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kbaim

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Joined
Aug 16, 2003
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Red Rock Country
Derek, may need your advice on this one.

Wondering if anyone else has encountered something similar...

On my 2 Axis Super Sports (one hummer, one mm90), both with piezos, I'm having problems with the piezo input jack on each. Actually 2 problems with each. (For those unfamiliar, the piezo guitars have 2 inputs).

***Note: I'm using only one cord (taking out of one jack and putting it in other jack), and one amp.

And I never even bothered to use the magnetic only jack until curiosity finally beckoned.

1st problem
when using piezo jack, magnetic pickups are a helluva lot noisier than when using magnetic only jack (almost sounds like a grounding problem as the guitar is most noisy when hands aren't touching it). Even on clean amp settings.

Weird thing is the piezo pickup on each guitar is whisper quiet. No complaints there.

2nd problem
The magnetic pickups, by themselves, sound darker (different)when using magnetic jack than they do when using piezo jack. This is more pronounced in hummer Axis ss.

And this is when piezo volume knob is completely off

Anyone out there kinda know what I'm talking about. And is there an easy fix ( I tried new batteries)?

Appreciate any help on this.
KEITH
 

Derek

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Joined
Feb 18, 2003
Messages
1,181
Keith,

The Piezo/Mono output has a buffer that was implemented to mix the magnectic and piezo signals together. The Magnectic output has no buffer. It is possible that the piezo/mono output is a little noisier because of this extra gain stage when using the magnectic pickups.

When using a guitar cable of different lenths their is a slight tonal loss associated with the magnectic pickups or better put a slight high frequency loss. This explains why when using the buffered/piezo output it seems brighter because the buffer does not recognize the lower resistance of the guitar cable. This piezo/mono output is good for using the guitar through one amp because it allows you to combine the signals however optimal usage for the piezo and magnectic pickups is to use two cables and send each signal to two different amps or use a stereo cable and splitter box. This would allow individual control of each signal while combining both sounds together.

Derek
 
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