Active Guitar Pickups Use Electronics To Improve The Sound of Your Guitar

Active guitar pickups also enhance your guitar operation and lower the magnetic requirements. When this happen there is no unnecessary pull on the strings to hamper sustain or pull your strings out of tune anymore, YEAYYY!  There are a variety of ways to “Activate” a pickup. A simple “buffer” pre-amp will do the trick, but it will also amplify the hum and buzz the pickup produces. Just because any pickup is “active” doesn’t guarantee you’ll get great results just a strong, clean and quiet signal.  In The Haywire Custom Shop-we like EMG pickups. They are one of our favorite Active guitar pickup companies because they are reliable, clean, sound great and utilize an internal pre-amp (inside the pickup), which not only makes the pickup louder, it also reduces the noise and they were made to be active!  In EMG’s the pickups have higher output than traditional passive pickups. The internal pre-amp is the most efficient way to operate an active pickup. All connections are shielded, as well as the pre-amp.  The impedance output of the pickup cable is low. This makes it less susceptible to noise. Also, it avoids the cluster of wires and possible loose connections in a guitar and installation is easy. No hassle installation. They have also introduced “solder-less” connections for players who want more simplicity.

New Pickups?

If you find that the output level of your EMG pickup is too hot to get clean tones, the best fix is to reduce the gain on your amp (if it has pre-amp/master volume controls). If that doesn’t do it for you, then try turning down the volume control on your guitar. Unlike a traditional passive volume/tone system, the low-impedance EMG system lets you turn down the volume with very little effect on the tone, so you won’t sound muffled when you back off the volume knob. This is much like the Haywire Treble Bleed Option for passive style pickups. You can snug these pickups right up under the strings so they’ll hear much more delicate sounds and harmonics other pickups fail to hear.