I have owned the boss cs-3 for 5 years.It's been roughed up on the road, but has not failed me on stage one bit. The casing of the pedal is very solid, i just wish the led was brighter. There are 4 knobs on the cs-3. Level,tone,attack and sustain.The attack knob is my favorite.palm muted notes really stand out the more you turn this knob up.The sustain knob does what it says..you can hold a note for days the more you turn it up.The only down part to this pedal is that when i turn my sustain up almost all the way,i get a lot of feedback.The cs-3 sucks out a good bit of my tone also..Overall,this pedal is worth the money if you cannot afford a high end compressor pedal.The customer service and shipping time from musicians friend were fantastic.Btw,country pickers will like the compressed sound on their clean channel.

I've been playing with the BOSS CS-3 for a few months while at open mic nights. I got it because I wanted to sustain bends and have more response with hammers. It's worked greatly for that purpose. Added positive effects I've had is a boost in gain and more "ring" to even single notes. The only real negative effect I've had is a slight "pop" when I pluck a string. I've heard reports from others about ambient noise and changes in pitch produced by this pedal, but I haven't experienced it myself.

As far as buying one, play with it first and see if you like it.

This pedal rocks! Not only will it tighten up your tone and give you a rich thick sound but it can make that twangy strat not so twangy if you use one. It takes a little bit to tweak to get the right sound your looking for but its worth it. It won't help out too much with feedback, hum, etc. but it will a little. Plus its a Boss pedal so u can throw it down the stairs as soon as you get it and it'll work perfectly still.

If you have an ear for tone and really understand how to EQ your guitar and get a good balanced sound, this pedal goes great with just about anything. You can run it clean or along with a distortion pedal. Just don't over-do it. It will sustain your tone for days.

my guitar teacher bought this pedal and we were playing around with it and wow its amazing! Im buying one soon defiantly, the sustainer in this pedal is great it makes a huge difference with solos and chords. The compressor is pretty good to it does a good job getting rid of that annoying and noisy feedback that makes turning your guitar up loud get you mad. Definity buy this pedal