Quote:
Originally Posted by aschroeder
It all depends on your priorities. I hate having a UST under my saddle and hate even more having a battery, soundhole controls and wires all over inside my guitar. I also don't play in loud band settings and only do solo acoustic gigs. So for me using a passive soundboard transducer was the way to go. No battery and nothing below my saddle to affect the unplugged tone. You can use an external preamp if needed to boost or EQ the sound.
There are plenty of advocates for the K&K on this forum, but I prefer the passive Schatten HFN for a couple reasons:
- The HFN is very easy to install with double stick tape or putty and can easily be removed later. The K&K uses super glue.
- I don't care for the boomy low end you get out of the K&K. You can EQ it to sound good, but I feel it always lacks clarity on the high end. The HFN also needs to be EQ'd, but it is sort of the opposite of the K&K since it has too much on the high end. I use a typical midrange scoop on the EQ but cut a good amount on the highest 6.4k frequency. It sounds amazing at that point, but I also use an impulse response pedal to enhance the tone even more.
A fellow AGF member did a good review of the HFN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wwzg2GFZHm4 or https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bz_GG1v59k
Here is his review on the Baggs Anthem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=624wUnur8xE
The Baggs Anthem is a great pickup. It is probably the best pickup available for people playing in a louder band setting. It's also one of the bulkiest systems with two pickups, large soundhole controls, battery, and a bunch of wires.
From my point of view if you care a lot about the unplugged tone, go with a soundboard transducer. If you want more versatility in a live setting, go with the Anthem. |
The HFN is an awesome design and sounds very good, but they need to find a way to get a balanced tone. The low E always sounded distant fto me. Lots of discussion about people having the same issues. I have heard it can be due to an uneven bridgeplate, but this doesn't really make sense as one method of installation is putty. I would think that putty would correct that problem.