Killing the Quack...

[rmsstrider]

Originally Posted by martingitdave

Change your pickup to the Fishman Matrix and use the Aura pedal you bought. I have experience no better tone except possibly the Tondexter.

I was having trouble dealing with the Quack in my Composite Acoustic legacy with the Fishman prefix plus T pick up. I tried the bodyrez and it did not fix the problem. I bought a used Fishman Aura 16 imaging pedal and no more quack.

I think the only thing better would be the Tondexter.

[MrErikJ]

Originally Posted by Matt McGriff

I am in search of a solution to the quack in my Element equipped McPherson Sable. I have used an Anthem/Session DI combination in my Taylor DN7 and have been very satisfied with my tone, but really need a bulletproof guitar for my worship playing every weekend as I end up having to leave the guitar in my hot car afterwards and it drives me nuts to leave my wood guitars in there. I had a string balance issue with my Sable and checked with McPherson about having an Anthem installed in my guitar after the fact and they were willing to do it, but highly recommended against it as they haven’t liked all of the microphonic issues they have seen when installing them in the Sable. They ended up swapping out the Element for another and I’ve used it a couple of times since.
I’ve tried a Zoom AC-3, Aura DI and my current setup is the Sable into a Venue DI XLR out to the board. I played the Sable over the weekend and just can’t handle the quack, spent a lot of time trying to EQ it on the guitar and on the pedal, adjusting the volume on the guitar and gain on the pedal and just can’t get a satisfactory tone. What makes it worse is that we use an IEM system so I have an intimate relationship with my tone and the quack is killing me and really kills my confidence in digging in when playing as I would hate to hear what I am hearing in my monitor mix.
I am really at a loss here and am not sure what I am going to do. I am considering trying a BodyRez along with my PolyTune pedal, as I have to have an onboard or inline tuner as our stage gets pretty loud so clip-ons are useless. Not really what I want to do as I then have to use a 1 spot for power and go through a church owned Radial DI (that I sometimes have to search for when I get there) and into the board. I was really hoping for an all-in-one solution. It’s pretty frustrating as I now have bought and returned the Zoom and Aura and the Venue isn’t cutting it either. If the BodyRez doesn’t help I may end up selling the Sable, as much as I like the guitar. It just doesn’t work for what I specifically bought it for, a stage guitar. Anyone have any suggestions?

If there's an upside, it's that the use of IEM is probably exaggerating the severity of the quack you're hearing. Through speakers into an open space, some of those artifacts become less audible.

That said, I'm sure it's still there and audible and, in my experience, it's hard to de-quack an active piezo as a good deal of that noise is clipping generated at the endpin preamp. The Body Rez and similar "light modelers" don't seem to help too much with active USTs. There are some great passive-USTs on the market, like the Baggs LB6, Fishman AG, and Barbera Soloist. Another good option is replacing the Element with a SBT and the most popular one on the forum is without a doubt the K&K Pure Mini. It won't be 100% quack free but it'll be around 80% less and with a good preamp, maybe even 90%. Another good option is the JJB (a K&K style pickup), the Ultratonic, the Baggs iBeam (I have one, rather like it), and the Dazzo. These can all be used passive with a good floor preamp and most of them also offer active options (though I prefer passive).

[gfirob]

There are a million poor souls out there (including myself) who have spent a bundle on pre-amps and other pricy hardware trying to purge the quack out of their performance, just to try to find an amplified sound that actually replicates the guitar they spent so much money on. Some of these help the patient, but only one device can cure the problem and that is the Tonedexter. There is nothing like it. Once you get your hands on one of these little guys, everything else is superfluous. These things are the real deal, there is nothing like them.

[Matt McGriff]

Thank you all for the input and recommendations. The tonedexter sure does seem to get a lot of praise, but $400 is pretty steep. A lot to consider.

[Hurricane Ramon]

Originally Posted by Matt McGriff

Thank you all for the input and recommendations. The tonedexter sure does seem to get a lot of praise, but $400 is pretty steep. A lot to consider.

For that kind of money you may as well spend another $100 and get the T.C.Helicon Voice Live 3 and really get that super bang for your bucks .

EZ :

HR

[varmonter]

You are limited in what you can use because
of the sable. Not sure if you can install a magnetic
pickup in that guitar but you could try . plus 1 on the SBT types like kk
but i never heard one in a carbon guitar.
I have two guitars with KK pups. you still need ouboard pre and eq
to eek out the nice sound from these.
This of course would be the cheapest route. about 100 bucks for kk.
If your stuck on the carbon thing a rainsong would allow
you to use a soundhole pup. I have never heard a rainsong i liked
but with a m80 or a sunrise (black on black looks good) it may
sound ok. The other option of course is to eliminate the need
to leave it in the car..then you could use a more traditional build.
phoenix makes a jazz mandolin which has a mag pup
installed under the neck. if a similar pup could be
sourced for a guitar this could be an option. you would have
to cut a hole in the sable.

http://www.phoenixmandolins.com/mandolins/jazz/

there is a member here that has an sm81 and a tonedexter package for 500.in the agf classifieds that's a good deal!!

[Gordon Currie]

Originally Posted by varmonter

there is a member here that has an sm81 and a tonedexter package for 500.in the agf classifieds that's a good deal!!

Thanks for the head's up, varmonter!

[Matt McGriff]

I ended up ordering a Boss AD-2 after watching and listening to a bunch of demos. Seems to smooth the tone nicely. Also ordered a 2 ft TRS to male XLR cable to allow me to use the line out directly into the board, without a direct box. Looking forward to receiving it in and giving it a shot.

[sublro]

tonedexter is not cheap, nor plug and play, but it is THE REAL DEAL if you are looking for "the sound of your guitar only louder" -

also, +1 on the k&k pure mini as the pickup, both with or without tonedexter. GREAT natural sound compared to a UST

[Melvis1186]

Also interested in a Sable, yet have concerns regarding the live sound (I also operate within the church realm). Just curious, but what came of your efforts to "fix" your sound? Im fairly certain I can get a good price on a Sable which should save some money to purchase additional gear to smooth out any unwanted quack. Is the Tonedexter really worth it? What exactly does it do? Is this the best solution to the Sable's quack?

[gfirob]

In the simplest way I can explain it, the Tonedexter compares the signal from your pickup (whatever it is) and compares it to the acoustic sound of your guitar through a microphone and creates a kind of model or EQ (they call it a wavemap) which then makes your pickup sound almost exactly like your acoustic guitar sounds to your ear. It is a new technology, there is nothing else like it. Imagine that you could EQ your guitar pickup with 2000 bands of equalization. It is not for every use, but many consider it the best solution to the acoustic amplification challenge. It is really worth looking into.

[Melvis1186]

Yeah Ive just spent the last hour watching videos trying to wrap my head around the ToneDexter. Given that I'm not very tech savvy when it comes to pedals and other gear, it seems a little intimidating lol.

However, is it commonly believed that this would fix the issues that the Sable has electronically?

[gfirob]

Not a difficult device at all, just different. It is way simpler than something like the Play Acoustic, which has 9 million menu pages.

[jonfields45]

Originally Posted by Melvis1186

Yeah Ive just spent the last hour watching videos trying to wrap my head around the ToneDexter. Given that I'm not very tech savvy when it comes to pedals and other gear, it seems a little intimidating lol.

However, is it commonly believed that this would fix the issues that the Sable has electronically?

It will do the job. I am primarily using it for my performance guitar, a RainSong CH-PA with a MiSi Trio (Baggs Element with no battery preamp). The correction to the pickup tone is amazing, to me. My friends happily using decades old pickups are not as impressed (and don't participate here at the AGF :~).

I've had that ToneDexter for two weeks. I initially made three Wavemaps, one of which I decided to redo. Reading the instructions made it seem more complicated than just doing it. For my quick "re-do", I just pointed a mic at the neck/body joint, about a foot away, no headphones, and just let it do it's thing. The problem I was trying to solve (bypass was louder than the Wavemap which made demoing for my skeptical friends harder) was fixed.

[jojobean39]

I own both a Sable and a ToneDexter. I’ve yet to properly map the Sable (I haven’t had time).

My thoughts on the TD are this:

I was skeptical. I got a good deal on an open box item from one of the sponsors. I paid $250 and I would pay full price if I didn’t get a good deal. It’s worth it.

I am not a pedal guy. I play electric and my rig is simple and I use one setting on the few pedals I have.

The TD is VERY easy to use. It takes about ten minutes to learn what to do and set up. The trickiest thing is just figuring out what mic and mic placement works best with each guitar. Don’t assume that the nicest mic works best. In fact, I’ve found that a $100 mic on some guitars worked far better than a $1000 mic.

I’ve mapped 4 guitars so far and I have one left, which happens to be the Sable. I’m hoping to do that this week maybe.

The results have all been VERY positive. I’ve mapped a Lame Horse, McPherson 5.0, Santa Cruz and my buddy’s Taylor 812CE 12 fret. The pickup systems were Baggs Ribbon, Baggs Element, Baggs Anthem (full, doesn’t work with SL) and ES2 on the Taylor. All have given me results with which I’m REALLY pleased. It’s not perfect. But it’s really good. People were amazed at the Taylor’s sound.