I guess for newbies out there try using an inexpensive multi effects pedal like the Digi Tech RP 150 its great for getting a feel of what is out there..

I think even for beginners, if they want to develop a tone of there own that they should avoid multi effect pedals. It is nice to have many effects in one pedal but they so often do each effect little justice. I do agree that effects can be very expensive and this can be discouraging for beginners. I think that a better option is to experiment with Behringer effects. They are inexpensive and each pedal is dedicated to a specific sound. Many of the pedals are only $20. I will be reviewing some of the Behringer pedals soon. Let me know if there is one in particular you are curious about.

I know a few guitarists who own cheaper multi-effects pedals, but they wind up using only one or two of the effects. For that money, they might have bought higher end single boxes. The guitarists I play with each week have Pods more expensive multi units, and there really is a difference for the extra cash. Probably the best advice I can give is to find a store locally that has a lot of effects and plan to spend a couple of hours putting them through a workout.

I've always been a skeptic when it comes to trying to cram too many gizmos in one box. As MattG reported earlier, they never seemed to do each effect justice. But the technology ages, there seem to be some really good 'all in one' units out there. The Pod series gets great reviews and you'll notice quite a few of them as part of the pro's setups. Boss makes really tough, really good sounding pedal boards. Again you see a lot of Boss boards if you look at the big boys rigs. I've owned a bunch of them. I have a cheap Digitech RP200A that I use as a headphone/practice/song learning unit. It has some passable sounds and is easy to tweak. It also has a mini plug line in that is good for learning tunes. I have patched it into my recording console at home. The tones do not hold up well under close examination. I have a couple of Yamaha products. A Magic Stomp and a DG Stomp. The Magic Stomp has really good effects and less than OK amp modeling. It is not practical to use live because it is really cumbersome to fine tune a patch if you are not hooked to your computer. The DG Stomp has much better amp modeling but a limited amount of effects to choose from. It is easier to use live but three years of tap dancing lessons are required to navigate it. I recently bought a Line 6 M13 pedal board. It is essentially every Line 6 pedal built into one unit. It has no amp modeling which suits the heck out of me. It is all stomp boxes. The sounds and ease of use are well above fine and as the advertising promises it is "Bonehead Simple" to program. With all that being said, I've walked both sides of the tracks. A rack of processors with a midi foot controller, a few multi effectors, a pedal board that required two humans to carry and set up. All of the rigs have served their purpose and then I moved on.... and came back... and moved on again....

Line 6 now has an M9 version of the M13 -- fewer effects for about $300 rather than $400. The delays and choruses are really nice. I could live without the distortions they are a bit too raucous. I like the old school overdriven tube amp distortions, not the nasty knife-edge kind.

Line 6 is notorious for bad distortion. The Spider amp has distortion presets like the Pod xt, that are named after bands which gives young guitarists the illusion that these are the exact distortion patches that the bands use. I.E. Maroon Five, Gavin Degraw, etc. So they automatically think that it sounds good. I will have to agree with Daveb, the technology is up and coming but they still sound a bit computerized for my taste. I'm like Lakelander, Overdrive before distortion. I think everyone needs a good overdrive pedal that only does overdrive, and a good delay that only does delay. Anything else can probably done with a multi effects pedal.