Boss DS-1 Distortion

I'll start by saying i'm an intermediate player and I have experience with Boss MT-2 as well, but now i'm working more on getting the exact tone and effect that I desire. This is where DS-1 comes into play.
PROs:
I wanted something simple and versatile, to be able to play blues and classic rock and some occasional heavy metal (maybe even thrash metal).
The pedal does the job for me and I highly recommend it for this purpose.
It has passed the test of time and is backed by many famous players: Steve Vai, Kurt Cobain, Gary Moore.
You can also find a lot of settings and mods available.

CONs:
Not sure if my high-output humbuckers are to blame (and also a lot of other reviews mention it), but at high tone, there is a lot of buzz - than can be used in some genres, but not useful when you want a mild distortion or a slight overdrive. But there are better pedals for that.

Conclusion?
Buy it, try it, learn to use it. It's a good basis to start for every player.

Well to begin this pedal is a classic. Considering that is used by many professionals I am surprised that it is still so cheap unlike the Ibanez tube screamer for instance. The controls are similar to a tube screamer but the sound is very different in my opinion. I have managed to get very good tones for soloing straight away. The distortion knob is very very responsive. With the tone knob and a bit of eq from your amp you can get a wide range of distortions suitable for many genres. What I am very pleasantly surprised about is how good it works in conjunction with other distortion pedals and even the boost channel from my amp. You can play around a bit and get some interesting tones using two distortion pedals at once, or the ds-1 going through the dirty channel. You have to be careful with the amount of distortion coming from each source or it can sound very broken and lose all consistency.
Also the construction is very solid, like all Boss pedals made to last forever. All an all a good distortion pedal especially for rock in my opinion. I would recommend it.

Use:
I use this pedal going straight into my Marshall dsl40c tube amp.

Pros:
-solid build quality
-creates a distortion sound which cannot be achieved with your amps dirty channel
-acts like a gritty overdrive when placed in front of an amp which is just on the edge of break-up
-placed in front of a very clean amp this pedal really shines, scoop the mids and add some bottom end to bring out the best in this pedal

Cons:
-the tone control has a limited range of usefulness and should only be used to compensate for your amps natural character (my amp is quite bright so I keep the tone control on the ds1 at 10 o' clock permanently, all tone shaping should be adjusted at the amp)

Overall:
This pedal is perfect for a dirty, grungy, hard-rock sound