Line6 M5 Stompbox

Do not be mistaken, this hasn't got anything to do with the movie. Although you don't get to play with Daniel Radcliffe you do get to mess around with the hundred of effects this incredible pedal has to offer.

Sometimes when musicians hear the word "multieffect" they run away and seek for shelter. They are a good tool if you hold a degree in pedal nobness or you're just an adventurer of new sounds, but in the end they lack that organic and warm feeling only a mother (I mean, a pedal) knows how to give.
The Line6 M5 offers a wild variety of sounds which will keep you entertained for decades. They range from fantastic to horrible. Some are great replicas of other pedals while others simply suck. That kind of goes away when you start changing the parameters of each effect with the dedicated knobs, but still some sounds retain unusable.

The pedal itself is indestructible. When the apocalypse comes, cockroaches & M5s will rule the world. So fear not dear stompers: you can kick the s*** out of this pedal and it will still refuse to die on you. The footswitches are not so practical though. They are ok to turn the effect on/off & tap tempo (you can also hold the right footswitch to activate a surprisingly good tuner) but when you want to activate a preset (yes, you can create many and even name them as you see fit) you need to press them both at the same time. Being one next to another you must use your feet in weird ways or kneel to it to use you're hands. It's not a big deal but it can be frustating if you're aiming for precision and using different sounds in a set. Keep in mind that you cannot use multiple effects at the same time, you have its bigger brothers for that (M9, M13)

Overall buy this pedal. Line6 M5 doesn't pay me to say any of this but if you give it a chance you'll find a very affordable and awesome machine with even more awesome features. Sure you'll sometimes feel retarded when pressing it and it has a bit of a learning curve which can be overwhelming at times (manual comes in handy), but in general you won't feel disappointed and even if you buy single stompboxes you'll want to keep this one on your pedalboard.

This pedal emulation processor can replace a lot of pedals in pedalboard. Personally I'm using this device for efects only (choruses, was-wah, harmonizer, whammy) not for the gained sound, and it works pretty well!
Works well with Boss FV-500-H expression pedal - personally I'm happy with this combination.
Also, works well as MIDI controlled device.

One thing you should have in your mind - it can emulate only one effect at the time. So, use can use only chorus, or only wah-wah, or only dist, or only Whammy. But not chorus and wah at the same time! To me it's Ok.

Needed that one pedal that has good sounding modulation, all from flanger, phaser, chorus, tremolo, vibe, rotary ...

Its big but is cheap and has great sound, and if its good enough for session men , its good enough for me too ;D

Totally happy with it! I already have a good delay and reverb and needed extra modulation but hated to spend lots of money on individual pedals. Looked at these multi boxes and many seems to cost a fortune! Line 6 M5 was rather affordable and fter a few review demos on YT I decided to get it.

Totally happy with it! All modulation is usable and some of them sound like 1000 bucks, and I get extra Filters, Delays, Reverbs (dont like the distortion/overdrives).

Patches can be created if one so desires! I think its a great box! For the price unbeatable!

Ah yes, midi in and out, stereo in and out :D whats not to like?!

I bought this on a whim and have used it extensively. I find that most of the delay/reverb/modulation sounds are very usable. The tap tempo is especially useful for delays and I love the fact that you can set the subdivision for the tap so you can get dotted eights for example. Line6 is known for great delays and this pedal has all the sounds from the legendary DL4. The particle reverb is also a very unique sound that you won't get anywhere else.

The construction is solid and the range of sounds is simply amazing. The drive sounds are not the best, but I bought this mostly for the other features so that does not bother me at all. It comes with a power supply which is always a bonus, and it can be set to be true bypass if that's your thing. I prefer to leave it in buffered mode so I can get trails when I turn the pedal off. The tuner mode is not the best, sometimes it has a hard time recognizing notes, but overall this is a great pedal and I am already looking to get the larger version, M9.

Highly recommended

This seemed like the obvious addition to a small pedalboard after some research.

Pros: For roughly 100 quid, the same price as any other individual pedal, you get anything you could possibly need in a single pedal. The models in this, for the money, are better value than that of a standalone pedal. This has become my main tap tempo delay, modulation, low octave, solo boost/compressor, weird reverb and synth pedal. A must have on anyone's board.

Cons: Not really any. A second one would be nice as you can only have one effect at a time. I'm aware the m9 is basically that but it is also too big and expensive for my needs. Obviously the models are not of posh handwired quality but they definitely stand up to other reasonably priced pedals.

I use this pedal mainly for bass to add some modulation, delay or special fx. For that kind of effects it is really great and cheaper than buying all kind of single pedals ;)

Only thing to mention is, that the distortion effects weren't really usable for me. Don't know why but they always sound unnaturally..

Apart from that the M5 is really useful and has a great build quality. I've played nearly 40 gigs with it and never had any kind of problems.

PS: For Live-Situations: It isn't possible to switch between presets effectively by scrolling up or down, so you have to switch the presets between songs!

I bought my M5 to fill a bunch of spaces in my pedalboard and it fulfills that function perfectly. Instead of buying a Chorus, Phaser, Flanger and Filter pedal, I got one M5 that does the lot.

I have an overdrive / distortion pedals and a couple of delays. My Amp has reverb, so I was really looking for something that could fill several gaps. I wouldn't normally use more than one modulation effect at once, for example, so having all of them on tap in a single pedal is terrific.

That's not to say that I don't use the other effect. The Delays and Reverbs in this pedal are stunning, with a huge variety of models. In particular, I have found myself selecting the ParticleVerb and noodling for 20 minutes - it's great fun.

Desirable models include the Echoplex and Space Echo, the Univibe and MuTron. Using an external expression pedal with the Univibe is especially satisfying.

There are hidden gems too, in the Chandler Tube Driver model and the Bias Tremolo - somehow much more musical than other tremolos.

Not to forget a built in tuner , an up/down preset mode and midi ports for external control. This pedal is HUGE value for money.