Lunch Report- Wednesday September 8, 2010

Today's Lunch- So far its been a bag of pretzels that I brought from home.
I may go out for a fast food foray as I drop in to my local Guitar Center to see what's new or used in their collection. This is actually how I have found and bought my most recent instruments.

Today's Discussion Topic- Cord voodoo!!

I mentioned that I use a Monster brand cable and that I had it break in the middle of a gig. To be fair, I bought the cable used and it did work fine for about 8 years since I got it, but are Monster cables and other boutique brands of cable really worth the high price for what you get?

I don't think so. I understand the need to minimize capacitance and not have a microphonic cable when performing. I own many other brands of cable that do a respectable job for a lot less money, IMHO.

The real subject of this discusson is: Are we suckered into fooling ourselves into thinking that we need certain hi spec cables by unscupulous manufacturers who are just really taking us for a ride?

There are now companies that are promoting and selling upgraded power cables! As if that is going to make any difference in the performance of your amp! Really - You change a 6 foot power cable and that is going to upgrade all of the house wiring that carries the current to the outlet that you have connected to? Not to mention the cable that runs from the power station to your house.

Morover these things ain't cheap. Some selling for hundreds of dollars and more.

What do you all think about this?

Is it just to be filed under "a Sucker is born every minute" or is there more going on here?

G&L question:
What is your opinion of the newer neck design? Do you miss the bi-cut neck or do you like the new style?

See you later-

bassman

My take on cords :

Yes, monster cables are for suckers, one of the big things with boutique cables is they claim that you need X gauge to transfer the signal well, however wire gauge is only important for CURRENT driven things, not voltage/impedance driven. The capacitance is the most important factor, this is all from my lab techs in engineering. They are pretty certain guitars are not current driven, as they are passive as is. As long as you keep capacitance/conductance down, in other words the wires isolated from eachother, the differences should be miniscule. You do however want braided chords, for increased flexibility. A good wearing outer surface, etc. As I linked in last weeks thread, I use a quality wire from redco, that costs about 50-60 cents a foot. A knockoff of a snootier variety. It has a fairly slim diameter, very flexible, and good readings. I do not believe the gold plug hoodoo either, as we aren't pairing them with gold jacks, and gold wire, so any extra conductance is kind of lost. Good corrosion resistance however.

So I would say for a guitar cable, yeah we're suckers. Other applications, particularly current driven (think of it as needing a highway for the electrons) you need larger gauges and whatnot. For about the same price as my home grown cables, Digiflex makes some very nice ones (at about 1$ a foot too, lasts a long time, no noise issues.)



G&Ls necks:

As a carpenter I think I prefer the bicut neck, as you could reverse the grain and it would effectively be a 2 piece neck, hopefully holding eachother in check as both will move differently. Glue is also stronger than wood , creating a rigid point. However I find the old style truss rod kind of meh, and if this is more stable all the better. I still think this truss rod is odd/a bit behind, as I am used to truss rods that can add relief, or take it away directly, opposed to this rod which looks to count on string tension to add relief, and only removes relief with the rod. There is no reason you could not use a bicut neck with any kind of truss rod.

At the same time, multi piece necks can experience differential swelling, especially with mixed species (like my 5 piece neck LB75). This can be dealt with with a little steel wool if you are comfy.

My big beef is no oil/wax or oil finish neck like Music Man or Carvin, these are the pinnacle to me. I am unsure whether I will take the finish off the G&L neck and oil it up when I get it. Depends how sticky it feels to me. The fact they give a 10 year warranty seems odd to me (although Carvin gives 5). The 10 years makes me think, what will happen in year 8, not we stand by our product supremely. I am curious to how stable G&L necks are over time due to this.

Cords: I use the Monster instrument cable w/LPE shielding and Quantum 2100 o2-Free instrument cables. I'm sure there are many acceptable ones out there, but these are working for me...

As for necks: they are making them differently now? Quartersawn? One piece w/ skunk? My Bi-Cuts work great and have seasoned well over time... I hope all of these changes are for a better product in the end.

I don't have any experience with the new necks. I like the bi-cut necks, no problems. And I like the micro-tilt. (Hint, hint!)

Cords are fun topic. Some hear a difference, some can't, or don't care. I use to make my own cords, using a special very low capacitance, foil-shielded Belden cable. (Got the idea from an article about the Greatful Dead.) That was pretty cost effective, and I could customize lengths and plugs as I needed. But the market has changed over the years, and I think the mfgs. are offering better products than were available back in the early Seventies.

I bought a couple of Mogamis, and some Planet Waves a while back that were HEAVILY discounted. I like the PW for my acoustics, as they have a kill-switch on one plug. The Mogamis are extra long, and I've been using them with my drum machine. I would guess that most of my pedalboard cables are from Live Wires, as are my main guitar-to-pedalboard and pedalboard-to-guitar cables. I have some other brands floating around--I know I have some Spectra-flex (which are almost too pretty to use, LOL!), Peavey and Pro-Co mic cables, and some old Whirlwinds.

And actually, if you're shopping at Guitar Center, the Rapco Road Hog guitar cables they have are excellent cables and a terrific value. They usually have them by the accessories counter around a mic stand, marked RH186 (for the 18' 6" length). They are fairly large diameter, low-capacitance cables with black rubber coating. They are a good cable at any price, but discounted at Guitar Center, they are an extraordinary value. GC sometimes also has a cheapie, no-nam cloth-braided cable, perhaps also by Rapco. The cable is good, but the ends aren't up to snuff. I have some of these that I've cut up for patch cords and put new ends on them, and they work great. The cloth-braiding helps durability.

And please, 12 gauge speaker cables. The bigger the better.

Bill

Monster cables mostly seem like a marketing rip to me. I've got a bunch of various cables and other than
some real cheapies I can't tell much or any difference. But then some folks claim they can hear a difference
between different types of batteries in their stomp boxes.

I've got no experience with the new necks. I've only got the bi-cuts and haven't had any problems.

But then some folks claim they can hear a difference
between different types of batteries in their stomp boxes.

My opinion is most of this is imaginary, well psychosomatic to be more accurate. You shell out money, to get an improvement you have heard of, and voila it is there... I put this in the same boat as effect of fingerboard wood (even body wood) on the overall sound of an electric guitar.

The batteries are a different story though, they may actually have an effect if they provide different output (the nefarious dying battery sound!). I would likely attribute that to signal loss, which for all effective purposes most people dodge and demand true by pass to prevent..

... are Monster cables and other boutique brands of cable really worth the high price for what you get?

I have Monster Cables everywhere in my rig and have been using the same 21' cord now for over 12 years day in day out. Since I haven't had any problems, I like their stuff. Still the question remains: why did I buy that particular brand in the first place? I have to admit that I fell for their marketing. Although as a physicist I do know that twisted pair cables work a bit better as far as power transfer is concerned. But for optimal use, and best S/N ratio, one would have to use TRS 1/4" jacks and amps in true differential mode. Wait, that is exactly what XLR cables give you and what is behind these connectors in the box. Oh well ...

As far as power cables are concerned, I am a big sceptic. Think a good power filter and stable voltage would do you more good.

What is your opinion of the newer neck design? Do you miss the bi-cut neck or do you like the new style?

Yeah, I miss the Bi-Cut. The fact that the warranty on Bird's Eye maple neck has been shortened to me is still somewhat of a red flag.

- Jos

I know that I'm a fairly opinionated bloke around here, but how are the necks built now? Quartersawn, one piece w/ skunk stripe or something else?

I know that I'm a fairly opinionated bloke around here, but how are the necks built now? Quartersawn, one piece w/ skunk stripe or something else?

Something else

Hope this helps

See the Features page on the G&L main website.

Also see this thread on the truss rod currently used.

Okey-dokey artichokey!

Are they still Quartersawn? as I see no mention of it, so logically I would assume no (as flatsawn seems to get the job done, however is no quartersawn for strength purposes.

I also bought into the hype and got a Monster cable some years ago. It is a good cable, but not significantly better than most, and the directionality thing bugs me a little every time I use mine. On the old board, I, along with a number of other people, got on the Bayou cable bandwagon. I have a couple of long cables (a 30' and a 20') from Butch and they are the best cables I have.

Kit