I've had this guitar for a little over a year and I have always usd the piezo/mag output with the piezo volume rolled down or blended in. I just recently started to use the magnetic pickups only (bypassing the piezo circuit) and I noticed there is an extreme difference in tone. Much darker and muddier than with the piezo/mag output. I know that it bypasses the use of the 9v battery, but should I expect a tonal difference if just using the magnetic only output? Does the battery also assist the magnetic pickups when using the mixed output? Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
SE Hollowbody II Magnetic Pickups only
- Thread starter mdnitz
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I haven’t played this model, but own a guitar with both piezo and regular pickups, have owned and played others.
There is a metric crap ton of difference in the tone of regular guitar pickups (ANY!) and piezo pickups. The piezo is supposed to give you the tone of an acoustic guitar, so yeah, it some completely different. So even if you have it dialed down, unless it’s all the way off, it will significantly impact your tone.
Thing is, those magnetic pickups are the “normal” pickups for the guitar, as an electric guitar. So if you’ve dialed your amp or modeler with the piezos, you’ll need to redial your your tones to the magnetic pickups. When I use my guitar with piezo’s, I run it through a whole separate signal chain most of the time. Only every once in a while do you blend them, and that also requires redialing tones.
You probably know all of this already. I only said it all because most people don’t think, and the sound samples I’ve heard don’t indicate, that the magnetic pickups are dark and muddy on this guitar.
I won’t swear to this, but I don’t think the battery is in play at all on the magnetic pickups, and is only used to drive the piezo preamp circuit.
Chris101
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My guess is that when the hum buckers are going through the piezo circuit they will first hit a bit of circuit that buffers the signal and makes it compatible with the blend circuit with the piezo signal. This would effectively wipe out the capacitance of your guitar cable going to your amp or effects which would make it brighter than the direct out socket where I suspect it’s just like a normal passive tone and volume control.
Oscarguitar
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I have the same guitar and run it with two cables, one to the amp one to the PA via a fishman pre amp. When I first got it I thought the same thing, mags were muffled and dull. Which compared to the piezo is true. However when compared to my Core 22 with Dragon IIs or my SE 24 with 85/15s the 58/15s are just warmer but not muffled and need a hint more brightness to cut through the mix.
However I’ll do a bit of testing today to see if the blend output of the mags is brighter than the mag only output. If there is a difference then that Concorde buffer might be finding its way back on my pedal board.
However I’ll do a bit of testing today to see if the blend output of the mags is brighter than the mag only output. If there is a difference then that Concorde buffer might be finding its way back on my pedal board.
Oscarguitar
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I thought I should report back! I’ve done a bit of testing direct into the amp now and have to agree that the tone of the mags is brighter through the Mix/Piezo output than the straight Mag output.
I also tried my Concorde buffer with the Mag output and it did restore some (all) of that brightness, so it does seem like the piezo circuit is having an effect on the mag outputs when the Mix jack is used.
On my board I use an SP compressor (nearly) always on so this does restore the top end on the hollowbody, using the buffer for the SE 24 made it a bit too bright.
I have two gigs this weekend so I’ll not change anything for now, but I’m considering adding the Concorde back in if I can tame the SE24 a little.
It’s good to have options!
I also tried my Concorde buffer with the Mag output and it did restore some (all) of that brightness, so it does seem like the piezo circuit is having an effect on the mag outputs when the Mix jack is used.
On my board I use an SP compressor (nearly) always on so this does restore the top end on the hollowbody, using the buffer for the SE 24 made it a bit too bright.
I have two gigs this weekend so I’ll not change anything for now, but I’m considering adding the Concorde back in if I can tame the SE24 a little.
It’s good to have options!
