It’s been a few years since it was announced that DigiTech would be revived after being acquired by Cor-Tek, the makers of Cort guitars. Aside from the DOD Overdrive Preamp 250, we haven’t exactly seen the series of reissues and fresh guitar pedals guitarists might expect. As a huge DigiTech fan, I still have my fingers crossed for a Space Station reissue, but it was with some excitement that I got my hands on the brand new DigiTech JamMan Solo HD.
Although there are many looper pedals round, not all are created equal. The JamMan in particular is sought after for its ability to preload loops, making it great for adding an extra bit of spice to your live show. You can still pick up the XT second hand, but now that it’s about twelve years old, it’s aged pretty well.
If you prefer your pedals brand new, here’s your chance to get your hands on one fresh out of the box. Rather than a total reinvention of its predecessor, the JamMan Solo XT, the Solo HD is essentially the same pedal with a few added extras. Is it worth your hard-earned cash? Let’s find out…
DigiTech JamMan Solo HD review: Features
The JamMan Solo HD’s headline feature is its built-in looping time. Capable of 10 minute loops with a total running time of 35 minutes and 200 loops in total, it’s probably overkill for most types of guitarists. If that’s not enough for your needs, you can expand this with an external Micro SD card of up to 32GB, giving you up to 32 hours of loop storage. It’s a ridiculous amount of storage and all of your loops are stored at 44.1KHz, 16-bit, which is CD-quality.
For connectivity, it features stereo inputs and outputs that allow you to use more expansive sounding loops and better integrate with a wider variety of pedals. A footswitch output is available for use with the DigiTech FS3X footswitch, which opens up loop memory selection via your foot, tap tempo, and stop and clear functions. An 1/8-inch aux input gives you the ability to connect an external music player, while Jam Sync inputs and outputs let you connect to another JamMan.
The front panel is fairly busy, with dual knobs for loop level and rhythm level adjoining a selection of buttons. There’s a tap tempo, a setup button for additional menu diving, a store button for saving your loops, and up/down buttons for cycling through loop memories. A single LED lets you know what mode the looper is in, with red for record, green for playback, and yellow for overdub.
Finally, there’s a mini USB port for transferring loops to and from your computer, and the Micro SD card slot on the left side of the pedal. There’s no SD card included, so you’ll need to purchase one separately if you plan on using the extra memory capabilities.
DigiTech JamMan Solo HD review: Performance
Armed with a Strat and my HX Stomp, I proceeded to loop patch one, only to find that it came with a pre-loaded drum beat. Loopers are usually pretty easy to get up and running, but the JamMan is built a little differently. The first 15 patches have built-in rhythms that stay on regardless of whether the rhythm level knob is turned down or not, which confused me a bit at first.
Once you reach patch 16 you’re given a clean slate to loop on, so that’s where I began my journey. Here the JamMan acts as your typical looper, with one stomp activating record mode and a second single stomp starting playback. Another single tap lets you overdub, while a double tap stops playback. It’s instantly inspiring, like you’re jamming with another player, and I immediately came up with some lovely post-rock inspired melancholic rhythms and lead lines.
A long press of the pedal will erase the current loop, but you can’t activate this until the loop has stopped and annoyingly it will restart the loop while you’re holding it down. It’s a small thing, but something to be aware of if you plan on using it for live looping, as you’ll be instantly reminded of your mistimed loop or bad note whenever you try to erase the pedal.
Going back to the patch memory I decided to try the rhythm support loops again to see how they performed. Here you have to press once to get the loop to work, and as I discovered you have to pay attention to where the drum beat comes back. If you start halfway through the drum pattern your loop will only cover that specific part of the beat.
The patterns I tried all seemed to be on an eight bar loop, and I actually found the flashing light on the tempo button quite useful, as I didn’t have the levels set quite right and my guitar was dominating the loop itself. Something that could definitely come in handy on stage. It also allows you to string together rhythms, as pressing the up and down buttons while a loop is playing will loop through the entire remaining loop before starting the next rhythm pattern.
The JamMan isn’t the most intuitive looper I’ve ever used, and you’ll definitely want to consult the manual before you get started. However – and I think this is where a lot of people have historically enjoyed the JamMan – for loading and triggering your own loops it’s absolutely brilliant. Pop an SD card into the slot and you’ll get an extra 200 memories, on top of the 200 built in, and the ‘card mem’ LED will light up when you’ve activated those 200.
It’s a bit of a grind to get there, but you can hold the up and down buttons to speed it up a bit. The pedal also remembers where you left off, so if you’re using it exclusively this way, you only have to go through them all once.
This is where the JamMan becomes that extra musician you didn’t know your band needed. I used it to throw down some spooky drones that I could then play heavy drop-tuned riffs over. It’s fantastic in this format, whether you want to use it as a separate entity entirely from your guitar tone to send to the front of house, or simply add an extra touch of ominous tone by dropping it into your amp’s FX loop.
There is a dedicated footswitch for use with the JamMan that unlocks some extra functionality, but out of curiosity I tried my Boss FS-6 to see if it would do anything. I could only get one of my footswitches to work, but it did let me scroll through presets, which could be handy for those who have an existing footswitch and don’t want to have to reach down and scroll through the controls on the pedal itself.
DigiTech JamMan Solo HD review: Verdict
A welcome return to DigiTech’s stable of pedals, the JamMan Solo HD isn’t the most intuitive looper out there. But take a peek under the hood and you’ll find a feature-packed and powerful looper with tons of potential in a variety of looping scenarios.
I can imagine it being super handy for those of us in power trios or single-guitar bands, allowing you to easily add an extra layer to your live sound. The flexible stereo connectivity allows you to use it in a variety of ways, while the addition of an aux-in and the ability to chain multiple copies of the pedal together make it great for solo artists.
Digitech JamMan Solo HD Review: Specs
- A/D/A conversion: 24-bit/44.1 kHz
- Maximum loop time: 10 minutes (stereo)
- Internal memory: 35 minutes (up to 200 loops)
- External memory: Micro SD up to 32GB
- External memory capacity: More than 32 hours (16GB SD card or larger)
- Service: Pedal switch, running level, tempo, set, save, rhythm level, up/down buttons
- Connectors: 2x 1/4-inch TS input, 1x 1/8-inch aux input, 1x 1/4-inch TRS footswitch, 2x 1/4-inch outputs
- Power supply: 9VDC 2.0A
- Contact: DigiTech