What are the benefits of active pickups?

[IanBallard]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

I think actives are AMAZING for the bass. There is just no way to get THAT sound from a passive bass pickup. That said, the frequencies that the bass deals with, are less likely to be hampered by a lack of "3 Dimensional jangle" which proponents of boutique and old pickups adore. Guitar pickups are going to sound more obvious in clean mode, that there is a lack of those complexities.

I'd probably get into actives in a guitar if I was using lots of effects, an ELX POG and some synth stuff. There you'd get a more consistent and predictable output into the effects. Obviously actives shine with metal too!

But I just love the complex nature of PAF type pickups and can't see myself playing an active guitar on a regular basis. Bass on the other hand, is a different matter.

 

[Franknfilms]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

I wondered about actives too so I just bought a used guitar for almost nothing that had some emgs in it. I have no regrets, it's nice to have a down tuned guitar with some actives in it for pummeling (and never muddy) metal thrash rhythm. With 18v the emgs have a great clean sound too. I highly recommend installing them if you have multiple guitars, might as well find out what all the fuss is about.

-Can't change magnets in some (or all) actives.

blueman's worst nightmare After having modded some humbuckers, i agree it is a shame I can't touch the emgs. In my dreams I am putting an alnico 8 in my emg 81.

 

[Johtosotku]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

I see two parts to this question. Benefits derived directly from pickups being active, ie. having a preamp in them are:
- The volume control is consistent and doesn't get muddy as you turn it down.
- The tone control to longer interacts with the pickups, so it just rolls off treble instead of changing the resonant peak.
- The pickups respond the same no matter what cable, pedals, or amp you plug into.

Benefits enabled by use of a preamp and commonly used in active pickups(aka EMG):
- Weaker magnets cause less string pull and compression.
- Extensive shielding makes for a quieter pickup and eliminates the need for a ground link to the strings, saving guitarists from horrible building wiring.
- Coils summed electronically, allowing excellent noise cancellation without coil interaction, ie. sounding like a typical humbucker.
- Coils can have fewer winds, raising the resonant peak and flattening the frequency response overall. I'm not sure EMG actually does this.

Oh, yeah - cons would be:
- Pickups don't interact with each other, so a Strat's 2 & 4 and a Tele's middle position lose their magic. It can be a cool sound in it's own right, especially when combining two humbuckers - it just sounds like a cross between the two and not something else entirely.
- Preamps can only have so much headroom when using a 9v power supply. A heavy-handed player can clip or max out the pickups unless supreme amounts of trickery are utilized. An 18v supply is the best bet.
- Most current active pickups are dual coils loaded with bar magnets or blades(think Lawrence or Barden). Unless you like that type of pickup you're out of luck. Maybe this should be a benefit - smoother, steelier response with no drop-off when bending strings.

Thank you.

 

[Frogman]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

in my dreams i am putting an alnico 8 in my emg 81.

this....!!

 

[ParameterMan]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

Thank you.

:beerchug:

 

[astrozombie]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

:lmao:

 

[108Dragon]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

i may be wrong here, and if so pls advise...

there's the safety factor, too

actives don't require the player/strings/bridge to be grounded, so if anything bad happens on the instrument cable you're isolated from it.

we have earth pins on all out mains plugs down here so we don't need to worry as much, but it's not a bad idea for a gigging instrument

If I am understanding the question correctly, the answer is;
The negative power wire is grounded through a three point jack. If the cable is pulled, so is the pickup power. If anything bad happens with the cable, the guitar should remain either grounded or the pickups will go to open circuit.

 

[xntrick]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

Hey man-you asked, and there have been some pretty sparkly, uber-clean clean tones in Metallica's catalog. If that's how you want every question to be answered, you should begin every one:

James Hetfield uses an EMG 60 in the neck position which has a great clean tone, i have tried the 60 and it is a versatile pickup..i was tempted to have my superstrat routered for a neck pickup just for the 60...

 

[uOpt]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

Also, any cons?

I'm not addressing the different sound, it's taste.

But for sure you get this:

• Sound doesn't change with cable length and quality of cable (unless too crappy of course). It'll sound the same with a twice as long cable. That's not the case with passive pickups.
• The volume pot can be a pure volume pot that only changes volume. That's not the case with passive guitars, the volume pot kills some of the resonance peak.
• The input impedance of the amp (or first active rig state) doesn't matter. That might not be a wanted effect since the different dampening from the different input impedance is part of the specific sound when using passive pickups. But for sure this rocks when you put in a pedal that has a different input impedance. If you have a bunch of pedals with bypass in a row your input impedance can dance around like Britney Spears.
• Make fun of people who have the battery under a Strat pickguard and run out.
• You can easily have active filters (think DB EMG set) inside the guitar without having to go with a pedal and without that circuit changing the base sound.

 

[Phantasmagoria]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

To be honest, the website's clips of the Deathbuckers sound better, but the few clips I've heard people make of them sound just as bad under gain.

^^ They're actually super smooth & bassy with gain at low volumes. For some reason when playing live they lose a lot of focus and get really harsh. I think it's because of the lack of compression. They are very "open sounding" pups and they get way too "open/airy" at high volumes, due to the very scooped mids, which is'nt such a good thing with high gain, if that makes sense.

I had them in a basswood guitar first and the cleans were amazing, The lead tones were to die for as well (at bedroom levels), but with rhythm, palm muting etc, the lack of punch/upper mids eventually made me really want something new with a bit more attack, growl & bite.

I just put one in the bridge of my alder Jackson which naturally lacked deep lows & had a very strong compact mid punch bias.. and it's a match made in heaven


As far as actives go...I have a set of Blackouts (h-s-h) in another guitar and they sound anything but sterile. They' re very hot/sensitive and proper height adjustment is crucial to optimize the way they sound...but once they're set up right they're downright incredible. Even the Ahb-2 Blackout metal in the bridge...which gets some flak for being too hot/noisy/boomy etc, sounds anything but harsh, noisy & boomy if set up right...the punch & crunch it produces is unreal and the lead tones just sing!!

 

[108Dragon]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

Ultimately, running active pickups of any make should reduce the overall amount of extra signal processing to get the tone you need. You shouldn't need all the compression and eq. at volume, or you installed the wrong pickup.

 

[uOpt]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

Why don't you need compression and EQ?

 

[IanBallard]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

The lack of hot @$$ windings means less string pull and sustain for days -provided your guitar is up to it. The active electronics do all the "work". With the Seymour Duncan actives, I can't agree with the "sterile sound" thing. SD actives are a lot of things. But sterile sounding ain't one of 'em. The 18volt actives I tend to use offer tons of headroom too. The metal pickups drive my Marshall to breakup before the signal even hits the preamp. The clean pickups are crystal clean with that signature SD tone.
The only reason I even use passive pickups anymore is that there are still a few that I can't match (tonewise) with a comparable active. Like the Dimebucker, the DP151 PAF Pro, the DP152 Super3, and my old love; the Bill Lawrence 500XL.
Having to use batteries ain't a negative to me. Just have to make sure they'll fit in the control compartment BEFORE you install the pickups.

The windings have nothing to do with string pull. That would be the magnet. You could put a an A2 (low gauss) in a Dimebucker and it was pull way less than a '59 with an A8 mag in it.

 

[108Dragon]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

Why don't you need compression and EQ?

Lack of string pull of the active pickup lets the guitars structures natural sustain do its thing. I never really used compression because I never really needed to achieve the tone I required from a rig not optimally built for what I was doing. I am under the impression most people that use compression do so to bolster sustain. I found using compression made the sound "unnatural". Tone doesn't ring naturally like it would without compression.

I stick with guitar makes and models that have natural timbres of known quantity to me and then I simply apply pickups that are of equally known quantity to me. In those combinations, I've only missed getting what I wanted (or expected) once or twice. In that, I use very little preamp eq-ing, because I get what I'm after with the guitar/amp combinations.

Perhaps I should have qualified my statement by saying that this is my experience with the active pickups I use.

 

[108Dragon]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

The windings have nothing to do with string pull. That would be the magnet. You could put a an A2 (low gauss) in a Dimebucker and it was pull way less than a '59 with an A8 mag in it.

Any piece of metal with windings around it and then a current put to those windings falls under catagory of electromagnet by definition. It doesn't matter if the metal in question has naturally occuring magnetic properties or not. With any electromagnet, wire gauge, amount of windings, and quality/quantity of current put through it determine magnetic field strength. Wire gauge and current being equal across the playing field, the amount of windings is the determining factor of the end magnetic field strength.
Yes, replacing a magnet with one of lesser strength will also reduce end magnetic strength of the pickup. But I highly doubt anyone is going to crack the epoxy case of thier active humbucker to do it.

 

[uOpt]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

But there's no "real" current in the coils. There's no power going in. They only make a tiny bit on their own.

Personally my impression is that string pull from magnets isn't a factor in passive pickups. The distortions you hear when getting very close are from the different view of the string's movement, not from magnetic effects.

 

[LReese]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

My $.02...

I saw mention of lack of windings on active pickups. This "can" be the case but go over to the pickup makers forum and look for the posts on a dissected EMG humbucker. Looks like pretty standard construction (High impedance coils), the difference being that the coils are mixed rather than in series - I think a big difference (and also having the bejessus shielded out of them).

Each coils leads are connected to the input of a differential preamp, which also can be designed to shape the sound. Just like the Blackout preamp that just became available though the design might be a little different. The Blackout design could be a bit different (see the use of the word "Can" above) but its probably not far off, though it can't be confirmed without reverse engineering (ie, a company secret)

If the pickup sounds right to you - its alright active or not.

 

[108Dragon]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

But there's no "real" current in the coils. There's no power going in. They only make a tiny bit on their own.

Personally my impression is that string pull from magnets isn't a factor in passive pickups. The distortions you hear when getting very close are from the different view of the string's movement, not from magnetic effects.

If the current to the coil is not a factor, why bother powering the coil? Or why bother having a coil at all? If it doesn't make a difference, why all the differences in windings between pickups?

I would have to run tests to tell you for sure. I have SD and EMG actives as well as SD and Dimarzio passives I could test. I also have an old Jackson DK2 sitting around. Hmmm. This could be fun.

 

[Luke Duke]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

If the current to the coil is not a factor, why bother powering the coil? Or why bother having a coil at all? If it doesn't make a difference, why all the differences in windings between pickups?

I would have to run tests to tell you for sure. I have SD and EMG actives as well as SD and Dimarzio passives I could test. I also have an old Jackson DK2 sitting around. Hmmm. This could be fun.

A pickup (active or passive) is simply a generator. Flux in a magnetic field induces current into the diamagnetic copper copper windings. The current goes through the volume/tone network and out to the amp. The active pickup just has fewer windings than a comparable output pup because an onbaord preamp EQs and boosts the signal.

 

[uOpt]

Re: What are the benefits of active pickups?

If the current to the coil is not a factor, why bother powering the coil? Or why bother having a coil at all? If it doesn't make a difference, why all the differences in windings between pickups?

I would have to run tests to tell you for sure. I have SD and EMG actives as well as SD and Dimarzio passives I could test. I also have an old Jackson DK2 sitting around. Hmmm. This could be fun.

Who is powering the coil? Certainly neither passives no EMGs.