Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

A comparison between different pickups using this system could have been nice. So is a before-after demo.

Think there's a way to wire it so you could switch it on and off easily? even if it means going to a different volume pot?

For example, think about a Les Paul with two normal volume knobs, one tone knob and this one replacing the 2nd tone knob...


Edit:
I love this time of year... new products and everything....
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

whatshisname said:
I wonder how long it'll be, before EMG releases a similar product, claiming that they had the idea first, with a slogan saying "We had the idea first, but we took our time to get it right." :laughing:
Click to expand...

Well, they allready have these :


http://www.emginc.com/products/index/135/142/4 -PA2

http://www.emginc.com/products/index/323/142/4 - AB

"The AB (Afterburner) is a push/pull booster with up to 20dB of preset variable gain, perfect for having fun with clean overdrive and distortion. It works with both active and passive pickups, uses rail-to-rail technology, and is easy to install".



Never tried any of them.
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

frankfalbo said:
:laugh2: Yeah the good thing is that it's directly related to the excitement level. You're going to have people on both sides of it because it's a unique, new approach. "Blackouts that look passive?" that's disturbing enough, :scratchch then you have the follow up message "My choice of pickups through this Blackouts preamp?" :eyecrazy: They're both kind of jarring messages. It's a challenge with the marketing messages, too. You never know which of those two statements is more important to whomever is checking out your stuff.

Already in this thread someone said we missed the mark talking about the aesthetics before the tonal benefits, then other guys like Jolly say they wouldn't consider actives in their guitar because it doesn't look right. They're both right.

I'm just happy it's a cool product that will make a lot of guys happy.

It'll be interesting to read the threads over the next year or so of how players are using it, and the tones they discover.
Click to expand...


I will BUY a used entry level guitar just to check this out.
I am sure it is not gonna cost that much !
I am sure a $200.00 Ibanez AX-something will do ;)

Hell, just the excuse i needed to but more Duncan pick-ups . . . BRING IT ON !
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

Jackson guitars have done this in the 80's as well.

JE-1000
JE-1200
JE-1500

All designed to add a gain boost or parametric EQ and create a low impedence system.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not bashing SD, in fact, I'll be first in line to get one of these, as well as the Liberator.
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

On-board boost or eq products have been around forever. We have the Firestorm that led to the launch of the Pickup Booster. The Blackouts modular preamp differs in that it treats each coil of the humbucker separately.

The way it works is precisely what makes the Blackouts have lower noise, and more dynamic range than previous active pickup designs, and what caused all the stir when we released Blackouts. Having that available in the control cavity has very little in common with a simple boost or eq. In fact, if you want your guitar to sound exactly like it does now, only louder and buffered by the active circuit, the Firestorm is your best bet.
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

Hey Frank; What's a Firestorm? I don't see it on the SD webpage. Is it different than an SFX-01?
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

frankfalbo said:
On-board boost or eq products have been around forever. We have the Firestorm that led to the launch of the Pickup Booster. The Blackouts modular preamp differs in that it treats each coil of the humbucker separately.

The way it works is precisely what makes the Blackouts have lower noise, and more dynamic range than previous active pickup designs, and what caused all the stir when we released Blackouts. Having that available in the control cavity has very little in common with a simple boost or eq. In fact, if you want your guitar to sound exactly like it does now, only louder and buffered by the active circuit, the Firestorm is your best bet.
Click to expand...

True enough. If anyone just wants louder signal of their existing pickups, there are a myriad of different ways to do it. My preferred way is to use a DOD Bifet pedal. SD pickup booster is another way. For the blackout preamp to be a success, it has to do more than just boost the signal. Sounds like you guys already have that covered.

Is there a way to bypass this unit and just use your existing hardware without it?
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

Since there is some interest in having a true passive and active setup here are your choices.

First if you have EMG active pickups you will have to settle for using a P2A module (a voltage follower circuit) to convert your passive high impedance signal to low impedance. No true bypass or passive mode.

Second you can take the output signal and pass it through a preamp. A DPDT switch can route the output around the preamp and straight to the output jack. So you get true passive and active bypass. You could wire up a Strat for a master volume and tone using 250K pots and use a 25K pot for the preamp control so that when in passive mode you have the proper values.

Third with a preamp for each pickup like the blackout preamp you could do the same thing you will need more poles on the switch or more switches. The pot values would take more thought with my initial solution being the use of dual pots for some positions.

The point is with preamps not mounted on the pickup you can have the best of both worlds it will just take some creativity.
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

Hypothetically, you could purchase a standard PAF type, like an antiquity with low impedance taps, run the taps into the preamp, and run the full impedance taps through normal potentiometers and then have good sounding active and paf pickups in the same setup?
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

if it's a differential preamp, you need both coils, so no coil tap, but this was exactly what i needed for my les paul because i had a spare 59 and a spare blackout
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

I'm not talking about splitting the humbucker, but of putting low impedance taps on each coil.

So for a standard 8k humbucker, you have two 4k coils in series, but with a special tap, you could have wires which have only 2k of each coil in addition to the standard 4k coil wires. You would use the 4k wires to have a standard bucker and would wire the 2k coils into your blackout preamp to get the active pickup.
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

I am very happy with the recent new products. I would be glad to have the benefits of a Q-tuner, combined with the blackout circuitry.
But, I would prefer the AHB-3 preamp. That would be chosen by the 7 string community too!
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

firebirdV said:
I'm not talking about splitting the humbucker, but of putting low impedance taps on each coil.

So for a standard 8k humbucker, you have two 4k coils in series, but with a special tap, you could have wires which have only 2k of each coil in addition to the standard 4k coil wires. You would use the 4k wires to have a standard bucker and would wire the 2k coils into your blackout preamp to get the active pickup.
Click to expand...

I think your idea has some merit. I'd consider a complete system for a guitar if I could have both sounds in one unit and then select what I want with a switch (it a toggle or push/push knob to switch over to the passive 8k mode). Maybe SD can figure out how to make it happen and then wind up a set of pickups that sound like a good set of PAFs when ran passive and like blackouts when ran through the preamp.
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

gr8scott said:
i think your idea has some merit. I'd consider a complete system for a guitar if i could have both sounds in one unit and then select what i want with a switch (it a toggle or push/push knob to switch over to the passive 8k mode). Maybe sd can figure out how to make it happen and then wind up a set of pickups that sound like a good set of pafs when ran passive and like blackouts when ran through the preamp.
Click to expand...


this +1,000,000
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

Sounds like a cool product. I like Jolly never thought about using active pickups.
I know I am going to buy a liberator, maybe I'll get one of these too and try it on my guitar with the Crazy 8 :naughty::eyecrazy:
 
Re: Now You Can "Blackout" Any Passive Pickup

tonefreak1527 said:
if it's a differential preamp, you need both coils, so no coil tap, but this was exactly what i needed for my les paul because i had a spare 59 and a spare blackout
Click to expand...

Thats not necessarily true. A single coil generates the same differential signal that a humbucker does. Just half the voltage. A coil split should work fine.

Edit: You would, of course, split to either coil wire rather than ground.
 
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