ToneDexter - Verdict?

[gfirob]

Wow, Kid, looks like the size and weight of the Tonedexter are not a deal breaker for you...

Quite a setup.

[jonfields45]

ToneDexter is without peer in my opinion and a better investment than more expensive pickups or dual source systems. However, if you've got the ear that can appreciate its goodness, then you might have the ear to chase tweaks into infinity and the ability to hear minor defects as major. That sort of endless chase doomed Aura for me. My ToneDextor met the same fate, but unlike Aura, I am very impressed with what it can do and I don't see my personal shortcomings as a strike against it :~).

[rb1591]

Originally Posted by jonfields45

ToneDexter is without peer in my opinion and a better investment than more expensive pickups or dual source systems. However, if you've got the ear that can appreciate its goodness, then you might have the ear to chase tweaks into infinity and the ability to hear minor defects as major. That sort of endless chase doomed Aura for me. My ToneDextor met the same fate, but unlike Aura, I am very impressed with what it can do and I don't see my personal shortcomings as a strike against it :~).

You could not have more aptly expressed my experience … and as you say, "personal shortcomings."

[BluesKing777]

A few have mentioned Aura and I have to say it is dependant on the application.....

I was hooked on Aura when it first came out...it did what some of the claims promised. It changed the sound to hide piezo quack. It also gave you a mic’d sound of your guitar...IF you had the mainly popular models on their Image Gallery eg. a J45 or a D18/28. If you had a metal Dobro, me!, with a piezo reso pickup, adding a few % Aura of something like a dread did get rid of the cardboard quack sound, wel it did with mine. My Blues King, well, it was in nowhere land - bubinga body with a fairly unique acoustic sound that no amount of Aura-ing would help against the inbuilt Baggs Element. I mean, it was improved by removing the quack....

Then, ba doom ba doom, big drum roll.....Martin brought out the Retro series guitars with inbuilt Aura and images recorded from vintage donor guitars. Oohh, yeah, baby! One of those had to be mine! But which one? Oh agony. D18, 28, 000-18 etc? At the music shop, I played those 3 acoustically and plugged to their little PA. Even though I am a OM/000 guy, I went for the D18E Retro. Just superb - great guitar, great pickup system, plug and play anywhere. Aura in all its superbness, if you like. All controls u need at the fingertips. Not many of us bought them!

So, to me, the Tonedexter is the Aura for my guitars that are pickup’d but no Aura image in the gallery to suit. Yes, I will happily train it and I really like it.

But like I have said before, if I was going to a blues jam or open mic, having to take the red box and find a power point makes it a big decision to take and waste time when I have 2 road warrior Maton plug and play AP5-Pro pickup system loaded AND a Martin Retro D18E fully loaded with Aura images from a 1938 Martin D18. (truth is the Martin is never going to see an open mic as I would probably get knocked on the head and have the guitar pinched on the way out to my car). Having to take the preamp and a EQ box would nix taking a guitar with my (wonderful) new Sunrise pickup too, I think...perhaps. Years and years ago, I would lug my little electric guitar and tube amp to blues jams because I didn’t want to use the house amp, a shocker transistor unloved Yamaha thing.....so that is how I know about the giddling around and begging for a power point with the mixing desk Nazi. So after getting a lather up rushing around to set up amp, of course, everone wants to use my amp.....and turn it on full, no no non no no No, I’m going home early. I fully suspect it could be the same if you take the Red Thing!

BluesKing777.

[shufflebeat]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

Yes, any blanket statement is likely to be wrong, so let me rephrase: "every UST I have tried has produced near-miraculous results". You are correct that I have not tried every UST in the world :-)

Apologies if this appears like nit-picking but what I said was:

1) it's not true for every guitar/pickup combination IME

For instance, I have an old Framus archtop with a narrow neck which restricts my choice of USTs to piezo film pickups rather than those with separate elements. It works well but each string has a very distinct character, more so than any of my other guitars. This seems to "confuse" the training process so that the scooped, “phasey” sound sometimes complained about with the TD is difficult to avoid. With careful mic choice and placement and, more importantly, unfeasibly light strumming I can coax a reasonable result out of the box but there is much trial and error.

I disagree about the skill required. I've demo'd this for others, taking roughly 2 seconds to setup, people moving around while playing, we're talking during the process, etc. Nothing intense about it. Great results 100% of the time (of the times I've tried it - past results are no guarantee of future, etc, etc). I also don't find mic placement to be especially finicky. You can get different results with different placement or different mics, but any mic, any placement, gets rid of the quack and offers an improvement, in my limited experience.

When I bought my TD (UK) I was surprised to find that the shop could offer no advice, a trial mic or any member of staff who could even talk me through the process. This is not an issue for me because I am blessed/cursed with a measure of tech-curiosity so I am fairly confident in such matters but lots of folks I deal with are amateur orchestral or folkie types who can just about find the right end of a jack lead and who would struggle with the process. For them £450 for a TD could be an expensive mistake.

I agree that “getting rid of the quack” is something the TD is very good at but I can also do this with other bits of kit and isn’t really miraculous.

[Doug Young]

I'm confused, not to argue, but I thought you were objecting to my saying it worked magic on USTs. Apparently I misunderstood. It is definitely true that TD doesn't work on all pickups. The TD team is pretty clear about what pickups they've tried and and also which ones are known not to work well - I doubt they've had a chance to try your Framus system, but if you let them know, they might have some advice, or might add it to the "doesn't work well" list. I'm actually not sure I've heard of anyone trying it on archtops, either, that may be new territory. Again, I'd ask the TD team about that.

It's pretty cool that a shop in the UK carries the ToneDexter! In case you don't know, TD is a team of three guys, just avid guitarists who are trying to do something useful. So I'm not surprised they don't have trained staff in the UK :-) But they do have pretty extensive videos on their site to help people know how to use it.

I agree that “getting rid of the quack” is something the TD is very good at but I can also do this with other bits of kit and isn’t really miraculous.

It sounds like I hit a sore spot with the word "miraculous". Sorry about that. It's no miracle, just technology, convolution to be precise. But in my experience it works very well, and I don't know of any other product on the market that does exactly what it does. Sorry to hear your experience hasn't been the same, but that's par for the course, not everything works for everyone.

I am curious what other devices you have found that get rid of quack. I avoid USTs, so that's not a problem for me, but it's a pretty common issue here on AGF, so I think people would be happy to hear what works for you.

[BluesKing777]

By archtop, do you mean an acoustic type with added piezo or electric guitar style, Doug?

I have a successful wavefile for my 1935 Gibson Black Special (a flat back L50 that was a ‘special customer’ edition, so I was told.

Years ago when I bought it, I took it my luthier man and asked him to add a pickup without hurting the guitar too much. He came up with a Schatten Archtop Pickup, which is a whole archtop bridge with a piezo inside somewhere. Loose the strings, take out the old bridge and put in case but make sure to note the position! In goes the Schatten and the lead went across to the F Hole and inside to the endpin area.

Sounds fabulous in Tonedexter! Just so ‘real’. Sounds absolutely horrible with no TD.


BluesKing777.

[The Kid!]

Originally Posted by gfirob

Wow, Kid, looks like the size and weight of the Tonedexter are not a deal breaker for you...

Quite a setup.

Haha, not a deal breaker at all. It's two flight cases and a speaker. Sometimes I add a sub and a monitor.

7 minute setup with one speaker. 12 minute setup with the sub and two speakers.

It's way easier than it looks.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by BluesKing777

By archtop, do you mean an acoustic type with added piezo or electric guitar style, Doug?

I don't know, what shufflebeat was saying didn't work well was a Framus archtop with some kind of ust. I was just commenting on that.

[Andy Howell]

The TD will give you the best hassle free acoustic sound you will find. Buying in the U.K. I would advise buying a decent dedicated power supply. Sounds Great Music (the dealers) will advise.

[shufflebeat]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

I'm confused, not to argue, but I thought you were objecting to my saying it worked magic on USTs. Apparently I misunderstood.

It seems we've crossed lines slightly, I thought you were commenting on by suggestion that the TD doesn't suit all guitar/pickup combinations which, to be fair, you have been consistent with whenever I've seen you comment on it. I've mentioned the term "miraculous" only because it's so eye-catching. My real (minor) concern was with the suggestion...

...and as I reported some time back, with people who use USTs, ToneDexter is miraculous.

...which might easily be taken out of context as one of those blanket statements we agree would be unjustified.

The TD team is pretty clear about what pickups they've tried and and also which ones are known not to work well - I doubt they've had a chance to try your Framus system, but if you let them know, they might have some advice, or might add it to the "doesn't work well" list. I'm actually not sure I've heard of anyone trying it on archtops, either, that may be new territory. Again, I'd ask the TD team about that.

Not necessary, after much fiddling about I have a workable wavemap. Not used it in anger yet but quietly confident.

It's pretty cool that a shop in the UK carries the ToneDexter! In case you don't know, TD is a team of three guys, just avid guitarists who are trying to do something useful. So I'm not surprised they don't have trained staff in the UK :-) But they do have pretty extensive videos on their site to help people know how to use it.

I'm very glad the TD is available here, my main annoyance is that it's rendered my recently purchased Baggs m1a redundant (I wasn't that keen on the sound anyway and it has a surprising tendency to high end feedback on loud stages) and even then the result with the M1a/TD was interesting - just not worth the hassle of multiple systems at gigs. I've put an old Headway into that guitar and am currently exploring the possibilities. No complaints apart from my own timing.

I wouldn't have expected Audio Sprockets to have trained up staff, neither would I have expected the shop to have done so (ok, maybe a little bit out of professional curiosity if nothing else) but the lack of advice leaves un-tech-savvy musicians vulnerable to unwise choices based on hyperbolic talk.

I am curious what other devices you have found that get rid of quack. I avoid USTs, so that's not a problem for me, but it's a pretty common issue here on AGF, so I think people would be happy to hear what works for you.

As previously mentioned (#13) I , like most of us, have spent a fair amount of time and money on this and would generally alternate between the Aura blender and the Yahama AG Stomp, depending on the gig. My "go to" images on the Aura were posted up by users in various parts of the world, it was a long process which is now obsolete(-ish) but has served me well. The Yamaha I find to be both an excellent sound sculptor and problem solver which will stay with me for the time being in the FX loop of the TD.

[AndyC]

Originally Posted by Andy Howell

The TD will give you the best hassle free acoustic sound you will find. Buying in the U.K. I would advise buying a decent dedicated power supply. Sounds Great Music (the dealers) will advise.

From my experience of talking to Sounds Great about ToneDexter, I'd be surprised if they were able to advise on anything - they were unhelpful, disinterested and unknowledgable - completely useless.

[shufflebeat]

Originally Posted by AndyC

From my experience of talking to Sounds Great about ToneDexter, I'd be surprised if they were able to advise on anything - they were unhelpful, disinterested and unknowledgable - completely useless.

Just as well they're so reasonably priced then, isn't it?

[Andy Howell]

Originally Posted by AndyC

From my experience of talking to Sounds Great about ToneDexter, I'd be surprised if they were able to advise on anything - they were unhelpful, disinterested and unknowledgable - completely useless.

Not my experience but then I had decided I wanted one — they were helpful talking about power supplies. They were also very helpful about delivery — I wanted it for a gig but wasn't at home until the day before. They looked out for my order and then held despatch until the right day.

To be honest I couldn't have asked for anything more. I would use them again.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by shufflebeat

Yahama AG Stomp, depending on the gig.

The AG Stomp did indeed do a nice job of reducing quack, tho I don't think it came close to ToneDexter (but I never had both at the same time - if you have both, maybe do a demo?). I was always surprised that gadget disappeared from the market so quickly. Tho as I recall, I didn't like anything about it other than the modeling feature, and it was a kind of clunky box to use just for that feature.

Sorry if "miraculous" was over the top, I was thinking about all the jaws I've seen drop when they try it for the first time, especially people with bad-sounding USTs.