Oye to the Ve! Everytime I go on the web now I end up with an ad for the next Tubescreamer clone. How farking many do we need? News flash, they all sound the same regardless of the price. An OD1 or a TS9 is all you really need.
Fuzz, how many ways can they market the same Big Muff circuit?
Klons- it's been shown over and over again that nobody can tell the difference in the sound between a four-figure priced Klon and a $30 clone.
Do you need a pricey boutique pedal to sound good? No. Generally all they claim to do is replicate the sound of the mass-produced ones, lol!
Do you want one? That's perfectly acceptable but don't be telling me that you need it, because you don't.
Yet you can be assured that sometime soon somebody will market a "new" TS9 clone. Same old circuit, different graphics.
Truth is that the component tolerances are so wide on these things that two built next to each other will sound a little different. It has nothing to do with the cost. Some are just better than others even within the same production batch.
Chuck