I think that part of what Lew is saying is, you can do all the research you can, but eventually, you just need to try something out.
A good example is the two Peavey's in my sig. The Predator and Patriot are the same guitar, except that the Predator has a Kahler Flyer tremolo and locking nut. The two 59's sounded killer in the Predator. I just lifted the whole pickgaurd assembly out, and put it in the Patriot. The bridge 59 is virtually unusable in that guitar because of excessive shrillness.
One of SD's best pups - is "bad" in that guitar. The difference a tremolo makes.
(btw - as you can see, I haven't gotten around to changing it back yet.)