Can you REALLY trust your tuner?- An experiment

[jkilgour2000]

Originally Posted by vindibona1

I think there are 5 other tuning apps on my phone that I didn't test yet. .

Hey, if you have the app CLEARTUNE, can you test it? I have been using that app exclusively for years -- I hope I haven't been out of tune all these years.

[Goodallboy]

Originally Posted by vindibona1

I had been demoing a new tuning app (Airyware) and posted it in an earlier thread. Folks came back with their favorite apps, many of which I had on my phone. So which app do I like the best, I wondered? I rely on perfect tuning to get my guitars to resonate as they should. Often I'll tune my guitar by one tuner or another and then have to tweak the tuning. Should I have to do that? I fully understand the issues of equal temperament. You don't tune a piano and then tweak it (yeah I know, different strings dedicated to a single note.. but it still holds in principle). So I thought I'd see which tuning apps tuned the best without any tweaking.

Before I get into that, I have to say that I have several clip-on tuners and they're all a little different. I absolutely detest Snarks. Never do they get me in tune so it sounds good. I have 4 or 5 of them ranging from $10 to $30 so its not like I didn't seriously try them before judging. I can tune with my Korg Pitchcrow and puts me right there 98% of the time. Same with my cheap Deltalab 10 (that I bought 2 for $10 on sale). When I gig and am plugged in I use a Korg CA40 in a chain with a Korg Pitchblack. The CA40 is easier to read and the Pitchblack is a great mute and confirmation device. I know with absolute confidence that I don't have to do any tweaking with my plug-in pedals. I'm pretty confident with the Korg and Deltalab. Snarks are relegated to getting in the ballpark after a string change.

Now about them apps...
The protocol was to tune with one app and see how it sounded and how I liked the sound without any tweaking. I was quite surprised that NONE of them tuned the same and the sound from each had different nuances!

I wanted to revisit the Guitar Tuna app as a number of people regularly use it and like it. So I tuned (my Taylor 614ce) with it and it sounded pretty good. I liked that they had implements +/- cents which is important to me. Then I immediately checked the tuning with the Peterson iStrobe Tuner. IT WAS DIFFERENT! Tuning was off from Guitar Tuna by as much as 15 cents in one direction on one string to 3 to 4 cents on other strings. Sounded different too. In all honesty I liked the sound from Guitar Tuna a bit better and was surprised by that (I did not check with sweetned tuning with the Peterson).

Then I tried Pitchlab. I liked the interface, but after retuning with it, I didn't care for the sound very much (in comparison to the others). Then I used Airyware. I think I liked the sound equally to Guitar Tuna, but it was a bit different. Then I retuned with Guitar Tuna and it confirmed, that the tuning wasn't the same, nor the sound, but I still liked what I was hearing. I also used MusiciansKit, but wasn't totally enamored with it compared to the others. But MusiciansKit has some other tools in it, like metronome and a recorder, that makes it worth having. I also tested ClearTune, recommended by a fellow guitarist from NYC that I ran into in February. I didn't care for it much.

I think there are 5 other tuning apps on my phone that I didn't test yet. But I wanted to share what I found in when tuning CRTICALLY (trying to achieve less than +/- 1 cent) and then testing for sound. It tuning that critically even possible in a live situation? Perhaps not. My ear can't accept anything but close to on-the-money. Equal temperament already puts you sonically at a disadvantage. I know if I'm off more than 2 cents anywhere to me it sounds like ca-ca.

Any thoughts? Thanks for taking time to read my utterings.

I'm confused, if you "liked" a tuning that was off by "15 cents in one direction on one string and 3 to 4 cents on other strings", maybe you don't achieve, or like "perfect tuning" after all. I'm missing something I'm sure.

[vindibona1]

Originally Posted by Goodallboy

I'm confused, if you "liked" a tuning that was off by "15 cents in one direction on one string and 3 to 4 cents on other strings", maybe you don't achieve, or like "perfect tuning" after all. I'm missing something I'm sure.

I liked the sound, but COMPARED TO OTHER TUNERS it was off. You have to realize that tuning is string to string and the composite will generally be in the ballpark. I know I'm going to be close enough in tune to others I'm playing with. I want to know that each string is in tune with the other stings... and that it sounds full, lush with maximum resultant harmonics.

On gigs I don't use clip-ons at all unless absolutely necessary. I use two pedals, relying mostly on my Korg CA40 (plugged in) with Pitchblack right behind it which I find not quite as consistent or easy to read as the CA40. If I didn't need a mute switch I'd probably leave the Pitchblack at home.

[Goodallboy]

Originally Posted by vindibona1

I liked the sound, but COMPARED TO OTHER TUNERS it was off. You have to realize that tuning is string to string and the composite will generally be in the ballpark. I know I'm going to be close enough in tune to others I'm playing with. I want to know that each string is in tune with the other stings... and that it sounds full, lush with maximum resultant harmonics.

On gigs I don't use clip-ons at all unless absolutely necessary. I use two pedals, relying mostly on my Korg CA40 (plugged in) with Pitchblack right behind it which I find not quite as consistent or easy to read as the CA40. If I didn't need a mute switch I'd probably leave the Pitchblack at home.

Are you saying that if you were 15 cents off that you'd be in-tune with other players who were not so "out of tune"??

[fazool]

I had the exact opposite experiences.

I had a Korg in-line tuner and it was an incredible piece of junk. After a bad experience with another Korg plug-in guitar accessory I swore off Korg products. The Korg tuner was slow, massively innacurate and had terrible stability.

I have Snarks and I do not like them all but the two models I stick with are very reliable and accurate for me and I count on them completely.

Microphone pickup into an app is much slower because of the operating system (as opposed to embedded software) so I find them very frustrating to use. If I forget a tuner and am in a pinch I will use G-strings which is the best one I've tried.

So for me:

Korg = no
Snark = yes
Apps = no

[jfitz81]

Originally Posted by vindibona1

I know if I'm off more than 2 cents anywhere to me it sounds like ca-ca.

I think my question got lost on the page break. But again, honest question: then why do you need a tuner?

[Goodallboy]

After playing guitar for over 40 years in bands and now performing solo and with a playing partner, here's what I know.

It doesn't matter that you're guitar resonates in tune with itself, and sounds like a grand piano if you're not in A-440 and your playing partners are. If you're loving your tone and you're 15 cents off from the rest of your group, it won't be a decent sound.

There is no "close enough" if you have a great ear. Any of the guitars I own need some adjustment from song to song. When my playing partner neglects his for a few songs it's like nails on a chalk board for me.


The only instance where being in tune with oneself is acceptable, is when you
are playing alone.

[Beakybird]

There must be an empirical method to determine which tuner is accurate. For example, if you took precision engineered steel blocks that are tuned to the different notes of a guitar string and played these blocks with a mallet, you would know if a tuner was giving an accurate signal.

More conveniently, you could probably find a website that has sine waves in different frequencies, and you could perhaps use this as a verifiable method.

While enjoying piano VST's on my digital piano, I can load different tuning temperaments for piano. Besides equal temperament which is the standard, there are hundreds of temperaments and all kinds of nuances of equal temperament. Pianos use stretched tuning because for some reason every string tuned perfectly doesn't sound right.

However, for guitar, I think that a tuner should tune to a universal note. Once that is established, if we want to slightly tune around a song so that a certain group of chords sound perfect, so be it.

After I use Unitune, any qualms about imperfection are met with the mantra, "Close enough for rock 'n roll."

[Brent Hahn]

Originally Posted by vindibona1

While [having everyone use the same kind of tuner is] not a bad thought I'm not so sure that that's totally necessary. The reason I'm so fussy is all about RESULTANT HARMONICS within my guitar. To get what I need from my guitar I'm talking about finding that right 1 cent differential across all strings that makes my guitars sound their best.

Fine -- use the tuner you like, and then have everyone else use the same kind.

[Purfle Haze]

Originally Posted by Goodallboy

I'm confused, if you "liked" a tuning that was off by "15 cents in one direction on one string and 3 to 4 cents on other strings", maybe you don't achieve, or like "perfect tuning" after all. I'm missing something I'm sure.

On this forum, some players swear by Peterson Sweetened™ ACU tuning, which puts the low E string off by 12 cents from standard tuning, It's 9 cents off from the high E, and the strings in between are all off of each other by a couple of cents, as so:

E: -3¢
B: -7¢
G: -5¢
D: -8¢
A: -10¢
E: -12¢

Are the players who use this tuning missing something?

[Purfle Haze]

I wonder if the differences in results that one gets with different tuners comes down to the interface. Some use a green light to tell you you’re in tune, and others use a simulation of a strobe tuner.

The various Peterson tuners are very popular, and promise a resolution of .1 cent, a thousandth of a semitone. My experience with the iStrobosoft tuner (Peterson’s iPhone app) is that the strobe display rarely stops moving, because a plucked guitar string does always not give a constant result; the attack is sharp, the sustain is flatter and as it decays it fluctuates. The variability might only be over a range of a couple of cents, but two cents measured in tenths is 20 possible readings. So that strobe keeps wiggling as the string attacks, sustains, and decays. At which reading is the string In Tune? And are tenths of a cent actually useful? Can you hear a tenth-of-a-cent difference?

On the other end of the tuner spectrum, a Snark may give you a green light when you are some unknown number of cents off from the exact center of the tuning target. Snark does not disclose its resolution. Maybe the green light is plus or minus a couple of cents, who knows? But it’s easy to tune to a green light rather than a strobe that never settles, and I think that makes green-light tuners popular.

So maybe the tuner that gives the best-sounding result to a given player is the one that has a green light with a very narrow tolerance– it gives a definitive indication that you’re in tune. I have been using a TC Electronics Unitune clip-on, and it seems to have both a tight tolerance and an unambiguous display. It puts a guitar in tune quickly. And my first reaction to the Airyware Tuner is positive. The display is definitive, and the guitar sounds In Tune. Thanks to Vin for pointing it out.

With both of these tuners, I still check octaves: the three Es, the Ds, the Gs, the Cs, the As, the Bs. As President Reagan said, Trust but Verify!

As I have written elsewhere, I think that prefab sweetened tunings are bogus because they are not specific to my instrument. Where do they come from? Why would they work on my guitar? But I understand that some players find them useful.

[Looburst]

Simple answer is, with acoustic guitars, close is all you can ever hope for. Not my words, I get this from all the session guys here in Nashville. Just the nature of the instrument.

[Goodallboy]

Originally Posted by Purfle Haze

On this forum, some players swear by Peterson Sweetened™ ACU tuning, which puts the low E string off by 12 cents from standard tuning, It's 9 cents off from the high E, and the strings in between are all off of each other by a couple of cents, as so:

E: -3¢
B: -7¢
G: -5¢
D: -8¢
A: -10¢
E: -12¢

Are the players who use this tuning missing something?

I believe this is what you really mean for the offsets....

E1 = -2.3 cent
B2 = 0
G3 = 0
D4 = -0.4 Cent
A5 = -2.1 Cent
E6 = -2.3 Cent

But thanks for the smiley face.

[KarenB]

Anything outside of A 440 hertz my sensitive ears.

A punster in our midst!

[profiler]

I am late to the party, but as a member of Airyware development team I'd be glad to answer any questions about how tuning apps works in general, why there are difference in measures between tuners, why real strobe is better than simulated one, why it is more difficult to tune bass guitars, why you may want to apply sweetening, and finally what we have done to Airyware Tuner to try to outperform competitors and make it the best tuner. Obviously, I cannot advertise here, but if anybody is curious about the app internals or has a request or feedback please do not hesitate to contact me. Otherwise, just try the app and make your own opinion.