The Acoustic Guitar Forum - Guitar app vs. tuner

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Guitar app vs. tuner

I have used a Korg CA-30 for many years now. Recently I downloaded the Guitar Tuna app for my Iphone 5s. I notice when I am tuning and using both at 440hz, the app will register the notes as being sharp when the Korg shows them to be in tune. If I tune it to the app, the Korg will show them to be flat. So which one do you think is accurate, and is there any way to tell for sure?

Too many choices

As the tuner is designed specifically as a tuner and the iPhone was designed as, well, a phone, I'd trust the tuner more.

But that's just me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by PTC Bernie (Post 4765613)

As the tuner is designed specifically as a tuner and the iPhone was designed as, well, a phone, I'd trust the tuner more.

But that's just me.

Well, Bernie, turns out that you are correct. Right after I posted I thought, hey get out the old tuning fork to see which one is more accurate. Duh! One hit on the old knee of my A 440 fork and the Korg came to life right on the money while the app shows way off the charts. My guess is that it's the microphone, not the app itself, so any app might be suspect. Has anyone found their phone to be as accurate as a tuner?

I've been using my iPhone for shows and my clip on as a backup with equally excellent results. My phone wasn't intended to be a camera but it takes better video and photos than most cameras. It works equally well as a health-meter and guitar tuner. ;)

I found the Snark more accurate than the Tuna app

More than likely one of the timing circuits, but, again, they're not meant to be highly accurate. They don't have to "keep time" as it were. The devices sync to time servers.

Whatever the reason, I'm glad you did a little research and cme to your own conclusion.

Now, for the neophytes from the tech generation, you want to explain to them what a tuning fork is?

I use to keep one on the shelf next to my eight track player :D

Quote:

Originally Posted by PTC Bernie (Post 4765634)

Bernie, did I show my age a little?:p

Hi Matt…
My take on it is if you can tune your guitar and play in tune with others, it's close enough. If not, then you need a different tuner. I'd guess you are ok with any of your tuners or the tuning fork.

Some of the tuners have a lot more precision than the tuning-keys on our guitars can sort out.

Scientific accuracy will depend on the app you use.

Whether your experience is 'typical' it's hard to say. You are assuming the tuning fork is accurate, and it might be. I'd say any of the three tuners you named would be fine for tuning and playing with others who are using even different tuning methods to get their instruments into tune, and good enough to tune and play in your home.

1/1000-of-a-half-step accuracy is really only necessary and useful to me when I'm setting intonation on my guitars. It would not be useful at all when I'm tuning my guitars for gigs, or in the living room for play.

I still have a Korg CA-30, and it's accuracy is suspect when the battery begins to lose power. Like the phone, the CA-30 becomes a burden in noisy environments (as does a phone tuner). It has calibrate buttons, but as I recall that just changes A-440 to something else. It was a good tuner in it's day.

But without an output (to match the input for a guitar cable) it's useless live unless you have a preamp with a tuner out option (so you can leave it plugged in).

The CA-30 is no better at tuning in the middle of the band in the middle of a song than my tuning fork.

I'm guessing since the newer Korg CA-1 is accurate to between +-1 to 1.5 cents the older CA-30 is similar. But I doubt the stability of the processor in my CA-30 since it's at least 15 years old.

The new Korg Sledgehammer (clip on) claims the 1/10 of a cent accuracy (same as the Peterson) and so do several others including the new clip on TC Electronics.

I actually find the Korg clip-on quite good on my electrics (not so good on my acoustic guitars) and the TC Electronics and Peterson StoboClip good for live acoustic play.

How sharp/flat does it register on your AC-30? It's got marks for every 5 cents, so you should be able to guess.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lookinup (Post 4765630)

I found the Snark more accurate than the Tuna app

Just remember, you can tuna guitar - but you can't tuna fish!

OP I tried tuning apps on my Android (I use a Galaxy Note 4) but apart from their accuracy (or inaccuracy) I find them to be very inconvenient to use on stage when compared to a good ol' Snark :)

Been using the Cleartune app (Apple) for years and love it. Has always worked well for me and checks out to fork and tuner.

Larry, I'll have to go back and retune to find out. what's weird is I downloaded two other apps that appear to be showing the same as the Korg. I reset the Guitar Tuna app and now it's a little closer to the tuner, but still shows the tuner to be sharp, some strings more so than others. Maybe the Tuna app. measures more sensitively than the others. Idk,

Quote:

Originally Posted by mattwood (Post 4765850)

Hi matt…
Well if it has more resolution, you could be right!

I still bet any of your tuning devices will work just fine.

Happy-Almost-New-Year!

Quote:

Originally Posted by mattwood (Post 4765850)

Matt, it seems to me that a tuning fork doesn't have a lot of pitch variance to which the Tuna app could be more sensitive.

Not all apps are equally good.

Although I no longer have an iPhone (went Android a long time ago) there are several very good apps for tuning for the Android platform and I would assume the same holds true for the iPhone platform. I auditioned several tuning apps and found most did a very good job.

But the best was an app called PitchLab Pro which is extremely good. It has several different graphic representations of tuners to choose from (or you can use multiple, which is what I use) including as 'strobe' type tuner which is excellent. I have found it to be more accurate than any of my clip-on type tuners.

Having a tuner you can trust always with you (like on your phone) is SO handy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mark Stone (Post 4765752)

Just remember, you can tuna guitar - but you can't tuna fish!
:)

Ha! Exactly what I was thinking..