Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

[Webfoot]

What do you think of pickups with ceramic magnets? Any good?

I know they can do distortion.... but when you go back to clean... don't they sound kind of hollow, cold etc?

Does anyone do a good clean ceramic pickup... or just can't be done?

 

[super rad stuff]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

it depends on how you play. some say they're brittle, to harsh, yadda yadda yadda. anyways, though i don't personally have any ceramics in my guitars, they're decent for cleans if you play hard. if you attack the strings harder, ceramics get a smoother sound around the edges and that brittle, harshness kind of dissapears. ime that is.

 

[Archer_of_Fish]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

no

 

[Benjy_26]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

The magnet type is only one factor in a pickup's sound. There's great sounding ceramic loaded pickups and bad ones, just like any other pickup using any other magnet type.

 

[Zerberus]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

I have ceramic Humbuckers in almost all of my instruments and they´re decidedly too warm for my tastes playing clean, split they´re generally ok. I go for exactly the type of cold and hollow cleans you hint to and I´ve only ever gotten there with single coils. And all of my SCs are AlNiCo, again because I find ceramic loaded SCs too warm and powerful for my cleans for the most part.

But going by magnet type and not viewing the pickup as a whole is like buying a car solely based on tire brand. It completely disregards the complexity of the system and the results that magnet SIZE, wire guage, wire insulation type, polepiece style, amount of winds, potting and other factors have on the tone

 

[LesPaulRules]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

I actually like the Duncan Custom in certain guitars. Doesn't sound hollow or bright in my rig.

 

[Christopher Caruana]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

for me, i dont like ceramics too much for cleans and overdriven stuff. their cleans dont have the heart and character that i love from an alnico II mag. and when playing with dirt, there is no tone. but on th other hand, i like ceramics for when i play harder rock stuff with lots of gain. but no they are not my favorite magnet. I like softer magnets

 

[Push to Shuv]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

I really liked the SH-5 Customs I have had in the past... amazing pickup with great versatility for a high output ceramic

 

[Mephis]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

I've only ever liked 1 ceramic pickup.

The dimarzio megadrive. It's completely void of all the other "ceramic sounding" issues other ceramic pickups have.

 

[super rad stuff]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

for me, i dont like ceramics too much for cleans and overdriven stuff. their cleans dont have the heart and character that i love from an alnico II mag. and when playing with dirt, there is no tone. but on th other hand, i like ceramics for when i play harder rock stuff with lots of gain. but no they are not my favorite magnet. I like softer magnets

you got me thinking; i find ceramics very strange in the way they respond to your pick attack. the softer you attack, the harsher they sound. but the harder you attack, the smoother and softer they sound, especially for chords.

 

[GoDrex]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

http://www.billlawrence.com/Pages/Pickupology/magnets.htm

Ceramics vs Alnico

When I read that ceramic magnets sound harsh and alnico magnets sound sweet, I ask myself, " Who the hell preaches such nonsense?" There are harsh-sounding pickups with alnico magnets and sweet-sounding pickups with ceramic magnets and vice-versa! A magnet by itself has no sound, and as a part of a pickup, the magnet is simply the source to provide the magnetic field for the strings. The important factor is the design of a magnetic circuit which establishes what magnet to use.

 

[idsnowdog]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

Pickups are bad sounding, magnets are just the means to create the electrical current in a pickup. Magnets are no worse than the wire used to wind the coils. So a bad pickup is the sum of its parts. Unfortunately ceramic magnets get a bad rap because their affordability means they are used in poor quality pickups. Calling ceramics bad is like labeling flour bad because it was used to make a bad tasting cake.

 

[korovamilkdud]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

I actually like the Duncan Custom in certain guitars. Doesn't sound hollow or bright in my rig.

I think the Custom is about the best Les Paul pickup ever conceived! IF you take the time to wire it for split/series. A series Custom will give you classic distortion tones, and a split Custom provides spanky cleans.

 

[EEF13]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

it all depends on the pickup

 

[JB_From_Hell]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

I think most people wouldn't dislike ceramic pickups if they didn't think they were supposed to. Most nitpickiness can be safely attributed to the internet.

 

[krankguitarist]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

Nah, plenty of great-sounding ceramic pickups out there.

I've never kept a ceramic pickup in one of my guitars, though. I've settled with alnico 5 or alnico 8 pickups in the bridge position, and alnico 5 or alnico 2 pickups in the neck position.

What I've got I'm pretty happy with, but I don't rule ceramic pickups out. As has been said before, its only one part in the equation.

 

[Quicksilver689]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

Nah, plenty of great-sounding ceramic pickups out there.

I've never kept a ceramic pickup in one of my guitars, though. I've settled with alnico 5 or alnico 8 pickups in the bridge position, and alnico 5 or alnico 2 pickups in the neck position.

What I've got I'm pretty happy with, but I don't rule ceramic pickups out. As has been said before, its only one part in the equation.

+1...I've used several great ceramic magnet pickups, but generally don't keep them - but that's directly related to the guitar they're installed in, in my case. I just took a DiMarzio D-Sonic out of my Schecter C-1 Classic because I didn't like the way it responded with maple neck-thru mahogany wings and maple top (imo, too brittle and not sweet enough), but on a bolt-on basswood bodied guitar with maple neck and rosewood fingerboard it sounds great to my ears. I now use a Custom 8 in my Schecter and it sounds awesome.....but, all that being said, music is indeed a hearing art, and YMMV.

 

[supernosher]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

The sound of ceramic is more compressed than AlNiCo - but I think you are taking the sounds people are describing too dramatically. Yeah they might sound cold, but that's because they're not sloppy like a '59 (ceramic is very tight). The '59 is actually more hollow sounding than any ceramic pickup and it uses AlNiCo 5.

 

[Zhangliqun]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

Not generally a fan of ceramics but in certain applications they are necessary (like the Invader and other such pu's). Beyond such applications, I vastly prefer Alnico.

Ceramic isn't necessarily cold or harsh but in my experience, it lacks the clarity and detail that Alnico brings. In the context of a pickup, a magnet is more than just something to create a Brand X generic magnetic field. The shape, intensity, and variations on that intensity throughout the same field vary from magnet type to magnet type (and even magnet to magnet in the same Alnico or ceramic grade, depending on charge level or precise ratio of the alloy, etc). Which means each magnet will see different parts of the string with different emphasis and thus emphasize different parts of the frequency spectrum.

Yes there's a lot more to a pickup than just the magnet. But there's also a lot more to the magnet than just a magnetic field that's more or less interchangeable with all other magnetic fields.

 

[Butch Snyder]

Re: Are all ceramic magnets bad sounding?

IMHO, there can be Alnico 2 magnets pickups that can be harsh just as there can be ceramic magnet pickups that can be smooth. The Duncan Custom is one of the best pickups available and I have never looked at it as being harsh. The Steve Morse signature pickups are ceramic and they're not harsh at all.