SOURCE AUDIO: Zio analog front-end + boost

SOURCE AUDIO IS best known for its forward-thinking digital effects pedals, like the C4 synthesizer and Ultrawave distortion, as well as the Nemesis delay and Ventris reverb. But a few years ago, the company began working with Christopher Venter of Shoe Pedals to combine the "under the hood" tweakability of its Neuro editing system with more traditional sounds.

- MICHAEL ROSS

The first fruit of this combined labor was the True Spring Reverb, an accurate digital representation of analog spring reverb and tremolo. More recently, digital-circuitry supply chain issues led the team to speed up the release of its first analog collaboration, the ZIO booster pedal.

ZIO is the first, and so far only, pedal in the line to eschew the Neuro editing system, sticking with the standard surface knobs and switches. This classic clean boost pedal adds no distortion or radical coloration, and as such its merits rely on the quality of the op-amp used to increase the output. After bench-testing various options, Venter and Source Audio chose the Burr-Brown SoundPlus op-amp for its dynamic range, frequency response and feel. The pedal supplies up to 20dB of boost, taking your guitar's high-impedance signal and outputting a strong, low-impedance signal to reduce any color created by buffered pedals and cables further down the signal chain. ZIO also has a toggle to restore some cable coloration, if you prefer.