Darkglass Noise Gate

The Darkglass Noise Gate is a noise gate pedal from Darkglass, the Finnish maker best known for bass preamps and distortion pedals. A noise gate does one job: as BOSS's own guide puts it, it "clamps down and eliminates any signal below a certain threshold," which makes it a more abrupt tool than a noise suppressor¹. Place it in your chain and it silences the hiss, hum and handling noise that appears whenever you stop playing, especially with high-gain distortion or a cranked amp.

What sets this pedal apart is how little there is to it. The whole interface is one push knob: turn it to set the threshold, press it to change modes. GuitarPlayer's buying guide describes it as having "a simple threshold control acting as your sole control option"².

How the gate works

A threshold control, as Guitar World explains, "sets the level at which the gate will 'open' and let signal through"⁵. Signal above the threshold passes; signal below it is cut. For a player, that means setting the knob just above your noise floor: quiet enough that your playing flows through untouched, high enough that hum and hiss disappear between phrases.

The trade-off with any gate is abruptness. Kit Rae's technical analysis of gating notes that "a poor quality noise gate, or one set too high, can cause the sound to have a pronounced on-and-off rather than a smooth fade off or on"⁶. That is the problem the Darkglass pedal's two modes address.

The controls: one push knob

The single control does both jobs. From the manual: "Use this push knob to control the threshold of the noise gate. Press the knob to switch between the 'Soft' mode (Blue LED color) for softer gain reduction and 'Hard' (Red LED color) for the more aggressive gate operation"⁴.

The threshold range depends on which mode you are in:

Soft mode reaches down to very low thresholds and tops out at -30 dBV, which suits gentler gating of a modest noise floor. Hard mode extends up to +5 dBV, so it can be set to open only at genuinely loud signal levels, the kind of firm gating high-gain players often want between chords³.

Soft and Hard mode compared

The two modes differ in both character and range. Soft mode applies softer gain reduction, so the volume falls away more gradually rather than snapping off. Hard mode is the more aggressive gate operation, cutting noise more decisively³.

The two-mode idea is not unique to Darkglass. The Flamma Innovation FC10 Noise Gate uses a toggle switch that "goes between Hard and Soft modes, for varying degrees or noise reduction"⁷, and the TC Electronic Sentry offers a hard-gate mode aimed at "heavy players who demand instant noise" removal. Where those pedals use a separate switch, Darkglass folds the mode change into the knob itself, keeping the enclosure small: 50 mm wide, 36,5 mm long and 45 mm tall, at 205 g³.

Power and connections

Power requirements are 9V DC center negative with a current consumption of about 60mA³, a figure GuitarPlayer's buying guide corroborates at 60mA². That draw is modest by pedalboard standards, and the pedal is specified for a regulated adapter only, with no battery option. The pedal presents a 1MΩ input impedance and a 100kΩ output impedance³, the high input value meaning it does not load down passive pickups when placed first in a chain.

Warranty and registration

To activate the warranty, Darkglass asks you to register the pedal at mypedal.darkglass.com using the serial number on the back of the unit⁴. If a pedal ever needs to go back to the maker, contact support@darkglass.com by email before shipping anything³.

The manual also notes that "in the interest of continuous improvement, specifications are subject to change without notice"³, so the figures on this page reflect the manual as published. The pedal is declared compliant with FCC Part 15 as a Class B digital device and with the European EN55013, EN55020, EN60555-2 and EN60555-3 standards, plus RoHS and WEEE directives⁴.

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