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Pickups & wiring Discussion about pickup types, replacements, recomendations, switching, wiring diagrams and sustainer systems for ANY guitar, JEMs included.

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  #1  
Old 09-02-2007, 07:14 PM
Mister CCJ  is offline
 
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dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


I was at GC yesterday playing a JS1000BK just to get an idea of the differences of pickups/amps etc. I noticed that (maybe the amp but dont think so) with the volume rolled down the pickups seems to be less clear than my stock v7/s1/v8 config. Now realizing that those ibanez pickups are very thin sounding (feel free to argue this), I guess it would make a little sense they would sound clearer with the volume down. Whats your opinion on this guys? And what pickups are clearer than others? Thanks
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  #2  
Old 09-03-2007, 05:20 AM
Devo  is offline
 
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


Sounds like you got an some sort of RG?

These all have high pass filters on the volume pot... the JS1000 has a high pass filter but it needs to be activated by pulling up the volume pot.

so if you rolled down the volume on a JS it would get muddier then if you rolled down the volume on yor RG... unless you pulled up the volume pot first

so congrats youve just accidentally identified the difference a high pass filter can make ... there must be about 500-600 topics titled "my high pass filter doesnt work" or "I cant hear any difference with the high pass engaged" etc etc
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  #3  
Old 09-03-2007, 05:27 AM
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


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Originally Posted by Devo View Post
Sounds like you got an some sort of RG?

so if you rolled down the volume on a JS it would get muddier then if you rolled down the volume on yor RG... unless you pulled up the volume pot first
Is that really true? I thought they were actually the same pots, just that the JS has an additional high pass filter to cut out the lows if it is pulled out?
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  #4  
Old 09-03-2007, 07:36 AM
Devo  is offline
 
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


Yes this is true... Nearly all modern Ibanez have a high pass filters hard wired to their volume pot... the JS is the only one where you can choose to disable this ... have a look through the diagrams here... the "331" cap on the volume pot in each diagram is a high pass filter... only the JS has this on a push pull....

http://www.ibanez.com/support/wiringdiagrams.aspx

all pots of the same resistance value and same taper are the same ...

The easiest way to describe it is to try and not think of the signal comming from your pickup as one signal, but as hundreds of thousands of signals all at different frequencies travelling all at the same time.

These signals react differently when they hit the 500k ohm barrier between them and the gound that the pot creats... The high frequencies find it much easier to get though this barrier then the low frequencies and hence the effect that you get is that you lose the high frequency .. and as you lower the resistance and the jump to ground gets easier, more high fequencies escape so that the sound gets muddier and muddier..

When you bypass the pot with a capacitor for all intents and purposes you reverse this effect... what happens is that capacitor acts as a road block for low frequency sounds but lets high frequency sound pass through relativly easy... When the pot is at full value it makes little difference as its easy for all the differnet frequency sounds to escape out to your amp... As you turn the pot down and the resistance drops some of the frequencies start escaping to the ground but the high frequencies find it easier to go through the cap so continue to escape to your amp.. wuntil finally its easier for them to go to ground then go through the cap and your sound dissappears.

this is an overly simplified description whose attempt is to describe the effect rather than the means
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Old 09-03-2007, 08:29 AM
Ibateur  is offline
 
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


Give the guy a medal. That's as good a description of "high pass" as one could get.
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Old 09-03-2007, 09:14 AM
Mister CCJ  is offline
 
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


haha wow I had forgotten about that on the JS. Yea its a RG btw. Awesome thanks guys.
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  #7  
Old 09-03-2007, 11:53 PM
eg  is offline
 
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


Good explanation. So the JS has the high pass filter disabled when the pot is pushed down and enabled when the pot is pulled out.
That would explain why you say that the JS is muddier compared with a typical RG when the volume rolled down with the pot pushed down. The high pass filter is not enabled.
An RG would have the high-pass filter enabled all the time.

What are the advantages of doing that btw?
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  #8  
Old 09-04-2007, 05:52 AM
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


the main advantage is the sound... which is entirely subjective but I much prefer the sound of a volume pot with a high pass filter as the tone stays pretty much the same as you roll the volume back... and if you want to lose some treble you can use the tone pot to achieve the same effect as a volume pot without a high pass

the second big advantage is not having a push pull that get in the way of your picking and the whammy bar... on my previous 2 JS I have hard wired the high pass filter (but then returned ithem factory spec when they were sold)

the third advangtage is that having it hard wired meas less cable, less parts and less solder for you signal to go though before it leaves the guitar.
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  #9  
Old 10-02-2007, 04:16 AM
eg  is offline
 
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Re: dimarzio clarity with volume rolled down


So in essense, a JS with the high-pass filter engaged will sound like any ordinary RG with the volume rolled down.
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