TC Electronic HYPERGRAVITY COMPRESSOR Exceptional Multiband Compression Pedal with Vintage Compressor Mode and Built-In TonePrints*

This is an excellent compressor, but it is not plug and play and requires getting acquainted with Toneprint. However it is not that hard to figure out. After a couple of days using it, here are some suggestions and responses to negative reviews.1- the preset settings (vintage and spectra) sound good at first but are pretty awful after some play, mostly because of the massive amount of gain they come with. It is therefore well worth getting into Toneprint and creating your own 3-band compression profile. Just a few minutes of tweaking will yield satisfying results.2- in Toneprint, start by turning off the “autogain” function, responsible for background hiss and also for the annoying latency response that many reviewers complain about.3- also, make sure your dry signal is not turned off when “blend” is at zero (as it is in the default Toneprint setting), something which is counterproductive. Instead of no volume at zero level and zero blend, set the “level” to go from unity (same volume as your dry sound) to a good amount of gain without excess – mine is set to go from 10db at zero to 30db at full volume. This allows you to truly blend dry and compressed signals to your taste with the blend control, from fully dry to fully compressed. (not going crazy on the maximum gain will ensure that the Hypergravity does not throw off the settings on your other pedals, as some reviewers complain.)4- now you can get into tweaking the 3 bands of compression if you wish, but just performing steps 2 and 3 will give you a gorgeous sounding compressor with plenty of gain and blend, sustain and attack. Compared to the Walrus Audio that has the same 4 controls, it sounds different but just as fantastic.5- it took me a while to realize that you tweak the Toneprint settings by changing the curves on the graphics… neither the pedal nor the Toneprint manuals tell you that… Don’t forget to save your settings in Toneprint and also to your pedal.6- the pedal did crash and reset itself a couple of times, as mentioned by another reviewer, when switching between compression profiles (spectra-toneprint-vintage). However it does not crash if you take the trouble to turn it off before going from one profile to the other and then turn it back on. Again, the suspect here seems to be the brutal “auto-gain”, which comes back on in "spectra" and "vintage".7- as for its compatibility with other pedals, my experience is that it varies. Some overdrives/distorsions do not like it too much, some do and are enhanced by it. Position before or after matters. Also, I suspect proximity to fuzzes and buffers matters too. But isn't this true of numerous other pedals?In conclusion, avoid this pedal if you are allergic to app editing and want your settings achieved quickly using a couple of knobs. Get it if you don’t mind spending a few minutes on your laptop to carve a great compressed sound. Thanks to the Toneprint editor, this pedal has incredible flexibility, and when set properly, few compressors can rival. As for analog vs digital, well, between the Walrus and the TC, it is hard to decide which one sounds better. I love them both. Five stars but the Toneprint instructions should be a lot more helpful.

So let me start off by saying that I purchased this for use with a Roland TB-03 bass synthesizer and not a guitar, but I am completely blown away with the customizability of this pedal. I also love the fact that it accepts a line level input so that I can run my synthesizer directly into the pedal without adding distortion or losing any gain.I was looking for a multiband compressor to help situate the TB-03 in a live mix which, for various reasons too complicated to go into here, I can't run through the main mastering bus. A regular compressor would squash too much of the dynamics and I really just needed something to limit the resonant peaks when the filter is open and the flatten the really low bass when I remove the resonance completely. If you're familiar with the sound of a 303, you know it can vary wildly in volume as you sweep the filter and I found myself having to adjust the volume with one hand while I adjusted the filter with the other. Really inconvenient during a live performance.What's awesome about the Hypergravity is that I can use the software to perfectly dial in the type of compression I want and then customize the knobs to adjust it on the fly. It's basically like having a multiband compressor plugin from a DAW loaded into a pedal. I can individually control the threshold, ratio, attack, and release of every band for a completely tailored sound. This is exactly what I was looking for!I set the sustain knob to control just the high end threshold setting and kept all the other knobs at their factory settings and now I'm able to perfectly dial in the amount of high end reduction that I want to hear. By adjusting the blend, I can bring in more or less midrange and bass from the original signal and now I almost never need to adjust the volume of the 303 while I'm adjusting the filter. It's perfect for my dawless setup.While I'm not using this for a guitar, it seems like this would be a great pedal for people who really like to dial in custom settings. It took me maybe 10 minutes to learn the software and get comfortable with it. If you're not already familiar with using compression, I could see there being a bit of a learning curve here and maybe preferring something that just works out of the box, but if you're like me and have been using mastering compressors for years, it's very straightforward. I basically set all settings to zero/off and then began slowly bringing in the effect until I got it where I wanted. Turning off the autogain setting was absolutely necessary, as one commenter has noted.If you're at all concerned about the limitations of this pedal, don't be! It's extremely customizable and versatile if you're willing to put in the time.

This comp rules. I love the flexibility, I love the different modes, it works great and sounds great. Love the blend knob, it's a quick easy way to dial in the amount of the effect when you're playing live. My only complaint is that the knobs turn relatively easily so my settings get messed up in the gig bag for my pedal board. I wish at least the volume knob had detents - that would be sweet.....In short, it's a winner. Don't hesitate.

It has three easy settings with the small silver toggle switch. I haven't really used much of the toneprint stuff. The changes to your sound are subtle, but make it sound good. The blend feature is nice, I haven't really tried any other compressors.