Got the Boss NS-2 noise gate. Has cut down quite a bit of the whoosh I was hearing. However, it's clipping off quite a bit of the notes I'm playing. Tried tweaking the threshold and decay every which way. Also find it works best at the end of the chain, as opposed to Boss' instructions to have it first (that just doesn't make sense to me.) So, I figure I need a compressor/sustainer, but which one? I hear Boss' are kinda noisy. I have a friend that loves his Digitech, but he's more of a jazz player- I'm fiddling around with heavy metal now, so I have the distortion box cranked up pretty high. Suggestions on make/model of a compression box? I've read at a number of sites that the Boss can be quite noisy.

btw- can one of you tech gurus explain exactly how a compressor works in SIMPLE English? I figger I should learn a bit more about the gadgets I'm beginning to accumulate. I haven't been able to set my Korg effects box to default settings, one being simple sustain (can't find the manual, and I programmed the thing yrs. ago to different settings.)

fwiw, I have the stomp boxes setup this way: Korg, Death Metal Distortion, noise gate. Tried different combinations, and found this way works best. Playing through a Crate MicroCube with the effects knob set to clean- set any other way other than acoustic just creates to much hiss. Have other amps, but they're in storage. Thanks much.