Carl Martin Buff Deluxe

The Carl Martin Buff DeLuxe is a dual-buffer system from Carl Martin. A buffer is a small amplifier stage that keeps your signal strong and clear over long cable runs and crowded pedalboards, and the Buff DeLuxe places one at its input and one at its output. Carl Martin describes it as a system that "preserves tone integrity through complex pedalboards, long cable runs, and true-bypass switching"¹.

The problem it addresses is familiar to players with big boards: long cables and many true-bypass pedals in series add up to capacitance that dulls the high end and weakens the signal before it reaches the amp. The Buff DeLuxe's dual-buffer design, with input and output buffering, is built to protect the tone from that degradation¹.

What it does

The Buff DeLuxe buffers the signal at both ends of the pedal. Input buffering keeps the guitar's signal strong as it enters the chain, and output buffering drives it through the rest of the cable run to the amp. Carl Martin says the result is that your guitar comes back to life, "as if there was nothing between it and the amp"¹.

The Mute switch is the other half of the pedal's job. Flipping it directs the signal to the dedicated Tuner Out and mutes the guitar, so you can tune silently between songs. Because the tuner sits on its own output rather than in the main chain, the Buff DeLuxe, in Carl Martin's words, removes "even the tuner from the signal chain"¹.

For players comparing buffers, the Buff DeLuxe's distinction is that dual-buffer arrangement plus the mute and tuner-out feature set, where many buffer pedals offer a single buffer stage and nothing else¹.

Questions