Schatten HFN active vs Trance Audio Amulet M?

[big jilm]

Hi, everyone -

I’m deciding between these two pickups for my Gibson J-29. I am starting up an acoustic duo, and I hate my Baggs Element with a passion.

Lots of love for the Schatten and the Trance - anyone have any experience with both of these that can comment on which one for my uses? I mostly strum and pick leads, not tons of fingerpicking. My J-29 is a short scale Gibson slope shoulder with spruce top and rosewood back and sides. I play with pretty heavy picks, and I strum both hard and softly.

I will likely be running through a mixer into a powered speaker, or an older Fishman Loudbox Artist.

Thanks for any thoughts you may have!

[GuitarLuva]

Can't comment on the Trance. I do run the HFN through a Fishman loudbox amp and it sounds amazing. Completely flat EQ.

[big jilm]

Originally Posted by GuitarLuva

Can't comment on the Trance. I do run the HFN through a Fishman loudbox amp and it sounds amazing. Completely flat EQ.

Nice to hear! Are you using the HFN with a battery pack installed, the active version? Or passive?

[GuitarLuva]

I'm running the passive version. I do have the Artist version on order to go in another guitar but I'll be running that one on phantom power. I hate batteries!

[SpruceTop]

I have experience with both and have had much better results with the Trance Amulet M-VT. So much so, that after my first Trance installation within an hour I ordered another system from Trance for another guitar. My Trance experience came after I returned a Schatten HFN Artist 2 Active to Schatten because I couldn't get good amplified tone from it. YMMV.

[jonfields45]

I put a passive Schatten HFN into my backup guitar yesterday. It sounds great with a bit of bass boost from a Boss GE7 and playing in my living room blows away the MiSi Trio (rechargeable Baggs Element) in my primary guitar. But in my duo, which emphasizes classic rock covers with the original guitar parts and harmonized vocals, I have no intention of not using my primary guitar with its MiSi Trio.

My advice would be to ramp up the duo and get some public performance under your belt before you change out your pickup. In a noisier environment and a busier sound (two instruments, two voices), different characteristics become useful and a more electric guitar like pickup is actually handy.

[big jilm]

Originally Posted by jonfields45

I put a passive Schatten HFN into my backup guitar yesterday. It sounds great with a bit of bass boost from a Boss GE7 and playing in my living room blows away the MiSi Trio (rechargeable Baggs Element) in my primary guitar. But in my duo, which emphasizes classic rock covers with the original guitar parts and harmonized vocals, I have no intention of not using my primary guitar with its MiSi Trio.

My advice would be to ramp up the duo and get some public performance under your belt before you change out your pickup. In a noisier environment and a busier sound (two instruments, two voices), different characteristics become useful and a more electric guitar like pickup is actually handy.

I hear you, but I'll say that I hate the sound of the Element so much that it depresses me. I've tried a Fishman Aura with it, a Zoom A3 - both of those made it a bit better, but I just can't handle it, to be honest.

Thanks for the reply!

[DMZ]

No experience with hfn. The Trance is a great live play option. To me it has an extra gear in presence. It does just about everything better than most I’ve tried. The headroom and punch, definition cut through with larger band sound just works. Ymmv see Maurys demos. Pretty close to what you get. Rich articulate defined. I use the MVT phantom. Bought a Royce box when plugged into my Katana or Ultrasound DS4. The direct to xlr snake is a bonus. The volume and tone control are awesome to use and handy to turn down and tune etc. Good luck!