What Has Happened To Boss Manuals?

[visserman]

Okay, It has been some time since I have been here.,,,

A few days ago I checked in and it made me curious about the current line up of compact pedals.
Many nice new pedals have been released over the last few years. I was not aware of some of them.

Checking the manuals of some of those pedals it strikes me there is not much info:
A general description of the knobs and layout and some other things but nothing more.

What was missing was sample settings and a guide for each mode and how to use it.
Okay you may say, just get the pedal and play. Yes of course, but the manuals I am used to do give you a lot more.
Not sure when the paper manuals stopped, but it probably has been a while.

Did I just look at the wrong pedals or............among them was the SL-2 but there were some others which I have forgotten because I am just browsing for fun.

Has anyone else of you noticed this as well, or is everyone happy and adjusting to the fact that you have to find out for yourself what kind of sounds your pedal can give you?

[BearBoy]

My SL-2 didn’t come with a manual. Just a “safety information” type sheet in multiple languages and a QR code to scan for an online manual. Pretty sure I must have downloaded the manual to my PC but can’t remember how detailed it was off the top of my head.

[BearBoy]

It’s a great pedal though

[The_Doc]

Just had a quick look at the SL-2 manual that I downloaded. Very comprehensive in terms of how to use the pedal and connect it up with other things but no sample settings. Seems to be the way for the more recent pedals.

I guess they stopped paper manuals because the volume of paper in the box was growing as the pedals became more complex and could do more. I can barely close some of the boxes !

[BearBoy]

Just had a quick look at a couple of manuals and noticed something interesting. The manual they currently have on their website for the DS-1 is (c) 2016 and does not have any suggested settings. I've got a downloaded manual on my PC that's (c) 1994 and that does have two pages of suggestions. The paper manual that came with my own DS-1 (purchased in 1990, manual dated March 1989) doesn't have any suggested settings.

[BearBoy]

The other place you used to be able to find suggested settings was in the Boss Guitar Effects Guidebooks they used to release.

Neither my original (1989) nor the current (2016) manual for the CH-1 has any suggested settings but there are some in the old Guidebooks.

Does anyone have a manual for the CH-1 from the mid-nineties? I wonder if that, like the DS-1 manual, was changed to include some at that time.

[visserman]

The other place you used to be able to find suggested settings was in the Boss Guitar Effects Guidebooks they used to release.

Neither my original (1989) nor the current (2016) manual for the CH-1 has any suggested settings but there are some in the old Guidebooks.

Does anyone have a manual for the CH-1 from the mid-nineties? I wonder if that, like the DS-1 manual, was changed to include some at that time.

I may have a manual from the mid nineties, since there are different versions, and I tried to get a earlier one as well.

Some earlier manuals did not have any sample settings, later ones did include some. The CH-1 may be one of those as well. Would have to check.
The earlier manuals were more of a fold-out leaflet. Later ones became a short booklet, with some of them having many pages.

The thing the Doc. mentioned before about many papers is probably the extra stuff which used to come with the pedals, things like safety instructions etc. The actual manuals do not take up that much space I believe, it is that extra info, and who really wants that eh? which takes up the space.
Now with it all being online, most of that is gone.

I think some of us may have liked some of those extras like a leaflet about the boss line-up for compact pedals for the time when the pedal was being bought. If you have some of those, you can quickly spot from which period your pedal is.

I did buy some new compacts in the first half of the 2000s and most of them have those leaflets. It also gave me a idea what kind of compact were there. This is all before the boss website started where we all found each other, around 2005.

I just noticed similar issues as what you mentioned before: Looked at the LS2, I do have a manual and sample settings and it is very comprehensive.
The manual online is from 2017 and shows just a description of the controls and the mode section. No sample settings and the actual manual is much shorter than the original one from when the pedal just issued.

Is this a problem, since so many people will go to YouTube for information about pedals?
I myself prefer a manual. If you are just left with a very brief manual that is a pity. Some pedals, or equipment,may be self explanatory, also depends on the experience of the user, but a good manual does never do any harm. Some boss manuals also came with short tips, useful pointer etc. Shame that most of that is gone.

[luck1001]

The gx-10 'manual' is utterly pathetic. A diagram showing a line from the unit to the amp. Really? I thought I plug it into the oven. Can't get it to work through an effects loop. Manual is garbage.

[SamXTherapy]

The DD-8 manual is a joke, too. It's very basic, and makes no mention of some of the important and useful functions. They're detailed in a downloadable version, fortunately.