Looper

just what my husband was looking for. great value for the money. he likes the drum tracks and ease of use.

Can't stop using it. The Donner circle looper is a looper with 40 memory slots and a synchronized drum machine in one pedal. There are 100 different beats, in 10 different styles, plus 10 metronomes, bpm control and an independent volume for rhythm and loops. Did I mention tap tempo? It has tap tempo. You can run the looper and the beats in synch or not in synch. There are two inputs and two out puts that allow you to run the looper off two instruments or out of two amps. So, for example, if you want to run a guitar in one channel and have it come out of one amp and a bass or a eukele in the other and have it come out of a different amp, you can do that. Or, you can run a stereo reverb or delay or chorus or something in front of the Circle and then run to two different amps and get stereo sound. I am really enjoying the beat library. I have not used them all yet, but I find having that many different rhythms at my finger tips is pushing me to learn to styles and new techniques that I might not have gotten around to without the Circle Looper. The Drums sound organic and lively. There is a button in the middle of the looper called "MERGER CTRL." When you push it, it turns green. Then when you switch from the rhythm side to the looper side and start the loop, you get a count off and then the drums start when the loop starts. And everything stays synched. If you don't push "MERGET CTRL" the beat and the loop won't stay synched. I'm sure there is a use for a loop where the music slowly drifts away from the drums, but I'm not there yet. The first time you don't use the "MERGER CTRL" it becomes clear why you should. LOL. Quick note, the drums and the loops act independently. So if you record a loop and save it, and you want it to play with the beat you recorded the loop with, you will have to set the drums to the settings you had them at when you recorded it. This is really easy, but if you don't realize that your drums aren't automatically saved, it can be a little jarring when you wonder why you thought you had been on time yesterday and today it sounds like there are two different songs playing. Going back to "MERGER CTRL" once you dial in the drums that you used to record and press 'start' the drums and the loop will start at the beginning of the loop. I hope I'm not making this sound complicated, it's not. The Looper has an led screen that is easy to read and very useful. The screen has a little "circle" that runs around the outer edge of it to tell you where you are in a loop, once you've recorded the first layer. So, if you get lost, you will kind of know where you are in the song. The Screen also tells you what memory slot you are on, what beat you are using, what bpm you are at. It will also tell you if you are coming into the looper too hot. The Directions are clear and detailed. This pedal is a little more complicated than just a simple looper, but it is definitely worth the effort. I honestly can't stop using it. It's just great and for the price, it's down right amazing. I believe these have already sold out twice, so if you see one, snatch it up.

Pros: - relatively easy to figure out (good, because instruction guide is miniaturized) - decent sound quality - priced well for features - loads of memory for saving loops - drum tracks sound better than expected, and recorded loops store and play the drum track/tempo - rhythm track synch works well Cons: - absolutely needs an power on/off switch. Plugging/unplugging the power adapter is not a reasonable solution when a switch is pennies to install. - stopping a loop shifts by default to “dub”, so any additional sustain or sounds after you hit stop get recorded before you can hit the footswitch again to kill dubbing. This is really, really annoying. - a slightly larger display would be so nice for some of us older players

I bought the Donner Circle Pedal Drum Looper and this is the first review I've ever done, I'm so pleased. Had a Boss RC-20XL for 20 years and loved it's ease of use, but I wanted drums instead of a metronome. So I had a Flamma FS21 for a year before it failed. It was complex, had bad drums, and unreliable and one of the foot switches failed. Next I bought a Boss RC-5, which was complex, no manual, couldn't get the drums going. So I bought a Mooer GL100, which was too complex, again I couldn't get drums and loop going. Sent that back tried the Flamma FC01, same deal, too complex, only one footswitch, no instructions. Sent that back, got a new Flamma FF20, looked cool, way too complex, and no manual. So I tried Amazon's Choice, the Donner Circle Looper, which I figured out intuitively in about 5 minutes, and learned a few more tricks from the concise manual. It's simple, it loops, you have a drum button to push and you get good, useable drum sounds, bpm, volume, etc. You have plenty of memory, no time warp though. This is a keeper for me and it only costs $115.99. No hours of reading a manual you have to download. It's fun, and right from the box you'll be jamming. A lot.

For the money, it doesn't get any better. If you write music, I find one of the most useful tools is a looper, and this one is awesome for a great value. The beats are useful and easy to use. I use this Pedal every day and it has become essential to my composing. Sometimes I just use it as a metronome, other time to save a riff or chord progression, a lot of time I put down an entire song , overlapping guitar, bass and vocals over one of the beats. This thing is so fun and useful. It is the peice of gear on my board hat inspires me the most. If your debating a purchase, drop the 100 bucks, you'll be happy you did.

The Dooner looper crashed after 4 months of moderate use. Donner customer product support is non-existent! They stated they needed a video under 10 MB before they could do assist me. I stated that 10 MB was unrealistic for such a request. I sent them quality photos showing my set up and basically what the video would show. I emphasized that the device had no displays or indication of it operating. They continued to harp on needing a video. I provided a copy of their warranty, which had no requirement to provide a video in order to receive product support. I went ahead provided them a video which had to be uploaded to Google Files which validated the device didn't not work. The video also showed another Donner Octave pedal being connected to the same power source as the Donner Looper. The Octave pedal worked fine. I after several follow up emails finally got a response asking if my power supply met the looper power supply specifications. I confirmed that it did despite already showing this in the video. There has been no response from Donner despite my sending several emails direct to customer service and to their website contact us prompt. I was apprehensive about buying this product but took a chance since the Octave Dooner pedal worked okay. I cannot believe a company with several industries awards has such bad customer service support. I will not buy from Donner again and would urge anyone contemplating buying any of their products to read the reviews and buy with caution. It should be noted that they have no phone number for contacting the company. Amazon customer support was much more responsive in resolving the problem!

Bottom Line Up Front: I would recommend this item if you are looking for a drum pedal and/or looper. The pedal housing, switches and knobs all seem to be built very well and should hopefully last a while. I removed the rubber feet from the bottom to add Velcro for the board without an issue. The feet are just stuck on with some adhesive. The drum tracks sound much better than expected. When I play it through a clean amp, they come across fairly realistic compared to some drum pedals I have used in the past. Another thing to note is that the drum tracks have a lot of groove and flavor compared to some that are just fancy metronomes. There are some consistent fills at then end of the bars on some of the tracks which can be useful and distracting. A real drummer would probably not fill/crash as often, but it adds some character to your solo jam sessions. The LCD screen is bright, easy to read, and responsive to the knobs as you make your selections. There are 40 memory slots to up to 4:00 minute recordings. You can link it up to the computer and download some very simple software from the Donner website to Import/export the recordings. ** BONUS** You can load files into the memory banks from other places, not just your recordings so if you have a track you are trying to work out parts for, you can load the file and save it in the pedal to mess around with at your leisure. I downloaded some drum and bass tracks from a website to jam over and am having a blast. The only downside which I hope we can get a fix for is that it seems as if you can’t name the tracks. Not a huge deal, but when there are 40 spots it would be better if we could save them by a name and not just default number. Overall this does more than I expected and the build/sound quality is higher than anticipated at this price point. I have purchased a few Donner items and have yet to be let down. It’s really a blessing in our current times that musical instruments and gear can be so affordable and of superior quality.

Ok, so, it is somewhat painful for me to give this only 3 stars because the basic functionality of the Circle Looper pedal is very intuitive and cool. However, I need to take points off for Donner's misrepresentation of certain features. Again ...! What is disappointing is that this is not my first Donner device where they simply did not provide essentials to how the device ... works (I bought the B1 Bass Synth from Donner and there are no midi CC controls available anywhere, despite the device having the ports for midi I/O). Back to the Circle Looper - To even understand what one needs to do to try to import / export via usb you need to first dig on the web, as their manual is useless in this regard. Finally, I was able to find a Mac OS version of their Circle Looper software. It registers the device… exists. From there, it does nothing. One cannot export loops they have written at all. I tried to import a 7 second bass hit to test the import function and the device / application both froze, never progressing. Of course, the out not working over usb is not the end of the world, since I can plug that into my interface. But, I find this really sneaky of Donner - To boast usb compatibility which is not really there. C’mon Donner - You make good stuff usually - Stop skimping on MAJOR features. Especially ones that are main selling points for the item! That is really some BS, IMO. Otherwise, the thing is pretty nifty. Can’t say it isn’t. Buyer beware, I guess *shrug