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Location: Boise, Idaho | The guy that bought my 99 Collector wondered if a preamp other than the Optima would eliminate the piezo quack on the bass strings. I did a little reading and didn't find an answer.
Anyone know if the newer preamps cause less quack. We've lost him now to the Taylor side and I don't know if there's any hope of bringing him back. |
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Location: south east Michigan | It's been getting a bad rap lately, but doesn't the VIP help get rid of some of the quackiness? |
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Location: Flahdaw | That's why I don't "plug in" my '99 much. I'm so used to the warmth of natural acoustic that all electrified sounds harsh and quacky to me. I'm looking forward of the OFC get together this weekend so maybe g8r and iffy can show how to get a good, warm amplified sound. |
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Location: Cork, Ireland | magnetic soundhole pickups don't quack... |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | Some quack more than others, and when it is present, a slow attack compressor seems to make it even worse, in which event I just bypass low-end compression altogether. Although I notice it in solo applications, I don't really hear it in the band mix and nobody ever complains. |
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Location: Orange County, California | an active DI, or high impedance pre-amp (Dtar stuff is good, Boss AD-5 works great).
Sometimes just figuring out how to run with the gain below 12 o'clock is all it takes to give you more headroom and a cleaner sound plugged in. |
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Location: lhanbryde | I got a preamp off of e##y sellers name is Rothesay Music , works a treat has gain , middle and treble sliders , just plugs into the jack socket . Cost £30, have a look . |
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Location: SoCal | Hmmm, Rothesay in Bute, UK...one of our two favorite dealers (and individuals). |
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| When the pre-amp died in my T****r, I put in a B-band and it was quackless. I eventually got tired of looking at the hole in the side of the instrument, so I got a new Fishman pre-amp and reverted. The downside is that B-band pickups only work with B-band pre-amps, so I don't know how well they could be adapted to Os and As.
I do know that B-band now makes a direct replacement pre-amp to fit in the side of the T, so I'll be retrofitting in the near future. |
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Location: SE Michigan | I have a 1581 Adamas with an Optima preamp. I also am a pretty heavy-handed and percussive player. So far the best solution I have found is to use a Fishman Aura Dreadnaught pedal. I find setting 13 sounds the best. It really cleans up the quack and makes the amplified sound much richer.
That and trying to lighten up on my attack a bit helps, but that's no fun! |
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Posts: 12759
Location: Boise, Idaho | Thanks for all the input. I'll pass it on, but I'm waiting for Temp (speaking of Rothesay) to chime in with a scientific explanation. Either that or he'll say the same thing I said, "use a mic." |
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Location: 6 String Ranch | Get a Collings |
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Location: Boise, Idaho | I recommended that to him, but he got a Taylor instead. |
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Location: Scotland | Originally posted by henry b:
sellers name is Rothesay Music Henry, that would be me. Glad you like it. Next time you want anything contact me direct. |
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Location: Boise, Idaho | So, Temp, translate what he said into American, would you? "Works a treat"????? |
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Location: Scotland | "does what it says on the tin" |
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Location: Scotland | Originally posted by Mark in Boise:
but I'm waiting for Temp (speaking of Rothesay) to chime in with a scientific explanation. The problem is the way undersaddle piezo pickups respond to attack transients. Basically they exagerate an already huge response peak. There's not much that can be done to cure this (extra preamp headroom can help a little, but this is a design consideration rather than a twist of the volume knob) The fact is that Ovation pickups are among the least "quacky" but really it's the nature of all undersaddle pickups. Other types of piezos such as SBT's like the Baggs I-Beam or K&K don't have this problem, but the payoff is a significantly lower feedback threashold.
One way to tame it a little is to learn how gain-stages work, and make sure your entire signal path has plently headroom. |
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| Originally posted by Paul Templeman:
Other types of piezos such as SBT's like the Baggs I-Beam or K&K don't have this problem, but the payoff is a significantly lower feedback threashold.
SBTs are a HUGE compromise, IMO based on experience. They work well only when blended with a UST, and then only in a small percentage of the total signal. |
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Location: Scotland | Of Course they're a compromise, and that was my point. If you use an undersaddle there will be a certain amount of "quack" and that is one compromise. Use an SBT and you have a different compromise. Use a soundhole magnetic there will be another different compromise, and stick a mic in front of the guitar and have a few more compromises. Blend any combimation of the above and you can get a really good sound, but it's still a compromise compared to the ACOUSTIC sound of the instrument.
These are the choices when you perform to an audience with an acoustic guitar: hire the finest microphones, sound engineer, sound system and venue money can buy, or play acoustic and keep you audiences to less than a couple of dozen, or use some kind of pickup and deal with the compromises. Life just isn't fair. BooHoo. |
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Location: Boise, Idaho | Thanks, Temp. I actually understood most of what you said, but only because I did a little research first. That and you don't type with an "accent." |
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Location: Scotland | Originally posted by ProfessorBB:
a slow attack compressor seems to make it even worse, in which event I just bypass low-end compression altogether. Careful use of a good compressor can help tame piezo quack a little. In compressor terms attack determines how quickly the compression kicks in. A slow attack setting would be used for sounds that do not have fast transient peaks (bowed instruments or wind instruments played legato for example) but anything which is struck such as drums and plucked or strummed stringed instruments have a huge attack spike, and it's this that contributes to the quackiness. So you want the compressor's attack time towards it's fastest setting or it will miss the transient. |
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Location: Colorado Rocky Mountains | Thanks, Paul. That explains why the slow attack compressor isn't effective for some models, while the fast attack does work. The Trace SMX two-stage compressor provides this flexibility with its dual compression (fast and slow) features. Oddly, every model seems to have its own quack threshold and different response characteristics to compression. It really pays to understand how everything in the signal chain impacts output, or like me, surround yourself with good sound engineers. |
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Location: Nova Scotia, Canada | I run all (4)of my O's into a L. R. Baggs Para Acoustic DI and they sound super...no quack. I would like to try a tube outboard DI but I so rarely play acoustic plugged in that, for me, it's hardly worth the bother.
Do you stock any of these Baggs units, Paul T? |
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Location: Scotland | I own a couple of Baggs Para-coustic DI's but I don't stock them. They're a very nice unit.
The new Baggs Venue acoustic processor/DI is worth checking out. |
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Location: Scotland | Mark, if I'm not mistaken the 99 Collector has a Thinline pickup. Unlike the original Ovation pickup the thinline is variation on the pressure-sensitive undersaddle type. That pickup is not doing him any favours in his quest to be quackless. |
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Posts: 12759
Location: Boise, Idaho | You're right, Paul. It was the only thinline I had, but never understood why they used different types. Initially I thought the thinline was the newer version, then thought it might have been matched to the Optima. |
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Location: Chicago | For what it's worth: anyone who has a "virgin" Ovation and wants to "electrify" it, I'll attest to the happy formula of Fishman ProFix pickup system plugged into a Bose L1. Naturally it's for modest sized gigs, but it works for me. The clearest live demonstration of this is the intro to "Spain" on our band page , or "Bozo's Waltz" etc.
The axe is the one in the photo: '74 Legend 1117. I put the same system in my 1581-5 Adamas. |
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July 2008
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Location: Boise, ID | I'm the guy with the '99 Collector's. Thanks mark for starting this post.
I love the guitar and after reading all the posts especially the last two, I was wondering if I can retro fit the guitar with a different pick-up (non thinline) that might have less quack. I am also interested in trying out some of the other solutions posted. I do a lot of home recording so micing the guitar in a nice room isn't generally an option. |
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Eliminating piezo quack