcore
it has the same qualities as those mentioned? I'm looking to buy? but do not know if it's good.
Seems to be ok. I have been running a caline psu for a few months now and done quite a few gigs and it hasn't missed beat.
Is this isolated?
all the cables are with the box or we have to buy them (Without the 10 cables who go to the pedal)
+alexneuville All the cables are with the box. :)
Had mine for 2 days...it works when it feels like it now, pops on and off all the time, god knows why, only had 3 pedals in it..pity.
get one with any plug you want on geek the app
Could you use this with EHX pedals and if so what port would i use ?
I'm using 2 EHX pedal with this power supply "East River Drive" & "Crayon". I haven't had any issues since OD's and Distortions are normally below 100ma. I also used a EHX Memory Man with Hazarai under the 500ma 12volt and encountered no issues! Worked like a charm!
I have 9 pedals hooked up to it, including an EHX Silencer, and it works great. No noise at all and it lights up the pedalboard from the mounting below.
Somebody knows if this power supply make noise? The price says me that yes lol, just wanna know cus im interested to buy a new power supply and i dont have much money. Thanks in advance.
I missed it. Are all the outputs limited to 100ma
no, 3 of them are 500ma for bigger pedals
I just got one and I am getting a lot of hiss from it and I don't know why? Any suggestions?
*****
Yeah I am using all boss pedals and a wha
I have tried all of them and in different spots and they all do the same thing
I have the same FxxxxxG problem.
Adam K all boss pedals is why youre getting hum. they are notoriously noisy.
Got a similar problem
all inputs are 100 ma. i have 120-130 ma pedals. so is this a problem? can i use it?
That's my question also. But I am using with no problem. Still there is hesitation. Because some Boss pedals (DD-8, OC-3 etc) officially demand 500 ma. I don't know whether I should replace it.
This is exactly the same as the AGPTEK CP-05 Guitar Pedal Power Supply 100% clone.
It use a Switching Power Supply which might generate a ground hum in some guitar amp effect loop.It does generate a hum on my EVH 5150 effect loop. But it does not if I just use it on my pedal between my guitar and my amp. Beware...you get what you pay for.
will i get hum, static noice or any other issue if i use it with adapter for eu plug?
*****
Nevermind, now i see that most sellers on ebay offer versions for eu plug, hope itll work good but for the price ill not be disapointed even if it dont :D
+Miroslav Rutesic Don't buy it. its crap
nice detailed review my friend
bought harley pp junior, no noice with a lot of 'noicy' pedals, still working great
NICE OH MINE COST 26 NEW AMAZON UHH HOW YA MOUNTING JUST ON TOP?????
not isolated 9volts outputs. its not true
@@Xxmeca421xX SAY WHAT ????
help my caline cp 05 noise
Mine was ok but broke after a few months
Good for bedroom players.
This cp-05 is not isolated, but it is have regulated and protecting sirkuit which make better than usual daisy chain, why people compare this to daisy chain? Lol, it is better, if you want better than this and have isolated you need spend more money
Better use voodoo labs pedal power and it's worth the price
it's not isolated. sorry. non of those cheap power supplies our isolated. I don't see how they get by with it. if it was truly isolated you shouldn't get any reading on your meter. watch a video where they do the same thing you are doing but they don't get no reading. so again you will not get a reading on a meter if it is a true insolated supply. now this company does offer a true isolated power supply. it's the 06 and the 08. and Ofcorse they cost a lot more then the 05.
not true isolated? I think no
*****
I missed that 35 dollar part somehow...yeah, that works
indeed, not proper isolated. nevertheless, this thing is still great for the price.
Absolute waste of money. This thing produces continuous noise, crackling and squeaks from voltage spikes. It is so prominant that I'm sure a dj would sample the crap coming from my amp produced by this catastrophic abomination of a pedal power supply. A daisy chain is infinitely better than this. 0/10. Ps. Not real isolated.
+Localgathering I have the same problem i tried different ways to conect my pedals and sound like crap!
+Localgathering Have you mixed digital and analog pedals? Tried different wall warts as input?
+Martin Krauser I have tried every conceivable combination and avenue to reduce noise. including different wall sockets, different leads, different amps, analog only pedals and digital only. The best solution; Ditch this glorified daisy chain, bite the bullet and buy a real isolated supply. I bought a voodoo lab pedal power. With the exact same setup there is an outstanding difference. I get practically no hum, hence the certainty that the fault lies with this falsely labled, resource wasting product.
Have you checked your home's feng shui, though?
Just kidding, cheap quality "control" strikes again. Apparently a gamble to buy one of these, I'll just try to make a DIY isolation with a transformer.
+Martin Krauser Judging by general consensus Im going to label this as a poor product rather than quality control. If you have the skills then why not? I just implore that you dont waste your money on this. Good luck!
Not suitable for high power digital pedals.
junk! its very noisy.
I just got mine, DON'T BUY IT!
It's noisy as hell, just unusable. I have a daisy chain of 5 pedals and it's still better than using this shitty brick. What a waste of money.
an absolute piece of crap. power surges and hum make performing with this junk impossible. buy the Voodoo Lab pedal power plus. well worth the money.
+rletchuk Have you mixed digital and analog pedals on it?
+Martin Krauser you should never really do that on any power supply
Don't be silly. There is no problem if the grounds are isolated. The problem with most cheap power supplies is that they are basically daisy chains in a box. The Vitoos DC is an exception, I believe.
I mean, if you mix a normal 9V analog pedal like Phase 90 or Carbon Copy and a really power-hungry digital pedal it might not end well, the digital should have it's own isolated output.
Yes. It can come from the same power supply, though. :)
The problem isn't even the current drain, since if the digital pedal draws 200 mA and the analog drains 10 mA, they can work just fine on a 250 mA source.
The real problem is that digital pedals very often do not shield the power ground, because the power ground is only there to power the chip. It mostly doesn't influence the audio signal at all, so it is cost efficient for producers to just ignore any noise leaking to power ground.
But when you connect that same lead to power an analog pedal, oh boy. If I daisy chain a DigiTech Jamman Solo XT with an overdrive, I get to hear noises like with a dial-up modem. :D
👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎👎
This thing is a price of crap I got one a while ago and I've had nothing but trouble with it. It hisses every one and a while and one day a few months ago it just randomly stopped. Let me just tell you, you get what you pay for
You get what you pay for. These cheaper supplies are just repackaged daisy chains, and will not only cause hum and all sorts of other issues, but will probably kill some pedals.
Buyer beware. Besides, best to support local industry who hang their proverbial brand hats on quality, rather than saving some $$$ for a Chinese company to get rich off the work of some poor people in a sweat shop.
I don't normally write negative comments on RUclips vids, and your demo is quite good and all that, but if there's one thing I can't stand it's saving $$$ at the expense of everything else.
Rodger van Raalte I personally would much rather support American jobs, but unfortunately, American manufacturers have become so greedy that they actually think that it's okay for them to have all of their parts made in China and assembled here in the US by low paid illegal immigrants whom they willingly hire while cutting legal Americans out of jobs simply so they can pay the illegals much less and make even more of a profit for themselves before marking the price that they paid up 5000% from their own overhead and then passing the bill onto American consumers who are just trying to survive living paycheck to paycheck while these (now rich) jerkoffs arrogantly look down on us from their multimillion dollar mansions. I can no longer afford to be ripped off by arrogant assholes who seem to think that their shit doesn't stink when in fact, their products are quite often just as crappy (and sometimes even more so) than their foreign competition that only costs about 2 hours of pay to aquire, rather than almost an entire week's paycheck to pay for the rich man's next exotic sports car and steak and lobster dinner.