The PS-3 has been discontinued, and if you ever have the chance to pick up one used, go for it! I got mine for under $100 Canadian, and it was worth every penny!

The beauty of this pedal is that it contains a number of digital-based effects. The name gives that away, I suppose.

Let's look at the delay functions first. Mode 1 has a delay time ranging from 32 ms. To 125 ms., which makes for intersting reverb sounds. I find digital reverb a tad harsh. Mode 2 goes from 125 ms. To 500 ms., which gives some very cool "slapback echoes". Mode 3 takes things to an extreme, going from 500 ms. to 2000 ms.

How extreme is Mode 3, you ask? I plugged in my Strat, cranked the F. Back and D. Time controls all the way up, set the balance to about 9:00, and played a lick.

And it kept repeating. I stayed in the same key, playing more and more licks. They simply went on top of each other, making for a seriously twisted tune. I stopped playing, and listened as the mix of riffs keep playing over and over and over.

In fact, I put my guitar down and came over to write out this little report, and know what? The riff just keeps going on, without any decay in the sound at all. The wonders of digital delay!

Since the pedal's been discontinued for a while now, I thought I'd help out anyone who's picked up a used PS-3 by scanning the suggested settings from the BOSS manual. There were eight settings in all, and so I've scanned each setting and typed out the text for each one as it was printed in the manual.

There were eight settings in all, 4 to a page. To see them, you just have to click here!

No need to thank me - we guitarists have to stick together!

So, the PS-3 is a fine digital delay. There's also the pitch shifting features. You can get some very twisted sounds of this, but that's not all. Mode 9 lets you detune one sound, and shift another sound's pitch up to +/- 2 octaves. Go one way, and you've got a bass note one octave below your original note, mirroring the BOSS OC-2. Go the other way, and you've got a sound similar to the Dano French Toast.

Mode 10 lets you do the same for two notes, which means you can have your original note matched by tones 1 octave up and 1 octave down - quite the aural experience.

I thought Mode 8 gave some very convincing chorus effects, including a nice almost "univibe" shimmer. If I had an expression pedal, Mode 11 supposedly mimics a Whammy pedal.

I once hooked my PS-3 up to a mike and was able to play around in Mode 9 until it sounded like I was singing with a woman - now THAT'S entertainment! By turning the Balance all the way over to Effect, I sounded like a woman, which is a whole other kind of entertainment, I suppose.

The bottom line is that this pedal is great fun if you like to mess around with the wonders of digital effects. I bought it mainly for the delay functions (2000 ms!), so everything else is a big bonus. Now I can only hope that one day I can snag a similar deal on a used PS-5!