Way Huge: Green Rhino vs. Pork Loin

[notnews]

I've owned a Green Rhino (the MKII I believe, it has just the 100hz low-end boost and not the newer 500hz boost), and I love it. It plays well on my PRS and my Jag. It's my go-to light/medium gain distortion sound all the way.

I've been reading reviews and listening to YT demos of the Pork Loin lately and people rave rave rave about it. Some people prefer pedals with fewer knobs, more of a set-and-forget layout, but the PL's tweakability and knob-twiddlability are appealing to me, along with the pedals range from OD to Distortion that seems like it can get just as heavy as the Rhino.

Does anyone have experience with both these stomps? How versatile is the PL vs. the Rhino?

Thanks for your feedback guys

[rocket88]

got both. i could be wrong, but i'm 99.9999% sure the green rhino is essentially a modded & tweaked tubescreamer, and the pork loin is wasn't based on another pedal. i think they're both equally versatile and have a different place. there is more gain to the pork loin and has a little smoother distortion due to the MOSFET soft clipping arrangement.

[notnews]

I've also heard that the Rhino is based on a TS, but I've always preferred a Rhino over any Ibanez TS I've ever played.. and my buddy guitarist has used 808s, 809s, 808 plus, handwired, blah blah.. the Rhino has always been sweeter and more usable for me, plus that 100hz knob has been absolutely money for me when I want to add thick low-end to my sound. The new 500hz feature really intrigues me.

I just wanted to make sure that having a Rhino and a Pork Loin wouldn't be redundant.

Rocket, you think the Pork Loin has MORE gain on tap than the Rhino? That's odd on it's face, considering the Rhino is advertised as a distortion and the PL as an overdrive, right? I'm not disagreeing or anything, just an observation.

[Travis]

Isn't the pork loin based on the boss blues driver?

[rocket88]

travis you may be right about that one, i honestly don't know about the pork loin. found the schematics for both

pork loin:


boss blues driver:


i do see some similarities, so the pork loin could be a massively hotrodder bd-2.

notnews, no worries about disagreeing with me. i always thought they were both advertised as overdrives, just different flavors. i remember something about the pork loin being "british" voiced.

i just went and messed around with them again and played with them back to back. i think saying one has more distortion would be a bad description. the pork loin has a smoother distortion compared to the green rhino, and you also have the clean blend which is super helpful when i was using one of my basses. as far as total gain from each, i think they're probably equal, but due to the Si clipping vs the MOSFET clipping i think the the green rhino seems to have more on tap.

can't agree more that the green rhino sounds better then the regular tube screamer. it seems to have a bit more character to it. but then again that's just my opinion.

[Travis]

I agree on the Tube Screamer comparison. I've tried the TS-808 reissue and the normal one and both sound "boxy" and "flat" for lack of better words. They're really not even cheap, especially the TS-808 reissue. You'd think they could do a little better.

For whatever reason the identical TS from the 70s sounds a bit more full and "lively".

The Green Rhino has a lot of clarity and harmonics. It feels much better to play