Mad Professor Snow White Auto Wah v. 3Leaf Proton

[tsp17]

Take this review with a grain of salt as i am not a big pedal user.

 

I am in a new project and wanted to get a little more funky on a few tunes, but want to keep my pedal set up minimal and simple to use. I was using a Morely Bad Horsie 2 optical wah a while back, but was really only playing straight ahead jazz then so i sold it to an HOC member. Was a good user friendly pedal, but a little trebly for me (probably user error) and took up a lot of space. So, i thought an auto wah of envelop filter would fill that need simply. I need simple. After some internet research I recently got both the Mad Professor SWAW (PCB version) and the 3Leaf to A/B. I'll return one.

 

Both are very well made, solid, great quality control. Both sound very good. Both are cool looking too. The biggest difference seems to be intentional. The SWAW is voiced like a wah, and the Proton sounds like a Mutron, only simpler. The Proton nails that slurpy, wet, funky vibe, whereas the SWAH sounds more like a wah. SWAW is definitely brighter and clearer sounding on chords. On both you need to "play the pedal" in that they respond to attack very nicely to stimulate the intensity of the effect. Both are dead silent which i really like. the quality of both of these pedals is clear.

 

I like the SWAW for rhythm and the Proton for single note lines, but both pedals can do either function well. Just a little different vibe. Both are fairly easy to dial in, but the SWAW is a bit more user friendly for me. 4 controls:

 

 

SENSITIVITY: Sets the filter trigger level, tune this carefully to fit your guitar/bass output and your playing touch.
You can further change the sensitivity from your guitar volume knob while playing.

BIAS: Controls the filter resonance frequency. When Sensitivity is turned fully off the Bias can be used as a sweepable filter.

RESONANCE: Controls the sharpness or Q-factor of the filter.

DECAY: Controls how fast the filter frequency falls back to resting point (that is set with the Bias control). This can be set fast (CW) so you get the wah effect on every note or slow for a more traditional auto wah sound.

 

The 3Leaf has that vintage 70's sound down and i bet would be super for bass as well. It has 3 controls (gain, peak and decay), and two switches (range and sweep). Pretty easy to work with as well, i just seem to get along a little better with the SWAW. If i were looking for a pure Mutron sound, for sure i would keep the 3Leaf. No question. Great pedal for this sound, nails it and is very easy to use.

 

So - i like both pedals very much, but i think i'll keep the SWAW. Hard to part with either, but can't justify keeping both.

 

Thoughts? Anyone else tried these? Hard to decide which to keep.

[tulk1]

These are auto wahs? Not foot actuated, well, other than turning them on?

[tsp17]

These are auto wahs? Not foot actuated, well, other than turning them on?

Right, they are envelope filters like to 70's Mu-tron. Think Jerry Garcia (Shakedown Street, Estimated Prophet) Stevie Wonder (Higher Ground), Bootsy on bass, The more aggressive your attack, the more effect you get. It is not a true substitute for a Wah, but sounds pretty funky when you get the hang of it.