From djacques@csulb.edu Thu Jan 20 23:36:21 2011
Subject:Vent Footswitch - First Impressions

I just received the Ventilator footswitch and had a chance to try it
out on my Motif XS. Believe it or not, due to unexpected setbacks
this week I have still not tried the Vent on my XK3c. I have been
digging what it has been doing to the Hammond samples on my Motif too
much to unpack and assemble the XK3c. But I have a gig this weekend
and will give you all a full report. So far I am impressed.

But let's talk about the footswitch. Generally speaking it is very
well-built and looks like it will hold up quite well. The first thing
I noticed was the size and weight. Although small, it's not too small
and light to move around easily on the floor under the organ. This is
very good considering how many of us struggle with crawling pedals...
The lettering is clear with "Stop" on the left and "Slow/Fast" on the
right.

I immediately pugged it into the Vent. To my surprise it did not work!
The Vent went to stop mode, but the switches did not activate the
speed. It took a while for me to realize that the thing needed two AA
batteries. So I opened it up, placed the batteries into the slot, and
noticed the dip switches. What do they do???? Well, here is the switch
layout (you can see how versatile this little guy is...) It can be in
122 or 760 mode. It can also be set to Momentary and/or Mixed mode
with different latches and speed priorities. All in all there are 8
different switch options. Pretty versatile.

I left the switches to default 122 Leslie, put the cover back on, and
plugged that baby in...

So what are my impressions??? Well, the Stop on the Vent is exquisite.
Just hearing the tone of my sampled Hammonds through the Vent's
overdrive was quite impressive. You can make it sound just like Stevie
Winwood's, Booker T's, or Jon Lord's organ. I could get the exact
Machine Head sound. But the real Joy was playing "Hang em High" and
"Time Is Tight" ... because when you disengage the off button the Vent
takes off to fast speed... well, it has to be heard to be believed...
Glorious...

The real critical test for me was to hear how the Vent handled going
from fast to stop and from slow to stop. Since the Vent's stop
position has the horn and rotor "facing" the front, I was wondering
how smooth that stop would be. Well, it was perfect. The rotors slow
down and coast perfectly to a stop without hesitating or jumping. Very
nice.

What would I like to see? LED's above the switches that would visually
indicate what speed you are switched to would be nice. I am sure that
the thought behind this is as most people will have the Vent on top of
their organs so that they can adjust the overdrive from song to song,
the speed is already indicated by the lights on the Vent. And really,
who looks under their organ anyway?

I really can't wait until I perform with this...

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