5 years after it was first teased, Dawner Prince finally announces Pre-Orders for its Boonar Tube Deluxe Echorec Tape style Delay

So we first saw a very finished prototype of this pedal back in October of 2019 - where it looks identical to this final production release as far as I can tell. I’m guessing there were some further challenges with the DSP side of things - where it’s often the MIDI programming side that holds things up.

In any case, we finally have a proper release candidate - which all Boonar and Echorec fans will be delighted to see. I personally was hoping for a Stereo pedal - as the last 1/3rd of my chain is stereo - and you need a stereo Delay to fit in with that. Instead the Boonar Tube Deluxe is a Mono In, Mono Out Pedal - but with an additional isolated Wet Out. So I guess this is aiming for vintage authenticity in that regard.

The pricing is another outlier for me - where understandably the R&D phase of this pedal has been somewhat extensive, and the maker needs to recoup most of that investment. The original / standard Boonar goes for $350, while the new Tube Deluxe Edition goes for a pretty lofty $1,200. Meaning that this pedal is mostly destined for recording studios I would presume! T-Rex’s actual authentic Binson Echorec take goes for $2,100 for comparison. The price of the Boonar Tube Deluxe is obviously relatively high.

Another thing that is high is the 12V DC [-] 760mA current draw power requirement. That makes for some very specialist power-supply deployment - which of course the Cioks Crux can solve for you! It does come with its own power supply too obviously.

When I saw the original prototype I thought the OLED Screen looked to be a little on the small side - I had hoped it would match the surface area of the Playback Heads + Feedback Buttons element - where the pedal is still coming up a little ergonomically lopsided. It’s really handy though to be able to see the delay time in both ms and BPM.

Technologically the pedal is pretty impressive, and as always, the sound is pretty top-notch - with that proper Twin Triode Tube Preamp delivering a wonderful warm heart to the circuit. Maximum Delay Range is impressive too - reaching 950ms with this model - and there’s all kinds of cool things you can do with the Swell and Drum Age to further enhance the output. This pedal is really a mix of old and new tech - and with all the modern advancements with power management - I’m a little surprised at the high current draw requirements - that’s obviously down to the Tubes surely.

There’s several interesting parallels here with the Strymon Volante - in terms of overall scope, and that the 4 Playback and 4 Feedback Buttons topology is ’borrowed’ from that device. For the record, the price on that unit is $429. UPDATE! - Dawner Prince’s Zoran has rightly corrected me on this point - the inspiration for the 2-banks of buttons, comes from the Binson Echorec P.E. 603T-6 - and Zoran had a version with that topology out 1 year before the Volante was launched!

One more fact for this unit comes from Zoran too, but via my friend Henry Kaiser, who reports Zoran’s words as follows :

"Boonar Tube Deluxe is a hybrid pedal. Dry signal path is always analog and tube driven, both preamp and output mixer. Only a part of delay (magnetic memory drum) is DSP.”

This is an odd mood for me of exhilaration for this pedal finally being complete, but tempered with slight disappointment for what it could have been. In the grand scale of things, I’m not too perturbed by the High Current Draw, or High Price even - rather it’s the lack of Stereo capability that takes it out of contention for me.

Otherwise there is so much cool tech here - including 16 onboard presets, and 127 via MIDI. MIDI control is obviously a big thing for this pedal - and I assume it was the MIDI Programming that likely held this pedal up.

Congratulations to Dawner Prince on this Milestone - while alas, I cannot make use of this pedal within my rig! I so wanted this to be stereo!

There is much to love here though - it really does sound superb, and it has a really rich and dynamic feature set - I of course wish Dawner Prince the best of luck with the launch! Here follow the various Feature Highlights and Technical Details.

As mentioned - the Boonar Tube Deluxe can be Pre-Ordered from the Dawner Prince Webstore for $1,200 - where it requires just a $200 Deposit to reserve one. Pre-Ordered units will be aimed to be delivered between late July and late September.