NPD: Dimarizo Black Angel vs. Schertler AG6 with S-MIC-M

[Methos1979]

Anyone that followed my NGD adventure a few months back with my (first time ever!) brand new Martin D-1 custom might remember that after initially planning on leaving it stock (no pickup) I quickly changed my mind and added a Schertler AG6 with S-MIC-M so I could take it to the occasional open mic with the sole purpose of showing off the guitar to friends. I say this because I own three Cole Clark guitars that I gig with and they are by far the perfect open mic guitar as you can get awesome tone on the fly with just about any equipment.

I like the Schertler for it's small footprint and light weight. The S-MIC-M attachment is also small and plugs directly into the pickup easily. The pickup has volume and mic blend controls. As many have noted the pickup does not have adjustable (or any visible) pole pieces so what have for tone is what you get. The other thing I loved about the Scherter, as ridiculous as it seems, is the blue jack plug cap. It looked great on my all-hog D-1. What I didn't like about the Schertler is the battery power. Sure, it says it will last 170 hours but it still just bugged me since the guitar will only be occasionally grabbed. That and I'd already suffered a battery failure at my first attempt at an open mic which soured me even more.

So I started doing a lot of reading on full passive sound hole pups and decided on giving the Dimarzio Black Angel a try. I found one here on AGF from a member who claimed it was new and never installed. Upon opening the box I can say that it certainly did look exactly that way. Awesome - thanks Todd! If you ever find yourself looking to do business with BoneDigger, don't hesitate - he's a straight shooter!

I played and recorded the Schertler straight into my Bose S1 and through a Headway EDM-1 preamp in the Bose just to have some comparison. Now, there's too many variables at play here in that I went from old medium strings (of which I don't know the brand) to brand new Cleartone Lights. So big difference there. I also played and recorded the guitar acoustically just to see the difference. I usually play John Pearse #710NM (new mediums) these days but I've had these Cleartones laying around for quite awhile and decided to use them just to give them a try. I find that I MUCH prefer the John Pearse new mediums to the Cleartone lights and will over to those as soon as I kill the Cleartones. But obviously the new vs. old, lights vs. mediums and differing brands is going to color the sound at least a bit.

That said, now onto the A/B. Let's face it - a magnetic pickup alone is a magnetic pickup sound, period. Kind of glassy and electric. The Schertler was always very plinky and hot on the B and high E strings. And since there are no pole pieces there is no helping it other than with outboard EQ. You can only dial in about 10% of the S-MIC-M before feedback becomes an issue for live, amplified play. It does help give the overall tone a little airiness but in all honesty not enough to really matter especially for live play.

The Schertler was definitely (and obviously) hotter as it is an active pickup while the Dimarzio is passive. As for the Dimarzio, it definitely seemed warmer than the Schertler although it still maintains that glassy, electric sound. However, the ability to adjust individual pole pieces means there's at least some ability to tweak overall tone. As I may have said earlier, I dialed the B and high E pole pieces down a good bit right out of the gate before installing the strings and that tamed that high-end plink that the Schertler needs outboard EQ to handle.

Overall when listening back to my recording I liked the Schertler better plugged straight into the Bose S1. This is in part to just how much lower the volume was with the Dimarzio straight into the Bose. To be more fair I should have dialed up the volume at the Bose to get a better comparison of tone. I actually did this later when not recording and I think I can say that I would like the Dimarzio at least as much, if not better, than the Schertler straight into the Bose when the volume is equal. When going through the Headway preamp I did bump the volume to compensate and I found that I liked the Dimarzio slightly better than the Schertler.

So in summary I'm calling this a success. Both systems are great depending on your needs and wants. Pluses to the Schertler is the smaller size, lighter weight, hotter signal and the ability to add in some internal mic. Oh, and the cool blue jack button (no, it wasn't the same size as the Dimarzio - ). Downside is the lack of individual (or any) pole piece adjustment and dealing with a battery. Pluses to the Dimarzio are no battery, adjustable pole pieces and warm tone. Downside is the need for some preamp boost for best tone, slightly larger size and heavier weight. The Dimarzio is also less expensive, especially when you add the S-MIC-M to the Schertler.

[BluesKing777]

Nicely written, Methos! Thanks.

I have tried most of the soundholers for pretty much the same reason as you...got the great sounding ‘live’ guitar pickup but want to show off the other beauties and what a long, long, useless road that can be, BUT......

I have both those pickups, Methos and have found that the ‘angle of the dangle’ (highly tech) of various guitars works with various soundhole pickups better. e.g. the Schert/Mic with no adjustable poles works great in some guitars of mine but horrible in others. It just has to be the varying height of the geometry of guitars.....some soundholes are miles away from the strings!

Another tip I found by mistake - the Dim BA sounds really good through the buffer box/preamp for my Sunrise pickup. (Plus an EQ box seriously needed).

But really, for your beautiful D18 at a friend’s or open mic, you can’t go past the ease and sound of an active Baggs M80. I take the pole pieces for strings one and two out and adjust the others fairly low to get more ‘wood’. You can plug this direct if you are not as particular as I know you are! But I think a preamp with EQ makes it sound very, very good. More control too.

BluesKing777.

[stephenT]

Haven't tried the Schertler, had a couple Angels, used Sunrise for years, tried a lot of other brands.

I've recently switched the Fishman Blackstack soundhole pickups. I can install w/o slacking the strings. I think it's the best of all the soundhole pickups I've used. I've always had the Sunrise permanently installed w/ endpin jack but I like leaving my guitars acoustic for playing at home, so I install the Fishman for gigs w/ the supplied cable that drapes out the soundhole.

[Stringmaster]

Thanks for the review Methos. I have a BA that I mount in my old L00 to take to open mics on occasion. My guitar has an elevated board, so the pickup is farther away from the strings--further reducing the output. It throws the sound guys off at times as they have to crank the mixer way up--Sometimes my sounds is lacking because of that, until they finally figure it out. Last week I went to a new open mic and when I got up the guy running the sound handed me a cable to plug in, but of course the BA has a male plug--he had no D.I.--just a guitar cable from the mixer. Fortunately I threw my PADI in the car just in case, so I had plenty of signal to the mixer. I thought about getting the Schertler to help with this, but I think I'll save my money for now, and maybe look for either something with built in electronics, or perhaps a preamp that is more "stealth" for when I get up. As you know, a lot of guys want quick on/quick off.

[Methos1979]

Great replies from all - thanks!

As for the Baggs M80, I actually had and used one of those for a short period of time on my Martin 000-18GE custom and it was pretty good. I thought about it but again preferred something passive. I thought about the M1 passive as well.

I also considered the Fishman Blackstack as it was the other one (besides the Black Angel) that was relatively well reviewed here. The Sunrise was just too big and heavy and was the most expensive so I ruled that out.

K&K makes a sound hole pup that was interesting and the sound in their demo video was awesome but you know how that goes. I did a post here to see if anyone had tried one that was met with crickets and I'm not a fan of being a beta tester so I passed on that. Besides, I couldn't find one used!

I also considered the MiSi Air which was very small and lightweight. It is active but you charged it by plugging it in through the guitar cord jack before use and you get up to 8 hours of playing time with 60 seconds of charging. So that was neat but again, not enough reviews and not readily available used.

In the end in the passive category the top picks were the Blackstack and Black Angel so I decided on the Angel.

As for preamps, the little Headway EDM-1 is perfect for this application. It's small and runs for 300 hours on a single 9v battery that tells you when it's low on power. I use a small rare earth magnet on the back and just clip it on the mic stand in front of me at the open mics, plug in the offered guitar cord and I connect my guitar to the preamp via a small 5.8 gHz wireless kit.

The Headway provides the gain I need plus on-the-fly 3 band EQ and an Anti-Feedback Range variable sweep knob which is more of variable high-pass filter for the low end frequencies and works great for taming any feedback issues on-the-fly. I've used this little wonder box on every guitar for the past year and a half (not including the Cole Clarks which don't need it) and it's been a tone lifesaver at open mics.

There's also a three-way impedance match switch, a Live/Mute switch, a phantom power three-way switch (Off/Ring/Tip) and a ground lift switch so they pack a lot of features into a little metal box with Class A components only the size of a pack of smokes. Very handy.

If we ever start to have open mics again (and I'm sure we will) I'll be testing the Martin out with the BA then and I'll report back to this thread then. Oh, and the guitar is not a D-18 as mentioned but a D-1 custom, a 12-fret all-hog dread based off the discontinued Martin D-1 Authentic and it's really something quite special both visually and tonally.

Thanks again for the replies so far and keep them coming. The more information on these threads the better for those searching for their own solutions. It's the best thing we do here at AGF!!

[jricc]

Thanks for a great review methos1979. Thanks to all who contributed their soundhole pickup experiences. I just recently started using the Baggs M1A and am liking it.

[Methos1979]

Quick update: Not a full gig or open mic but we just finished a full band practice and I took a little bit of time to adjust the pole pieces for best even tone and also spent a bit of time to dial in the Headway EDM-1 and Bose S1 and I was more than pleased with the final tone achieved to the point where I might reconsider this guitar as a usable gigging guitar. The Cole Clarks are still certainly superior but I can see perhaps selling off one or even two of them (to replace one with a second Angel 2) and the Martin could be a backup or even a primary in certain conditions. It's already going to be the primary for busking where no amplification is allowed.

[Ten]

One reason I’ve stuck with the BA, and that I haven’t seen mentioned, is how well it takes pedals if you like to experiment sonically in that direction.

[Methos1979]

Originally Posted by Ten

One reason I’ve stuck with the BA, and that I haven’t seen mentioned, is how well it takes pedals if you like to experiment sonically in that direction.

Generally not a pedal guy (after my EAE StompMix X6 and Ernie Ball JP Jr.) but always good info to know for those who are. Thanks for the tip!

[lkingston]

I absolutely LOVE my Schertler AG6/S-mic. String to string balance is not adjustable, but I find it perfect. I adjusted the heck out of my M80 and never could get it satisfactory, even taking out pole pieces entirely.

One thing I love about the S-mic is how isolated it seems to be from handling noises. If I touch the pickup or mic or the top, I don’t get the physical coupling noises I have seen with other mag mic pickups, and yet if I snap my fingers over it or talk into it, the mic is very sensitive. More mic air than top sensing: which I love!

[Methos1979]

I agree that the AG6 with the S-MIC-M is a great system. Dialing out the plinky highs was easy with a EQ and I did love the small and lightweight footprint. For those that prefer an active system it certain should be considered. One thing mentioned often in the reviews here and elsewhere is that it's also excellent for recording where you dial up the mic blend to 100% and get great tone. I never record direct like that so that didn't apply to me though.

[meb]

Since I was the provider of the Schertler combo to Methos1979, I guess I
should chime in. As usual, Methos has provided wonderful insight to
these various SH pups. I agree with him on all points. I had used the BA
in all my guitars before I tried the Schertler. I gigged happily with it
for a few months and found it approx. = in sound to BA + a preamp, which
in SH pup land is a darned good thing.

When I tried a Sunrise, it upped the pickup bar for me. I put the Sunrise in 2
guitars, and decided to likewise keep a passive BA in my third for uniformity.
I also found I usually needed/wanted a preamp/di with the Schertler anyhow.

Stephen-T's praise for the Blackstack led me to try one. It has now replaced
the BA and on-deck to challenge the Sunrise....and smaller, less
intrusive, cheaper, and is at least approx. = the sound. If the Sunrises
were not already installed, I would go with the BS.

My note to Methos is: I you are going to use the external cable, the BA
is much easier to install/uninstall. If you are going to permanently
mount is to an endpin jack, check out the BS first. I know Stephen-T
takes his in & out; so maybe I am making too much of an issue here.

With my passives, I keep an OTSS (Open To Source Sensors) power
plug on hand for those cramped quarters where I need gain. It is slightly
pricey for what it is, but may be a great tool for those open mics.

Thanks to everyone's input on the thread. At least now we have some
great options for us SH pickups fans.

[Methos1979]

Thanks, Michael for your input. I have already installed the BA in the end pin jack since I had the AG6 installed that way. Also, I'm not a fan of cables running out of the sound hole.

Regardless, I would love to hear a really detailed breakdown of the differences between the BA and BS as you heard them. I'm always open to more information on these types of threads and by their very nature the ability to swap out between SH pickups makes these considerations very much desired.

So please by all means share your opinions on the differences between the two if you are so inclined and thanks in advance!

[meb]

I wouldn't fret over the BlackStack; you are in a good place. With your
fingerstyle playing (as I recall) you probably would not see that much
difference. The BA excels at micro-dynamic nuances. What the BS does
is add some fullness that helps increase overall dynamics.

BTW, you do realize that you can use that cool blue Schertler endpin with
the BA, don't you?? You can use the minijack interface to swap the
pu's if you so desire. I did so many times. But you cannot use the
AG6 with the BA mono jack without draining the battery.

Good luck!

[Methos1979]

Originally Posted by meb

I wouldn't fret over the BlackStack; you are in a good place. With your
fingerstyle playing (as I recall) you probably would not see that much
difference. The BA excels at micro-dynamic nuances. What the BS does
is add some fullness that helps increase overall dynamics.

BTW, you do realize that you can use that cool blue Schertler endpin with
the BA, don't you?? You can use the minijack interface to swap the
pu's if you so desire. I did so many times. But you cannot use the
AG6 with the BA mono jack without draining the battery.

Good luck!

Actually these days I'm doing as much strumming as fingerstyle. At some point we realized if we wanted to get gigs we needed to play upbeat material and added a bunch of strummers. I'm even playing with a pick these days although I still love the sound and love to play fingerstyle!

Yes, I thought about that with regard to using the blue cap. I knew I couldn't leave the AG6 since once I made the decision to go with the BA I knew I'd sell off the AG6. But if the jacks were the same thread size I would have gladly kept the blue one and put the silver on the AG6.

Of course I could just swap them over by soldering them as I have those skills but again, not that big a deal. Thanks for the info on differences between the BA and BS. Probably the one thing I'd try if I run into one in the wild is that K&K SH pup. Sounded great in their demo but it was also ugly as sin!