Help with K&K mini pickup

[Quickstep192]

I’m playing plugged in for the very first time. I have zero experience with this, but I got a pickup put in my guitar for a one time gig with a friend.

At our first practice, I was plugged into the PA and it didn’t sound as natural as I’d hoped. It wasn’t completely awful, but to me it sounded harsh and more like an electric than an acoustic. One of the guys plugged me through his pre-amp and did some adjustments, but it was still not great.

So, I’m wondering, should I get a pre-amp or DI that’s best suited to the K&K mini? Again, I can’t emphazize enough how little experience I have with this. To underscore that point, I don’t even know the difference between a DI and a Pre-amp.

Any guidance is greatly appreciated. References to specific products are especially welcome.

[Athens]

The advantage of the K&K Mini ( and one of the reasons I use it) is no battery to change or worry about leaking.

One of the disadvantages is that they need a little help so most people use them with a DI or some other device before going into an amp.

I'm certainly no expert on amps and electronics, that's why I play acoustic.

But, even with the limited amount that I play amp'ed I've learned that a DI is essential.

Also, what kind of amp are you going into? There's a lot of fiddling with amps and electronics to get to a clean sound.

[bigreddog]

Here is a youtube clip of me practicing with our group. That is an Eastman E10D with K&K going straight into a Fishman Loudbox Mini:

https://youtu.be/fW-bDTxwIaw

[Toby Walker]

Hi Quickstep,

I have a few K&K pickups in my instruments and as good as they are, you'll want a pre-amp that will give you additional tone settings (EQ) which will allow you to fine-tune your final output. I would suggest taking a look at ones made by Fishman and LR Baggs, both of which are widely used.

Your best bet would be to go to your local music store with your guitar and amp and try some out.

One of the best devices I've found is called a ToneDexter which does a great job of replicating your guitar's acoustic sound. You simply plug mic into it and while you're also plugged into the device, play into the mic for a few minutes. TD actually remembers the sound going through the mic and then remembers it and stores that sound into one of a dozen memory banks! Afterward, you unplug the mic and with just your guitar plugged in, it will transform the sound coming from your pickup into the sound TD remembered when you trained it with a mic.

[Woodstock School Of Music]

I've found that the K&K sound is sensitive to what it's plugged into. Some people say they don't have any problems plugging into different sources but that has not been my experience. I would check out the K&K preamp or a Redeye

From the K&K website

MY GUITAR SOUNDS BOOMY AND/OR FEEDS BACK EASILY
It is quite difficult (but not impossible) to use the Pure pickup in loud band situations--especially on small stages. It is designed more for the acoustic musician and the best possible natural tone. A soundhole cover is the first remedy here and helps a lot. Bands like Tom Petty Band use the pickup successfully, but they play on huge stages. Our PowerMix Pure System would actually be the best choice for high volume situations.

In addition to this there is most likely an impedance match issue going on as well. Acoustic amps and most competitors' preamps are designed to work best with undersaddle pickups or other very high ohmic piezo pickups. They feature extremely high input impedance (5-10 meg), which boosts the bass response. Most competitors' pickups need this high input impedance to boost the bass response of their pickups, because most of them sound tinny in passive mode.

The Pure has a healthy bass response to begin with. It is overkill to boost it with extremely high input impedance. The Pure pickup sounds best with lower input impedance like 500 k to 1 meg, even just in a line input of a mixing board. One should try it on a PA and plug the Pure straight into the line input of the mixer, just to see that the excessive bass response is gone right away.

The best option to compensate for this is to get a Pure Preamp.

It may also be necessary to turn down the bass control on the amp. We use an Ultrasound acoustic amp (10 meg input) and we have to turn down the bass on the amp basically all the way. But it sounds great this way. If you are reluctant to turn down the bass because you think that the EQ must be at a centered position otherwise something would be wrong, it's important to remember that EQ exists to be used.

[rmyAddison]

Take your guitar to a "good" music store and ask to try some different DI's, and since you admit your newbie-ness, ask someone for help.

I have a K&K mini in a Martin CS 00-42 (Adi/Madagascar), a tiny guitar, the sound needs "massaging" (mostly EQ balancing). I run through a VoiceLive3, primarily to add vocal harmonies, but it has a pretty good guitar bank to tweak the guitar channel sound.

Not recommending it at all for your needs but mentioned because yes the K&K mini needs some help (a good DI or equivalent) to get the best sound, direct into anything does not maximize it's potential.

There are a lot of DI boxes out there, find a good store with knowledgeable staff, who should know some good DI choices for a K&K, and audition them just like you would a guitar. Happy shopping.......

Edit - that ToneDexter sounds interesting, was not familiar, but I would add that to the audition list.

[AndyC]

I think some of the posts here are failing to differentiate between a DI box and a Pre-amp.

In a nutshell, a DI box won't do anything to alter / adjust your sound - it is simply a box that will allow your signal to travel over further distances without degradation before it goes (typically) into a mixing desk.

A pre-amp WILL allow you to adjust your sound, because they offer some form of EQ (Equalisation). Some are more complex than others, with sweepable mid ranges etc. etc. but they will allow you in almost all cases to adjust, as a minimum, the bass / treble components of your sound.

A lot of the pre amps on the market will ALSO act as a DI box, which is where I think some of the confusion has entered this thread.

The other point to bear in mind is the impedance of any input into a pre amp.

Personally, I use a Red Eye pre amp with my K&K, and in my humble opinion it's as good as it gets.

[Quickstep192]

One of the popular DI/preamps that I See is the Fire-Eye Red-Eye. But I notice it has no adjustments. Sorry for such a rudimentary question, but how does it know what to do?

[AndyC]

Yes it does have adjustment - it is labelled as a "treble" control, and will allow you to boost or cut the treble until you hit the sound you like. It also has a boost button if you want to up your volume for solo's etc.

Read more here:

https://www.fire-eye.com/red-eye-1/

[auggie242]

Re: Red Eye How does it know what to do? It doesn't. I have one. Others will strongly disagree, but it did little for any of my 3 guitars with K&K minis in them. Better than no pre amp but still not what I was looking for.
If I were buying today I'd look hard at the Tone Dexter.

[varmonter]

if like you say you have no experience the
tonedexter for 400 dollars may be a bit daunting.
personally i would try something simple
like K&Ks pure xlr . it's a small preamp/di in one
that has bass mid treble controls and is designed
for the KK pup. for what you pay for a tonedexter
you could go with a better sounding unit like
grace designs bix or the Alix. Great preamps with
great studio grade eq.
But the kk pure xlr is a great little preamp
and is real easy to use. I found mine used on ebay.

[J Patrick]

...i've owned more than a dozen preamps that i've used with K&K's over the last 15 years...they've all worked well enough to get the job done...some have been just okay and some have been very good....but it also depends on a lot of other factors not the least of which is your playing style....if you're a finger stylist with a light touch it will be pretty easy to get good results with just about any preamp...(some will still sound better than others)....if you're a hard hitting strummer it gets a little trickier dialing things in and a better quality preamp will likely help...

...to be truthful the only preamp i've found to date that really handles everything well while providing enough tone shaping capability is the Tonedexter...(although i do wish it had a mid control)....its ability to attenuate the preamped signal and combine it with the microphones signal to create a usable wavemap tailored specifically to the particular instrument is amazing...

...other factors such as soundsystem/amp...quality of pickup installation and the guitar it is installed can be huge factors...and of course gain structure is often a key

[jseth]

I have the K&K Pure Mini in my Goodall Grand Concert... I was not thrilled with the tone of it, regardless of whether it was going straight into my AER Compact 60 or my Bose L1 Model II (w/ T1 Tonematch mixer), so I bought a K&K PURE XLR pre-amp for it.

The PURE XLR makes a big difference. Mates with the Pure Mini very well. I still think that I would use an external microphone along with it, to give some "breath" and string noise to the overall sound, but it's usable with just the pre-amp.

One thing that will help if you're plugging straight into an amp or mixer is to SET THE INPUT GAIN CORRECTLY... no matter what pickup you use, improper input gain can wreak havoc with the sound... most times, it's having the gain too low that is the culprit, but too hot an input can distort and sound "off", as well.

A DI transforms the input signal into a low-impedance signal, allowing it to "mate" successfully with any device that accepts a low-impedance signal - like most mixers. The DI also allows that signal to run through long distances before it degrades... if the mixing board is a distance away from the source, a DI is the way to keep the pickup's signal from losing strength and frequency response.

A pre-amp gives you multiple ways to "shape" the input signal; bass, treblle, mid-range controls, a phase inverter switch (many times), various other ways to get the guitar's signal to sound the way you would like. Some pre-amps have a multitude of adjustments to toy with, others (like the Red-Eye) have very few. The more adjustment parameters you have, the more you can alter the sound of the pickup; at the same time, if you don't know what you're doing, having all those different adjustments doesn't help at all but serve to both confuse you and to mess up the sound of the pickup.

Some pre-amps have a DI output built in, others do not. Some will cost around $100, some can cost $1,000 or more... and pretty much everywhere in -between!

If you are going to drop a bunch of dough on a pre-amp, it will behoove you to do your due diligence... you will want to get something that works with the PA or amp that you will be using. Not many pre-amps are going to work well with EVERY different mixing board or amplifier.

In short, it's a fairly deep "rabbit hole" that you are about to go into! Take the time to learn about amplifying your guitar and discovering what will work best for your application. Failing to do this will probably cost you a bunch of money that is misspent.

[6L6]

All of my acoustics have K&K's in them. I love 'em!

When playing into a dedicated acoustic amp, using a Pre amp will not help and may even hurt your tone. But if playing into a PA, a good Pre amp can help for sure. I use the K&K XLR preamp when playing into a PA and it works great.

[#Cruncher]

I have the pre-phase preamp and love it. It was the best jump from the Taylor's ES. I do run it thru my JDI Radial DI.