Laguna 380 PZ. Real acoustics?

[jdogric12]

Here you go wooly bully. This is the 380L PZ, humbuckers (both) on the left through Boss Chorus CE-2 and an Art Tube MP Studio. On the right you'll hear the piezo into a Focusrite TrakMaster pre. First the humbuckers, then the piezo, then both. I recently found my long missing .50 allen wrench and set this guitar up last week. I think it is actually the best playing Rick I've ever played. I don't even mind the wide neck or plain G on it. But enough out of me... Enjoy! Hope this helps. -J

https://www.yousendit.com/download/Q01I ... aFR2Wmc9PQ

[atomic_punk]

GREAT sound sample! I am going to have to get one of these now! THIS is the kind of stuff that should have been made available when they were for sale!

[kiramdear]

thanks, JDog, I never heard one of those before. The sound is convincing but you can tell that the strings are too very light gauge for, say, an acoustic blues sound. As an acoustic, it's hard to say which brand it sounds like...

[BlueAngel]

There is actually a good technical reason why a guitar with both piezo AND magnetic pickups should sound more like a 'real' acoustic than one with only a piezo (ie the traditional electro-acoustic sound).

Piezos and magnetics produce signals which are inherently out of phase with each other - not 180 degrees out, as you get if you simply reverse the polarity of a signal so the peak of one signal corresponds to the opposite peak of the other - but 90 degrees apart, so the peak of one signal corresponds to the zero-crossing point of the other. A piezo pickup generates its peak signal when the string displacement is at maximum, causing the greatest (or least) downpressure on the bridge saddle, which happens at each end of the vibration motion - as you would expect, so the output waveform is a fairly close representation of the string movement. But a magnetic pickup generates its peak signal when the string is moving fastest, which occurs in the middle of the vibration motion - this gives quite a different sound which is one of the reasons electric guitars 'sound' electric. (You can easily test this by reversing the polarity of one of the two pickups in a combined system - the result is not noticeably more 'in phase' or 'out of phase' - just different.) The combination of these two signals gives a more complex sound with a lot of harmonic addition and cancellation - not unlike a real acoustic guitar where the top moves in complex ways with some parts out of phase with others, and all radiate sound waves - if you've ever seen a strobe film of one you'll see how it twists rather than moving straight up and down.

Taylor have tried to capture this with their 'Expression' system that uses several sensors at different places under the top, combined with a string sensor under the end of the fingerboard - but the sensors are all magnetic (including the body movement ones), and to me it doesn't really sound much more 'acoustic' than a piezo system - just wrong in a different way, and not as good as a combined magnetic/piezo system.

[BlueAngel]

There is actually a good technical reason why a guitar with both piezo AND magnetic pickups should sound more like a 'real' acoustic than one with only a piezo (ie the traditional electro-acoustic sound).

Piezos and magnetics produce signals which are inherently out of phase with each other - not 180 degrees out, as you get if you simply reverse the polarity of a signal so the peak of one signal corresponds to the opposite peak of the other - but 90 degrees apart, so the peak of one signal corresponds to the zero-crossing point of the other. A piezo pickup generates its peak signal when the string displacement is at maximum, causing the greatest (or least) downpressure on the bridge saddle, which happens at each end of the vibration motion - as you would expect, so the output waveform is a fairly close representation of the string movement. But a magnetic pickup generates its peak signal when the string is moving fastest, which occurs in the middle of the vibration motion - this gives quite a different sound which is one of the reasons electric guitars 'sound' electric. (You can easily test this by reversing the polarity of one of the two pickups in a combined piezo/magnetic system - the result is not noticeably more 'in phase' or 'out of phase' - just different.) The combination of these two signals gives a more complex sound with a lot of harmonic addition and cancellation - not unlike a real acoustic guitar where the top moves in complex ways with some parts out of phase with others, and all radiate sound waves - if you've ever seen a strobe film of one you'll see how it twists rather than moving straight up and down.

Taylor have tried to capture this with their 'Expression' system that uses several sensors at different places under the top, combined with a string sensor under the end of the fingerboard - but the sensors are all magnetic (including the body movement ones), and to me it doesn't really sound much more 'acoustic' than a piezo system - just wrong in a different way, and not as good as a combined magnetic/piezo system.

[BlueAngel]

Oops... somehow I hit 'quote' not edit. Doh . Ignore first post...