I had a small hand in the development of that pickup but only in that I was asked to compare it to the pickups in my '63 Strat and the Antiquitys in my newer Strats. I feel that it is the most vintage sounding of all of the humbucking/noiseless Strat single coils I have tried. I'd say it has about 95% of the tone and that the main diff I hear is a certain thickness to the mids in the Stack Plus...and some players would call that an improvement. I spent pretty much the whole summer with my Strat with new Stack Plus prototypes and it was pretty much the only guitar I played all summer. They're excellant!