I have always loved the ingenious industrial design of the Boss compact pedals, first introduced back in 1977! Due to the way everything is laid out, the knobs are always protected from being accidentaly stepped on, and the pedal itself is large and really easy to press even with bare feet, which could never be said about the small round metal footswitches of most of its competitors. My first looper pedal was the original TC Electronic Ditto, and the footswitch was the primary reason I no longer have it. The pedal itself was smaller than the Boss, but a slightly increased size is a sacrifice I am more than willing to make for the sake of improved comfort. Also, the RC-1 has an extremely convenient round loop indicator which serves as a sort of progress bar of the loop, so you can always know when it is nearing the end and overdub it or simply turn it off at the right time. Lastly, I read the manual and discovered an amazing feature I did not even know the RC-1 had: apparently it can be set whether it goes right into the overdubbing mode when you press the pedal to stop the recording, or whether it just starts playing the recorded loop. I think, it is very convenient, especially for musicians who use multi-layered loops live.
