Members No Soul Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by walfordr Actually I've never tried one either! Can't see why I would bother. then wtf are you doing on a forum running your mouth about them? x 20 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walfordr Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 QUOTE]Originally posted by No Soul then wtf are you doing on a forum running your mouth about them? x 20 Hoping that someone would come up with some real reasons to use them, but so far without luck. I've never tried riding to work on a unicycle either - that doesn't stop me having the thought that there is a better way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Shocker Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by walfordr Hoping that someone would come up with some real reasons to use them, but so far without luck.I've never tried riding to work on a unicycle either - that doesn't stop me having the thought that there is a better way. When I play the guitars I have with EMGs in them, I play them because I like the sounds I get from them. Good enough? //S Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BowerR64 Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 in the 90s when i first noticed em there wasnt any other pickup that had the hair with the amp i had. I didnt think till just this year anything could sound as good as the actives but latley im changing my sound. The EMGs still sound good but im finding there are some cheap passives on e-bay that sound just as good for about 1/3 the price. They arnt EMGs but my guitar isnt a fender or a gibson so i dont really care. My amp can make up for the hair if i need more. I think i like less then i did in the 90s Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members No Soul Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by walfordr QUOTE]Originally posted by No Soul I've never tried riding to work on a unicycle either - that doesn't stop me having the thought that there is a better way. what a bull{censored} correlation. You already know how to play a guitar, so why not just shut up and try em? Not to mention your question has been answered already! You clearly just dont want to believe they are good, and thats just fine, but what are you trying to accomplish? Guitar pickup bigotry? I demand this thread be killed! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walfordr Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by No Soul what a bull{censored} correlation. You already know how to play a guitar, so why not just shut up and try em?Not to mention your question has been answered already! You clearly just dont want to believe they are good, and thats just fine, but what are you trying to accomplish? Guitar pickup bigotry?I demand this thread be killed! I think you have got me wrong. I do believe you when you say that EMGs sound good. There are also passive pickups that sound good. This thread was about the difference between active and passive pickups, not about whether EMGs are good pickups or not. My goal is to learn from people more knowledgable than myself as to what the advantages of an active pickup are over a passive pickup. I believe I have been given one good advantage (you can drive long cables) and some potential advantages which you can achieve in other ways (lower string pull = lower your pickup, higher output = use a boost pedal). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members No Soul Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by walfordr I think you have got me wrong. I do believe you when you say that EMGs sound good. There are also passive pickups that sound good. This thread was about the difference between active and passive pickups, not about whether EMGs are good pickups or not.My goal is to learn from people more knowledgable than myself as to what the advantages of an active pickup are over a passive pickup. I believe I have been given one good advantage (you can drive long cables) and some potential advantages which you can achieve in other ways (lower string pull = lower your pickup, higher output = use a boost pedal). There are definitely folks who believe actives are the be-all end-all of pickups, and you are correct in that being far from the case. The bottom line is they react differently, be that good or bad is up to you. I should also mention there are plenty of other active pickups out there besides EMG (though they are my favorite) Seymore Duncan makes actives, Bartolini is another manufacturer worth noting. Seriously man, just go out and try them. You probably wont like them, but at least you will have a much better understanding of them than anything you are likely to pick up here. I actually used to question active guitar pickups in a lot of the same ways you do until I just shut up and tried them, and Ive been hooked since! I wouldnt put them in all my guitars (matter of fact I only have em in one guitar I own and plan to keep em that way) but I really dont think Id be happy without at least one guitar with em. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BowerR64 Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Another thing about EMGs is they use blades so the string spacing doesnt really matter. The cable thing is neat and they produce little noise because they use a really low output pickup then boost the output with the preamp in the pickup. I would bet if we tried the pickup with no amp it would sound like crap. One thing that can be bad is trouble shooting a problem. If you grab a bad cable its always in the back of your mind these pickups use a battery. You always wonder if the sound is different if the battery is going bad or of its somthing else. If you use EMGs in a guitar with a pickguard that could be a pain in the ass to pull apart to check the battery. You always have to remember to remove the cable or the battery goes dead. They sound best with a fresh string new battery. As the batterys gets low the gain slowly drops. Least these are things ive noticed. Passive pickups eliminate some of the things that active have Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members No Soul Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by BowerR64 Another thing about EMGs is they use blades so the string spacing doesnt really matter. The cable thing is neat and they produce little noise because they use a really low output pickup then boost the output with the preamp in the pickup. I would bet if we tried the pickup with no amp it would sound like crap.One thing that can be bad is trouble shooting a problem. If you grab a bad cable its always in the back of your mind these pickups use a battery. You always wonder if the sound is different if the battery is going bad or of its somthing else. If you use EMGs in a guitar with a pickguard that could be a pain in the ass to pull apart to check the battery. You always have to remember to remove the cable or the battery goes dead. They sound best with a fresh string new battery. As the batterys gets low the gain slowly drops. Least these are things ive noticed.Passive pickups eliminate some of the things that active have all good points, and the EMG HZ series (the HZ4 in particular in comparison to the EMG81) is pretty much the basic design minus the pre. Larger/stronger magnet Id bet though. And Ive actually met some folks who like the way active stuff sounds like with a weaker battery, same lines of folks who like using pedals with weaker batterie I suppose. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members dot-dot-dot Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by hoerni You might be right. I'll need to check what source I got that number from. I just checked the Canare website, and their guitar cable is only 49pF/ft. That's about 150pF/m (sorry, I have to work in metric ). Anything 150 or below is probably a decent cable - as I said, I can see you might hit 300pF/m for crappy cable - 900pF/m sounds insanely high, but then again if you're talking about the cables that are Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members eeka-chu Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 I think the main problem for driving lines would be effect inputs. The effects loop on an amp starts with a buffer, which will be something like a cathode follower. A cathode follower has a massive input impedance (Tens of MOhms) and a very low output resistance (Hundreds or thousands of Ohms). So the output is capable of driving a lot of current out into the effects loop. On the return there's a normal common cathode gain stage. If you're sending a signal out to an effects pedal that uses solid state electronics you have to be aware that some solid state components need a current to drive their input. A transistor for example... You put a voltage across it's emitter and base to control the current through it. But a small leakage current occurs between the voltage and it needs to be supplied with the current it requires or the voltage will distort. In ultra-high tech modern stuff they use a lot of things like MOSFETs in switch mode supplies. The controllers for these need to be able to source pulses of control current measured in amps. However, a boost pedal with a buffer on it's output will still acomplish the same thing. I was going to mention having the preamp inside cuts down on cable to preamp distance but figured you could always just have it in the cavity if that was such an issue. I added an EMG 81 and 85 to one of my guitars (Yeah, removing the pickguard is a major pain in the ass!). I have got to say that if you want a hot rock or metal sound they're something you shouldn't be too quick to right off. However, as soon as I switched to the clean channel I thought I'd actually broken my amp. I had the volume right down at one or two and the thing was cackling and popping on every note. Even when I turned the volume on the guitar down I'd get similar sounds. It was an old Marshall from the 80's and I figured it was probably just broken. I rarely used the clean channel since it doesn't seem to go through the reverb tank, so I just turned the gain down on the dirty channel. I eventually sold the EMGs to some mad guy in Austria, who bid way too much on a pair of second hand EMGs in my opinion; I felt kinda sorry for him! I also ditched the DiMarzio FRED that came with my JS10th. Then I bought a Custom EVH wind from the SD custom shop. Da darrrr, clean channel works again. The output from the EMG had obviously been so high it had caused the clean channel to clip all the time. I bought boost pedal but have started to use it less and less. Instead, I rebiased my amp. If I had the money spare I would own a guitar with EMGs, but I prefer the versatility of passives. Having the option to remove boost or add it. I once thought that EMG should add a preamp kill switch to the controls but thinking about it, they probably have used a much smaller coil so it'd suddenly transform into a very weedy pickup. Less coil means less DC resistance and less self capacitance. Saying that, I've heard a lot of people complain about these sounding muddy compared to the passives they've used...? I was thinking, perhaps a super tiny switch mode supply could be built to alter the voltage to the pickups using a control on the front. I've run it through the designer and it's come up with options. You've need something like two lithium ion batteries or a 9V cell. Then the supply would boost the voltage between 7,8,9V and 27V. Just thinking out loud. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TheGZeus,OnFire Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Active pickups have a preamp/buffer inside them. Often times there's alot of voicing going on in that preamp. EMGs also incorporate a compander with a pretty heavy ratio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TheGZeus,OnFire Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Oh, and the pickups that ROndo uses in the AB3500 and will be selling by the end of summer are my favorite pickups ever. HUGE dynamic range, no compression, relaively wide frequency reponse, high output but very smooth and warm.Plenty of clarity, though. I hate EMGs, personally, just to note. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TheGZeus,OnFire Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Also, there's really NOT that much lower string pull in an EMG VS a moderate output passive. I mean, and X2N, Invader, Super Distortion...THOSE you're going to have ALOT more string pull.But take something like a '59 et al, or about anythign with an A2 magnet, and it'll be about the same. Lace Sensors have no string pull.They're also more technologically advanced when compared to traditional passives OR actives.The Transensors have 1/8th the impedence and the same output level as traditional pickups as well as a more clear tone and even frequency response. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TheGZeus,OnFire Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by eeka-chu II added an EMG 81 and 85 to one of my guitars (Yeah, removing the pickguard is a major pain in the ass!). I have got to say that if you want a hot rock or metal sound they're something you shouldn't be too quick to right off. However, as soon as I switched to the clean channel I thought I'd actually broken my amp. I had the volume right down at one or two and the thing was cackling and popping on every note. Even when I turned the volume on the guitar down I'd get similar sounds.It was an old Marshall from the 80's and I figured it was probably just broken. I rarely used the clean channel since it doesn't seem to go through the reverb tank, so I just turned the gain down on the dirty channel.Low impedence unity gainor more has alot less amperage and alot more voltage.SOme amps don't like that.I ran a guitar with those active active that are used in the Agile(different guitar) into a JSX, though, and I had a nice clean tone going with plenty of headroom for their big dynaics.I grabbed a guitar with a JB in it, and I was getting LESS output and distortion...Impedence matters more than alot of people think. But then, that amp's clean channel was meant to work well with effects, so that explains that... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walfordr Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by TheGZeus,OnFire EMGs also incorporate a compander with a pretty heavy ratio. How do you put a compander in a pickup? Where is the expansion done? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TheGZeus,OnFire Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by walfordr How do you put a compander in a pickup? Where is the expansion done? Well, they have a very narrow dynamic range, and if they do indeed have fewer windings, that would HAVE to be the case. Picking below a certain 'intensity' notes vanish FAST, and above a certain level, they cease to get much louder.Sounds like downward expansion into compression to me. How do you fit them in a pickup? They use tiny tiny components.Look at their EQ circuits like the SPC et al.Tiny tiny tiny parts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members walfordr Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Originally posted by TheGZeus,OnFire ....Sounds like downward expansion into compression to me....Tiny tiny tiny parts. Mmmm. One of us has a brain thats going down the same path and I'm not sure who it is so I'm going to bed! G'night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members eeka-chu Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Does anyone have a link to some very detailed information on what Lace have patented in their pickups? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members vmx23 Posted June 7, 2005 Members Share Posted June 7, 2005 Probably it's just me but I find that EMG sounds really processed. Like those modelling amps you know? They sound good, but good like a recorded amp kinda way. So the EMG do sounds good but in a recorded guitar tone kinda way. I can see them being very useful for recording though. Consistent sound quality and the sound engineer don't have to spend as much time in production to get a good tone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members No Soul Posted June 8, 2005 Members Share Posted June 8, 2005 Originally posted by vmx23 Probably it's just me but I find that EMG sounds really processed. Like those modelling amps you know? They sound good, but good like a recorded amp kinda way. thats kinda the point Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members TheGZeus,OnFire Posted June 8, 2005 Members Share Posted June 8, 2005 Originally posted by eeka-chu Does anyone have a link to some very detailed information on what Lace have patented in their pickups? Search for 'us patent office'.It's got all the details, they're REALLY complex. If you look into how hard it would be to deal with all those tiny magnets you realise what a value they are at the price they are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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