#1
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K&K pure mini very low output
Hello all.
for any of you that wanna know what the level of a pure mini really is, I recorded my acoustic guitar straight into Pro Tools from the following sources. First I set my level using my strat, lead pickup to set my level. Then I recorded My PIEZO through my onboard preamp in this order. 1. My Piezo thru my Takamine with the preamp volume on my guitar 100% with the EQ bypassed. 2. My K&K pickup with the K&K preamp 3. My K&K direct. I played the exact same thing 3 times. Some had me convinced there was something wrong with my setup and I agreed so I needed to find out for sure, since all my testing was not showing any install or wiring issues. Yes! I removed the pure mini and installed a brand new pure mini EXACTLY to K&K's specifications. My findings....NO DIFFERENCE except time and money. so here are the real figures based on the my main meter on my pro tools out. CLEAN. If my electric guitar is ZERO Here are the numbers Electric Gtr - Zero ( 0 ) Piezo Pickup out of Takamine full volume no eq (- 4db) K&K pure mini with K&K preamp full volume (-12 db) K&K pure mini pickup direct in ... no preamp (-26 db) A K&K pure mini direct is roughly -26db lower than an electric plugged in direct. Here is an an image https://photos.app.goo.gl/zcwCNftCQozNEgEb8 Eureka! So THIS is why the pure mini would not work in my Takamine preamp, too low output. And the pure mini may be "Loud" as a passive pickup but it is not Loud in general. A lot of work, but there it is. I shall move on. Cheers, Gerry C Last edited by gerryc123; 02-23-2021 at 02:59 AM. Reason: new url |
#2
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Its clearly not for you. While no piezo will match the miniature AC generators we call pickups, that level makes me question material or method. Seems a little excessive for a properly functioning system, IME.
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Dave F ************* Martins Guilds Gibsons A few others 2020 macbook pro i5 8GB Scarlett 18i20 Reaper 7 |
#3
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The first K&K Pure Mini install I did was in a guitar that I previously used with a Fishman Rare Earth humbucker soundhole pickup.
When the install was finished I compared the two and there really wasn't much difference in output when plugged directly into my amp. I've never noticed any "low output" on the dozen K&K Pure Mini installs I've done for myself and others. I'm glad that you've defined your particular problem, but the normal user experience with K&K Pure Mini pickups does not replicate your results. The vast majority of users have never complained of "low output". I shall also move on. |
#4
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#5
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Which K&K preamp do you currently have? I don't own preamps any which don't color tone - I want to affect the tone. The output of a K&K is strong. If you don't want to affect tone (with tone controls), pass it through the chain unaffected at each level and only add gain. |
#6
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My passive K&K pickups are very high output. I'm surprised by your results.
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"Lift your head and smile at trouble. You'll find happiness someday." |
#7
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Hi Gerry, we've been talking about this offline, and it seems easier to share my thoughts here, and I'll also post my attempt to reproduce your experiment. very interesting issue, and the whole thing of comparing output between different pickups is something that doesn't get that much attention.
It's hard to know what's going on, but it seems like it could be a couple of things, ranging from expectations, to gain staging, to some install or wiring issue, or anywhere in between. A few random observations: 1) There's no standard for pickup output levels. Even with electric guitars, outputs are all over the map. Same with acoustic pickups. But we have gain controls and so on to adjust for that. You're trying to use a Helix (I think?), which is nice since it has programmable presets that you can use to adjust between guitars. 2) In general, I'd expect many electric pickups (humbuckers at least) to have higher outputs than most acoustic pickups. But it can vary widely. When comparing pickup's I'd stick to comparing acoustic-to-acoustic. Comparing an acoustic pickup to an electric, which are often made extra hot to support overdrive, can be misleading. By comparing the acoustic pickup against a pickup that may be designed to be hot enough to drive an amp into distortion, you may be starting with the wrong benchmark. 3) Comparing passive and active pickups gets confusing - active pickups have a built-in preamp. 4) Impedance matters with passive piezo pickups like K&Ks. You can plug an electric guitar or many active pickup systems into very low impedance inputs and be fine. A passive pickup will likely lose lots of bass and lots of volume. 5) The comparison between the K&K direct and the K&K thru a preamp all the way up is sort of expected. If the preamp adds 20db of gain, then the output would be expected to be 20db hotter than the input. 6) You're putting the K&K in a Takamine, right? Most people choose a Takamine for the pickup system, so I'm not sure there's a lot of precedent for putting a K&K in that kind of guitar. It's possible, given the integrated pickup/bridge system in a Takamine than K&K won't get the vibration they expect. 7) I'd still suspect some kind of wiring issue with your situation. The K&K should not be that quiet. That or impedance (see 4 above). I'll follow up with the experiment on levels I did.
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Music: Spotify, Bandcamp Videos: You Tube Channel Books: Hymns for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), Christmas Carols for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), A DADGAD Christmas, Alternate Tunings book Online Course: Alternate Tunings for Fingerstyle Guitar Last edited by Doug Young; 02-23-2021 at 01:07 PM. |
#8
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I did a quick levels comparison, playing the same little lick on 4 different guitars with 4 different pickups, all direct into my UAD Apollo guitar input without adjusting the gain or levels between guitars. Here's what I got:
Screen Shot 2021-02-23 at 10.49.16 AM.jpg First sample is an Eastman electric with a humbucker. I'll call that level "0" like you did. 2nd is a Baggs Anthem. Active pickup with a builtin preamp. I'd consider this pickup a good "standard" acoustic benchmark. Level is -12 db down from the electric pickup, so from this we can say that the electric pickup is much hotter than a "typical" acoustic preamp, even an active one. 3rd is a Trance Amulet M. Active pickup with built-in preamp. it's hotter than the Anthem, quieter than the electric. -9 db down from the electric, but 3db hotter than the Anthem. 4th is a K&K. -5db down relative to the electric, but a whopping 7db hotter than the Anthem (6db corresponds to sounding roughly twice as loud). So I'd say this experiment confirms that an electric humbucker (this one, at least) can easily be much louder than typical acoustic pickups. However, it also confirms my experience (and what many others here are reporting) that the K&K's output is quite hot, significantly hotter than even some active acoustic pickups. So what's going on with your setup? I'm not sure....
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Music: Spotify, Bandcamp Videos: You Tube Channel Books: Hymns for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), Christmas Carols for Fingerstyle Guitar (std tuning), A DADGAD Christmas, Alternate Tunings book Online Course: Alternate Tunings for Fingerstyle Guitar Last edited by Doug Young; 02-23-2021 at 01:10 PM. |
#9
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Doug's results are in line with what I expect. A K&K is typically about the same as a P90 on an acoustic guitar, which is ~6-10dB lower than a humbucker on an electric guitar.
So, how to explain your results. I can only thing of two things that could cause such low readings as you are seeing:
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James May Audio Sprockets maker of ToneDexter James May Engineering maker of the Ultra Tonic Pickup |
#10
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Any preamp with a 1 meg or higher input impedance is usually fine if you're feeding something that's effected by impedance mis-match. |
#11
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I have the K&K preamp. I'm doing just that, adding gain, then going into my HX Stomp for eq and reverb. Hopefully won't have to touch the mixing board too much. I am going through a Mackie DL 1608, hope to just save the settings and be done. Thanks |
#12
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On my gig, I play a Fender Strat for 20 songs and my Takamine for twenty songs let's say. All my presets for my Strat are saved and sound great. I have the backing tracks in Pro Tools and tweaked all my guitar presets in HX Native, exported them through Helix Edit into my Stomp so at the gigs I just play. Sounds great. I did the same with my Takamine but really hated the PIEZO quack so I installed the K&K. I set aside a day to tweak to my acoustic presets for the new pickup but realized that even with the K&K preamp the level was quite lower than the PIEZO output and that I wasn't expecting that. I doubted my install or if the pickup was defective, so I had a luthier reinstall a new pure mini, same exact level. I'm strapped in now at the studio, coffee is on and the phone is turned off. Lol. I'm gonna make this work G |
#13
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I will use the K&K preamp with my new setup and just get it to sound as good as I can. I'm sure I will get there. Cheers Doug! Gerry C |