Strymon Flint

The Strymon Flint is a digital pedal that puts tremolo and reverb in one box: tremolo on one half of the panel, reverb on the other, each with its own footswitch so you can run them together or one at a time. Strymon describes it as "essentially two pedals in one" and as a studio-class effects pedal that delivers "the history of tremolo and reverb in a pedalboard friendly format"¹. The current version, the Flint V2, lists at a price of $349.00¹.

The three tremolo types are the '61 Harmonic Tremolo, the '63 Power Tube Tremolo and the '65 Photocell Tremolo; the three reverb types are '60s Spring Tank Reverb, '70s Electronic Plate Reverb and '80s Hall Rack Reverb¹. The '61 mode is based on the harmonic tremolo circuits of early 1960s tube amplifiers, a dual-band filtering effect that alternately emphasizes low and high frequencies, with shades of a mild phaser combined with tremolo¹.

The controls and hidden settings

The panel splits in two. On the tremolo side you get a bypass footswitch, a three-way voice toggle, and Intensity and Speed knobs; the reverb side has its own bypass switch, another three-way toggle, and Mix, Decay and Color parameters². The tremolo footswitch's LED indicates tremolo speed¹. The Reverb (Decay) knob varies reverb time, and the '70s and '80s reverbs approach "infinite" decay at maximum¹.

Guitar World's review notes that there are secondary controls hidden away, including Pre-Delay, Tap Division, and Boost/Cut, accessed by pressing and holding both footswitches or by engaging Live Edit mode by holding a single switch². On the Color control, the reviewer found it gives a darker vibe when bumped, affecting the decays with a break-up that filters out musically².

Several global settings live in a setup mode rather than on the panel:

• Input level: hold the REVERB ON footswitch while powering up, release once both LEDs flash, then turn the INTENSITY knob. Instrument mode (green, the default) is set for guitar or bass level; Line mode (red) is set for line level sources such as a keyboard or synthesizer and adds 10dB of headroom. Press either footswitch to store⁴.
• Bypass mode: hold the REVERB ON footswitch while powering up, then turn the MIX knob. True Bypass shows green, Buffered Bypass red. Press either footswitch to store⁵.
• EXP/MIDI jack mode: hold the TREMOLO ON footswitch while powering up, release once both LEDs flash, turn the MIX knob to choose a mode, then press either footswitch to store⁶.

Power and connections

The V2 runs on 9V DC, center negative, with a minimum of 300mA, and the power supply is not included¹. Guitar World lists the same rating². The original Flint required 250mA minimum at the same 9V center negative⁷, so an older power setup sized for the original may not have headroom for the V2.

Connections are a 1/4" stereo/mono input and L and R stereo outputs². The input is a high impedance, ultra low-noise, discrete Class A JFET preamp, and a TRS adapter cable is required for a stereo input signal; use Out L for mono output¹. The V2 has full stereo in/out with a rear panel switch for stereo (TRS) or mono (TS) input¹⁸. The original Flint also did stereo, but by flipping an internal jumper and using a TRS splitter cable, and it shipped in mono configuration from the factory⁷⁹. The V2 also has a USB-C jack on the back for controlling the pedal via MIDI and for firmware updates¹.

MIDI, presets and the EXP/MIDI jack

The V2 has full MIDI implementation through the EXP/MIDI jack or the USB-C connection, so you can control just about every switch, knob and setting remotely, and tremolo speed can be synchronized via MIDI Clock Sync with the sync setting saved per preset¹. There are 300 MIDI preset locations for loading and saving settings¹. Guitar World notes there are no onboard preset slots: the presets are saved and recalled using an external MIDI controller².

The EXP/MIDI jack itself is multifunction. In setup mode you choose one of four functions, each shown by the LED color⁶:

For tap tempo, connect an external switch with a TRS cable to the EXP/MIDI jack and tap in a tempo to set the tremolo speed¹⁰. With a MultiSwitch Plus connected in MIDI mode, you can save the pedal's current state: hold the TREMOLO footswitch until both LEDs blink green, then press the A, B or C footswitch on the MultiSwitch Plus to save to that location¹¹. Full MIDI functionality is also available by sending MIDI Program Change messages through a 1/4" TRS MIDI connection using a Strymon Conduit or MIDI EXP cable⁶.

Firmware updates are done with Strymon's Update software: connect the powered pedal to a computer with a USB-C cable, and the software detects it automatically and shows "Your device is up to date" when finished¹². The current release is firmware REV 1.21, from November 2024, which added Nixie 2.0 compatibility; an earlier revision, v1.19 from September 2023, added MIDI CC# 25 for Clock Division¹³.

The original Flint and the V2

The original Flint ran on a SHARC DSP with 32-bit floating point processing, 24-bit 96kHz converters, and had an analog dry path when reverb only was engaged⁷. It won a Guitar Player Editors' Pick award, with the magazine's February 2013 review citing its small size, stereo outs, expression pedal input, three reverbs and "a wonderfully voiced analog front-end"¹⁴.

The V2, released in 2020¹⁵, keeps the same core effects algorithms, with hardware differences around them². Guitar.com's review notes that Strymon claims to have done nothing with the core sounds of the original Flint¹⁶. What changed is around the edges: a new ARM DSP chip, a 520MHz ARM Superscalar processor with 32-bit floating point processing, MIDI, the 300 presets, full stereo with a rear panel switch, and the line level input mode with its 10dB of added headroom for basses with active pickups, synthesizers, keyboards and effects loops¹⁸. Premier Guitar's coverage of the updated line described the new version as having full stereo inputs and outputs with a rear panel Mono/Stereo switch⁸.

The V2 measures 4.5" deep x 4" wide x 2.4" tall (101.6mm x 114.3mm x 44.5mm), weighs 1.1lbs (0.5kg), and sits in a strong, lightweight anodized black aluminum chassis¹².

What reviewers said

Guitar World's verdict on the V2 was emphatic:

MusicRadar's review of the original Flint concluded it was "a handy tool that covers plenty of ground"¹⁸. Delicious Audio called it "a thorough (and incredibly successful) stereo exploration of vintage spring reverb and tremolo tones"¹⁵, and Pedal of the Day said the V2 "brings all the sonic glory of the original into focus, along with a slew of new upgrades"¹⁹.

Players have used it on real boards. Pete Thorn demonstrated it in Strymon's own demo video²⁰²¹, and Harrison Whitford told Strymon he had kept one on his pedalboard for about six years: "I've had the Flint for about six years and it's never left my pedalboard, and I don't think I've played a gig or session" without it²¹.

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