Load resistance - tone loss.

[kleuck]

PSPICE Modeling of Guitar Circuits with Effects of the Instrument Cable

[David Schwab]

Maybe he has an all-true-bypass pedalboard with a coily cord!

Ha! I'm always amazed that people don't see that this true-bypass stuff is a step backwards. It's a partial reaction from the old days when pedal makers would use a cheaper SPDT switch and leave the input of the effect attached, which often had a fairly low input impedance, like on a cry baby wah. But now with people that have like 10 pedals; that's a lot of wire and cables in your signal path!

[kleuck]

Ten at least more or less crappy buffers are also 9 useless ones in your signal path

[David Schwab]

Ten at least more or less crappy buffers are also 9 useless ones in your signal path

That's assuming they are crappy. One buffer at the beginning is a better way though. But nine buffers makes up for the often crappy cables between effects.

[kleuck]

But they ARE most of the time crappy, poor caps, too low values (low freq losses) poor noisy generic transistors...
And the second buffer is always a useless source of noise, buffer between pedals are of no interest, even a crappy cable doesn't have any negative effect on sound when it's 5' long.