Eventide's Riptide cleverly combines Dual Voiced Drive with Dual Voiced Uni-Vibe in both directions

Quite a number of us bought the Eventide H9 at least in part because of Josh Smith’s Leslie / Rotary Speaker Preset among other choice modulations, reverbs and harmonizers. We didn’t get a Uni-Vibe voicing until the relatively recent H90, and now for the first time we now have a stand alone edition of Eventide’s Uni-Vibe Algorithm with two slightly different voicings in tow - a Classic Uni-Vibe swirl, and a deeper more Phasey alternative. On the other Channel we have two versatile Drive voicings - a smoother kind of boosted overdrive, and a dynamic mid-range crunch. Those alternative voices are accessed by clicking on the LED’s above the two footswitches - which change from Red to Green for the two voices on each side.

There are 3 Handy Controls per Channel which can be set against 5 onboard Presets (127 via MIDI), and you have an Order button top-right to place the Drive or Uni-Vibe in first position.

Controls - VIBE } Vibe (Dry>Wet Mix), Speed, Intensity, LED Mode : Classic / Phasey, On/Off Footswitch / Activate Presser, DRIVE } Drive (Gain), Tone, Level, LED Mode : Crunchy / Smooth, On/Off Footswitch / Advance Presets, UNIVERSAL } Order >< Button.

Rear Ports & Controls : Mono / Stereo Switch, Single In Post / TRS, Dual Out Ports / Stereo, Input Switch : Guitar / Line Level, Expression / AUX / TRS MIDI Jack, Mini USB for Updates, Power Jack - 9V DC [-] 350mA.

It’s funny that so soon after Strymon’s Ultraviolet DSP take on a Uni-Vibe we get a sort of competing product in similar format - but with quite different setup and pros and cons. In fact in many ways quite a lot of pros - including the greater number of presets onboard, but less granularity - considering the Stymon Ultraviolet is all about the Uni-Vibe (3 Voicings) compared with the Riptide’s 2 voicings - but then that has 2 Drive voicings in addition and a more granular Mix / Vibe knob.

I’ve never thought the Eventide Gain voicings to be as good as those achieved by Boss or Strymon - both using a variant of JFET circuit ahead of their DSP. While on the Riptide the voicings actually sound pretty decent. I’m still personally very much an analog overdrive guy - while I really like what Boss, Mooer, Neunaber and Strymon have done with their DSP Gain Machines - Eventide has mostly seemed to me a little behind the curve - same happened really with my H90 - where I kind of skimmed through and past all the overdrive and distortion voicings - while some of the fuzzy-synth ones can be pretty decent.

Would be interesting to hear from players who rate and regularly use the Eventide Drive / Gain voicings. I’ve never quite managed to get full satisfaction with those yet - perhaps I’m missing a trick or two!

I quite like this concept, and what it does it does pretty well - but there are so many great analog drive and analog uni-vibe pedals - that I’m not really sure what extra this brings to the party - apart from the presets!

By all means prove me wrong!

The Price is fairly decent at $299 - while there’s not quite enough about this devices to really win me over. I own both Eventide H9 Max and H90 units and already have several hundred overdrive pedals - and 14 Uni-Vibes to my name. I’m not convinced this is quite the winning combination that Eventide evidently seems to think it is - but I’ve been wrong before! I was hoping that if someone brought out a DSP Uni-Vibe - they would properly kitchen-sink it - like Strymon did for Phase-Shifting with its Zelzah. For me there just isn’t quite enough extra about either this Riptide, or Strymon’s Ultraviolet to fully justify acquisition - at least not for my preferences.

How about you dear readers - are any of you into either the Ultraviolet or this Riptide?