The Ziffer Overdrive – Jordan Ziff Signature MINI Pedal

The TS8-JZ Ziffer Overdrive was developed for Jordan Ziff – lead guitarist of Hot Crazy, RATT, and guitarist in Marty Friedman’s band -, and is mainly derived from our TS8-MS Overdrive / MIDI Switcher pedal which he embraced as its tubescreamer choice. This time we removed the MIDI switching capabilities and added several controls which contribute to subtle tone-crafting and expanded versatility.

When it comes to cramming a whole rack unit into a stompbox, few companies are more adept than Becos. Now, they’re back with a tweakable mini overdrive – a signature pedal for hard-shredding Ratt guitarist Jordan Ziff. In classic Becos style, this is a mini-format stomper but with more controls than the average-sized unit.

The Ziffer’s circuit is mainly tributary to the vintage 808 sound & feel, yet it features our extensive modifications which we now took even further. While still featuring the tri-option CLIPPING switch which modifies the overall gain structure to better shape suitable tones for a large variety of applications, it also brings a few more extras. Compared with the TS8-MS, the Ziffer Overdrive features a DEEP switch with an option for beefing up the lower end frequencies, a DRY/WET MIX trimmer to blend the clean signal over the wet overdriven signal, and a DRY EQ trimmer that acts on the dryline only, to mix back either flat clean or tilted frequencies on either the lows or highs spectrum. In fact, the Ziffer’s dryline processing is inspired by our Solo Boost which we are now partially bringing back for a very versatile, powerful, and synergic blend of drive & clean tones. Of course, you could also use the Ziffer as a clean boost or as a tilting equalizer plus boost pedal.

For Ziffer’s fabrication, we replaced the one-transistor buffers with audio grade op-amps which contribute to a lower noise floor (especially in the high-gain settings) and the “transparency” that we’re all looking after. We also employ very low-tolerance metal film resistors and high-quality Panasonic multi-layer plastic metalized film capacitors in the audio path. We build everything in a small and compact package on our high-quality Gold-plated tracing circuit boards, without loose interconnecting wires, for lifetime endurance.

The Ziffer Overdrive should be powered with good filtered and regulated external power sources (not included) in between 9VDC and 18VDC for improved transparency and high headroom. It can be browned out down to 7VDC for an even more particular tonal flavoring.

Key features 

• True analog bypass
• Gain, Tone, Level controls
• Classic/Asymmetric/LEDs clipping options
• Classic/Deep frequency response
• Dry/Wet Mix
• Dry EQ frequency trimming
• Dry boost/cut variability
• Hi-quality audio ICs, low tolerance parts, Panasonic Polyester capacitors
• Black powder-coated MINI-size genuine Hammond aluminum enclosure
• 9-18 VDC external power supply (not included), center negative, 12mm long barrel plug
• 3-years premium warranty (direct to manufacturer, international, transferable)

More info

 Manual
 Video demo | More