So I've had this unit a few weeks now... I haven't yet got around to trying it out in a live performance situation so I can't speak to its practical abilities and limitations in that respect, but I've sort of got a handle on what it will and won't do and how to operate it (except for the MIDI part, I don't use MIDI being too much of a Luddite and general technophobe myself)

I actually like this piece of gear, although when I begin to list its limations I'm not sure why I like it... well, I haven't owned or used any kind of live looper since I had a Repeater, so it's good to have one again, but I keep comparing it to the Repeater and finding it deficient on many counts:

* Working with tempo: Unlike the Repeater, the 2880 doesn't have any kind of beat detection, NOR does it even have a tap tempo button, which means that if you are trying to make a loop from a prerecorded CD (drumbeat, four-bar chord progression, whatever) it is extremely difficult to hit the button at the exact beginning and end of the bar so you have an even loop that doesn't end early or late i.e. off the beat - The 2880 DOES have a 'quantize button' that can automatically end the loop at the exact end of the bar, but ONLY if the bar is in 4/4 and if the beat of the source material is synched to the 2880's imprecisely adjustable on-board tempo... Moreover, the tempo setup is inflexible in that the slider goes from 30 to 240 BPM in steps (basically the tempo slider doubles as a pitch slider which varies the pitch in semitone intervals from 2 octaves down to 2 octaves up while simultaneously altering the speed of the loop, just as you would by altering the rpm of a tape loop)... which brings me to Rick's point: unlike the Repeater, you have no INDEPENDENT control of pitch and speed of the loop... bummer - And if you record a loop at one pitch and tempo and then want to record another track at a different pitch and tempo setting, then the playback of the original loop shifts to the new tempo/pitch setting as you record the new loop: so if you wanted to create a bass line by doubling the pitch setting during record, you'd have to listen to the original loop at double pitch and tempo while recording, and then switch back to the original setting (which would return your original loop to the normal setting, and make your second loop one octave lower and half-speed)...

* Unlike the Repeater, this doesn't have an external effects send/return circuit, so forget about putting effects on one loop and not on another... I run the 2880 from the effects send on my mixer and back into a channel strip so I can send the loops thru another effects processor, but it has to be applied to all the loops coming from the 2880...

* The built-in metronome is cool for recording loops but useless for live looping unless you want to have the metronome clicking as live accompaniment to your performance (it doesn't record the click track, of course, but it outputs it thru the main outs, instead of just thru a headphone jack for example)...

* If you're planning on saving loops you'll need to buy plenty of compact flash cards to store each set of loops on, since you can only put one loop on each card (one loop meaning four tracks and a two-channel stereo mixdown track) - You can back up loops from the cards to your computer and reload them later onto separate cards to bring to your gig, like if you've got thirty loops you want to keep just back 'em up and only keep five or ten cards on hand... So, no use getting one of these huge 2GB CF cards that with lots of storage unless you're planning on recording 60-minute loops (in other words, using this unit as a four-track recorder with removable drives, as opposed to using it as a looper): a 128MB card holds a four-minute loop (that is, four tracks with unlimited overdubs on each track + a stereo mixdown track) which is as long a loop as I'm likely to need...

On the more positive side of things, I like the footswitch, which offers more control options than the three-button foot pedal option for the Repeater - The 2880 pedal has six buttons (new loop, play, record, octave down, reverse, and track select)... And it does true stereo looping like the beloved Repeater... It has a punch-in button so you can fix one little part of a loop without rerecording the whole track or overdub...

Also I like that when recording a new track after recording your original loop, you can begin the recording at any point in the playback (not just at the beginning) of the first loop, which enables you to easily add some cool counterpoint and syncopation...

A big plus is that I think this model sounds better than the Repeater, which makes it better for in-studio applications: the noise floor is lower, there is none of that chirping with compact flash card loops, and no electromagnetic interference like with the Repeater which used to cause an annoying whine in my powered monitors whenever it was powered on... However, I did notice some faint clicking that would start to build up on prerecorded loops during playback (this was only obvious on loops with silent segments and when listening on headphones)...

I like the mixdown function which enables you to record loops on all four tracks, then do a live mixdown onto a separate stereo channel, manipulating the faders and pan knobs during mixdown... And I like how the track faders double as feedback control when overdubbing onto a single track (adjusting the amount the volume of each overdub diminishes with every repeat)...

In sum, I paid about $550 for the 2880 and foot pedal (foot control sold separately) including shipping, and that's rock bottom pricing from www.instrumentpro.com... if you could find a used Electrix Repeater for not much more than that (wish I hadn't sold mine, stupid me) I'd say get a Repeater, unless you're using it for mainly studio applications and can't deal with the Repeater's noise issues...

I might have more to say when I've more thoroughly explored using this model in live settings (lately I'm having more fun with my new Lexicon MX200 processor, which outperforms my previous Lexicon MPX550 at half the price), but that's it for now...