Joyo AT Drive

The Joyo AT Drive is a compact overdrive pedal from Joyo's Iron Man series, built as a clone of the Xotic Effects BB Preamp. Like the pedal it copies, it aims at warm, full overdriven tones, and reviewers found it delivers exactly that¹.

The pedal sits in a solid casing finished in a fiery reddish-orange, with four white plastic dials under a flip-up hood, an Iron Man series design touch that shows the illuminated Joyo logo when closed¹.

What it does: warm, full overdrive

The BB Preamp it copies is known for providing warm, full overdriven tones, and BK Pedal Reviews found the AT Drive "can also claim to do without dispute"¹. The four dials give you a simple control set:

That two-band EQ layout mirrors the BB Preamp's design, which pairs a Tube Screamer-derived gain stage with a two-band Baxandall EQ².

A clone of the Xotic BB Preamp

BK Pedal Reviews describes the AT Drive plainly: "Apparently this pedal is a clone of the Xotic Effects BB Preamp Overdrive Pedal"¹. To understand what that means for your sound, it helps to know the original.

The BB Preamp was first released by Xotic Effects in 2005, a few years after the AC Booster and RC Booster³. Aion FX's technical analysis of the circuit found it is essentially a Tube Screamer with the tone control hard-wired at 9:00, plus an added variable gain stage and a two-band Baxandall EQ in place of the single tone knob².

The "AT" in the pedal's name points at the BB Preamp's best-known player. In 2017 Xotic released the BB Preamp Andy Timmons signature model (BBP-AT), which Premier Guitar reported is "a reincarnation of the original Xotic Effects BB Preamp"⁴. Aion FX's tracing of that signature version found it seems to be a reissue of the pre-2007 BB Preamp circuit, the version Andy Timmons preferred to the updated one².

Aion FX also notes that the widely circulated single-pot DIY schematic of the BB Preamp, which originated in 2006 as a simplified work-alike by a forum user named KHE, was never intended as an exact clone², so not every "BB Preamp circuit" out there matches the real pedal.

The Iron Man hood

The AT Drive's most distinctive feature is its bonnet, or hood, covering the four dials. When closed it shows the Joyo logo illuminated, part of the Iron Man series design shared across the line¹. For a player, it protects your knob settings from being nudged on a crowded pedalboard or in transit.

Price and how it compares

In the UK, the AT Drive sold for £30 new on Amazon as of December 2022¹. That makes it a fraction of the cost of the pedals that carry the same Andy Timmons association. The JHS AT Andy Timmons Drive V2 listed at $219 in August 2026⁵, and the Keeley Super AT Mod listed at $199 in May 2023⁶.

What reviewers said

BK Pedal Reviews, reviewing the AT Drive in December 2022, found it "a solid little pedal" and concluded that "the AT Drive can confidently stand up to any of them" when compared with the other overdrives the reviewer had covered recently¹.

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