Can active pups change actual sound?

[metallicaguy1]

The other day I recorded part of a song--a clean riff, no distortion. Guitar (emgs with active pups) was starting to sound odd on my amp and on comp. Well, I changed the battery, problem solved. Sounded loud and clear again with new battery. However, the part of the song I recorded--the same track--now sounds different when I replay it. I dunno of it's because of new battery or what. I tried rerecording the same riff via the same track and it sounds different than what it did. Completely different. With the faulty battery (or whatever), the notes sounded crisper and less muffled. Now they don't "ring" like they did. they sound muffled and weak. Could the dying battery possibly have done this? I can't figure it out. I changed pups, played with the knobs, and can't recreate the sound. WEird.

[EvilDragon]

Of course. Active pickups means that they have a preamp that is battery powered. Preamp definitely influences the sound.

Inform yourself a bit on the gear that you have...


http://www.dawsons.co.uk/blog/what-i...assive-pickups


This is why a lot of guitarists still prefer passive pickups... No change of tone because there's no battery (although after some years it's a good thing to check the windings and re-pot them), plus better picking response for more dynamics.

[metallicaguy1]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

Of course. Active pickups means that they have a preamp that is battery powered. Preamp definitely influences the sound.

Inform yourself a bit on the gear that you have...


http://www.dawsons.co.uk/blog/what-i...assive-pickups


This is why a lot of guitarists still prefer passive pickups... No change of tone because there's no battery (although after some years it's a good thing to check the windings and re-pot them), plus better picking response for more dynamics.

Evil, is there any way I can get back to that other sound? I tried taking the battery out and playing, but that didn't work. There's no sound.

[EvilDragon]

Active pickups will not work without battery (because battery powers up the preamp! When the amplifier doesn't work, you get no sound, that's just common sense ). And no, you can't really get to that sound until your battery depletes again.

[toddhisattva]

Originally Posted by metallicaguy1

Could the dying battery possibly have done this?

My friend would collect dying batteries because they made his flanger sound great.

Maybe a resistor could duplicate the effect for you.

[karbomusic]

Originally Posted by toddhisattva

My friend would collect dying batteries because they made his flanger sound great.

Maybe a resistor could duplicate the effect for you.

Sometimes not but sometimes yes. The DC resistance of the battery itself changes when losing charge so it depends on the circuit and why it sounds better with a dying battery.

[dub.matze]

if you want eact the same sound like the otherday i sugest to build a dying battery simulator. Just use two 9V blocks to power it and use this simple circuit between the pickup and the 2 batterys (in paralell):



(it works also with one battery)
then adjust outputvoltage to your needs with the pot. (input are the bats, output are the power input of the pickup)

there are many other circuits out there - just google "diy dying batery simulator"

[EvilDragon]

I'd just go with a passive PU. Less annoyance

[dub.matze]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

Less annoyance

i dont agree ...
with an active pu you can
- bottleneck your guit with a powerd cellphone -> less noise
- play with your tongue with amalgam in the mouth (but plz use a di) -> less noise
- and you get an extra pot (just label it with 50% to 140%)
- if you have weak fingers it is easyer to play (smaller magnets) - we all geting older ....

just kidding - i dont play guit.....

[richie43]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

I'd just go with a passive PU. Less annoyance

Less annoyance? I would take active over passive any day, passive pickups get lazy with age, they are so passive. With active pickups, at least that are still trying...lol

I actually only use passive pickups.

[karbomusic]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

I'd just go with a passive PU. Less annoyance

Yup!

[DerMetzgermeister]

Originally Posted by EvilDragon

I'd just go with a passive PU. Less annoyance

Change batteries every few months (or years) is not much of an annoyance.

In the end is just a matter of taste and preferance.

Besides... we, guitar players are more or less, suckers for punishment and annoyance, otherwise nobody would play with floating bridges, killswitchs, complicated custom pickup wiring and switching, yard-long pedal boards, hundreds of sim presets, tube amps... and so on

[SaulT]

I have no idea why active circuitry is so uncommon in guitars.

Personally I prefer a hybrid approach - a passive pickup with an onboard buffer preamp. The tone itself doesn't change and you get all the benefits of that lowered output impedance - less noise, no tone loss due to crappy cable or long cable runs, etc.

Not having to buy expensive cables or having to worry about "oops, my tone's going to suck because I forgot a cable and have to use the house cables" totally offsets the time and money spent changing a battery every few months.

...someone needs to make some non-active pickups called "Aggressives".

[karbomusic]

I have no idea why active circuitry is so uncommon in guitars.

Guitar players aren't techs.

Part is additional complexity no matter how small it appears to us, the battery that might die, the additional thing that might/could/will go wrong, fitting it into the guitar, not wanting a preamp before whatever..

Also, IF the preamp is amplifying enough, we run into a situation where we never want to hit the supply rails of an 9V battery, if we do, the player is going to say "but the active guitar sounds more compressed" because it is.

I prefer not to have them unless it is ONLY a buffer, no active EQ or other circuitry whatsoever but since even that requires a battery, I don't really want them at all. I design/build my own buffer and place it in a pedal instead using a power supply. I can do that because I don't run a 40 foot crappy cable.

[metallicaguy1]

I see that alchemy audio has dead bat sims, but they also say they're not good for digital effects :/

I'd buld one myself if I had some tech savvy lol

[Bristol Posse]

Long/crappy cables and unbuffered FX are a part of my sound.

When I was younger and dumber, I fell for the internet wisdom and I got a wampler buffer and high quality cables to make my signal chain "better" and hated the "improved" sound

All that "good" stuff went straight up on eBay

YMMV

[karbomusic]

Originally Posted by Bristol Posse

Long/crappy cables and unbuffered FX are a part of my sound.

When I was younger and dumber, I fell for the internet wisdom and I got a wampler buffer and high quality cables to make my signal chain "better" and hated the "improved" sound

All that "good" stuff went straight up on eBay

YMMV

You are exactly right, some love one sound, some love the other. In the world of electric guitars where the entire industry is built on exploiting circuit failures, fidelity is rarely the only game in town. I like mine buffered 95% but not all the time and when I do, I want it at my pedal board, not at the guitar. I also don't mind the noise unless it is unusually horrible. IOW, I'm not a dead silent snob so to speak.

[metallicaguy1]

Is there any way I can just drain the 9volt quickly??

[Judders]

Originally Posted by metallicaguy1

Is there any way I can just drain the 9volt quickly??

Lick the terminals for 12 hours.

[EvilDragon]

Originally Posted by metallicaguy1

Is there any way I can just drain the 9volt quickly??

You should just learn how to get a good tone with battery in good state.

[thequietroom]

Ya man. Unless your guitar is defective in some way, put new strings on.. New batter and re record it