BOSS expands its 200 series with the RV-200, a new stereo reverb with 12 algorithms, hands-on control, and full MIDI support.
The Japanese company Roland has been selling pedals and other guitar-related equipment under the sub-brand BOSS for many years. Not the Hugo with its fancy clothes. BOSS has a colorful range of pedals, many with a long history.
Modern pedals are also available in the portfolio. The pedals from the 200 series are particularly exciting. These have a lot of functionality, are stereo, and are intuitive to use. With the RV-200, BOSS now unveiled a new exciting reverb in this series.
BOSS RV-200 Reverb
The new RV-200 expands the RV Reverb series with another model. It also has a stereo signal path and offers a lot for the asking price.
RV-200’s reverb engine runs on a custom BOSS DSP with 32-bit AD/DA converters, 32-bit floating point processing, and a sampling rate of 96 kHz. This guarantees glitch-free, high-quality effects.
The pedal features 12 distinct reverb algorithms, ranging from classic to wilder tones. According to BOSS, each algorithm offers studio quality with outstanding detail and definition. Let’s believe these promises. Only a review can show whether it is true.
On the algorithm side, you get classic reverbs, including room, hall, plate, or spring. There are also more creative ones like shimmer, slowverb, modulate, lo-fi, reverse, and a newly developed arpverb. That’s a big selection of reverbs that can be explored.
Like all pedals in the BOSS 200 series, the RV-200 stands out with a comprehensive yet intuitive interface. It offers the crucial controls right on the pedal with dedicated hardware controls. This includes reverb time, effect level, pre-delay, and adjustable high and low pass filters.
Then, you can work with the density control that allows you to adjust the weight of the sound. With the parameter control, you can access other hidden tone-shaping controls unique to each reverb type. Programmed reverbs can be stored in 127 memory locations.
The RV-200 also offers two onboard foot switches, giving you full control over the effects, such as bypassing the effect, scrolling through the presets, or holding the reverb. Perfect for endless sounds. Plus, you can assign other creative performance FX to it, like warp, twist, and fade.
Connectivity
On the back, you get stereo inputs and outputs on 6.35mm mono sockets, an expression pedal input, and a power supply socket. On the side, you get a MIDI interface with an input and output on mini-jack sockets.
Yes, the pedal has full MIDI support, allowing you to control various functions with a MIDI controller. And there is also a USB port. Roland, eh boss knows my love for micro USB sockets. Rrr, why!
First Impression
At first glance, an exciting new stereo reverb pedal. It offers many algorithms, can be controlled with MIDI, and is also fairly priced. A very competitive reverb that could be an alternative to the Strymons and Eventides. The RV-200 is definitely on my list that I need to test.
BOSS RV-200 is available soon for $269,99/299€..
More information here: BOSS
Available at my partners
Maybe not as sexy looking but this is definitely a solid offering from Boss..
My favorite hardware reverbs are in that Lexicon kind of sound.
I don’t like the sound of Strymon reverbs at all. (Weird how much people like those). I’ve never liked Boss reverbs, either. But Boss does make them tweakable and makes good hardware. But what I’m hearing here makes me think they’ve just taken their approach (which I don’t like, and made more hi-fi).
Neunaber’s Immerse MkII is a nice reverb, but it’s high passed so there’s no low end (if you would want it).
The various pedals that use Lexicon reverbs (Digitech Polaris, Hardware RV-7, and various RP multis) all sound quite good for my tastes.
I’m really happy with the reverbs in the Fractal FM3. Seems dumb to get an FM3 just for reverb, everything else in it is top notch.
I’m curious about the Neunaber Illumine. That seems quite promising.
I should rephrase that the Immerse MkII isn’t low-endy, but it’s not high-passed.