ChiefbigeasyNew Orleans, LA✭✭✭Dupont MDC 50; The Loar LH6, JWC Catania Swing; Ibanez AFC151-SRR Contemporary Archtop
Posts: 355
More rabbit hole fodder!
Seriously, guess I’ll hold off until the new Tonedexter shows up. Some users suggest that the Tonedexter is more fussy about the mic you use to record sample, as opposed to the LR Baggs approach using the iPhone internal mic. Don’t know if they’re going to address that or not, and I wonder what’s up their sleeve otherwise.
Will NUX work well with a contact mic, specifically Manouche mic? I think the consensus in the past was a yes but I'd like to confirm this before get one.
Every note wants to go somewhere-Kurt Rosenwinkel
ChiefbigeasyNew Orleans, LA✭✭✭Dupont MDC 50; The Loar LH6, JWC Catania Swing; Ibanez AFC151-SRR Contemporary Archtop
edited October 2023Posts: 355
Does NUX indicate on their website what pickups they like? Tonedexter has a long list of confirmed favorites, some that work with reservations, others they say don’t.
Interestingly, Tonedexter says they don’t like magnetic pickups, but LR Baggs say they do. I would not have thought that the IR technology would be that different between the two units, but who knows.
If I were to hazard a guess, I’d figure that the Manouche mic is a variation on a style of piezo, so if a piezo works with the NUX, so should the Manouche mic.
Of Interest to anyone who owns the Manouche mic: my bandmate owns one and has been having trouble with feedback and fidelity of sound. He discovered that the cord itself is extremely microphonic and highly sensitive. You can check this yourself by flicking the cord itself when you are plugged in. He had been running the cord underneath the tailpiece and off the back of the guitar for aesthetic and practical reasons, but the pinch against the body by tucking it snugly under the tailpiece was introducing unwanted overtones and sound that interfered with his placement of the mic itself. Letting it hang freely improved the sound quite a bit. I suggested using a small amount of putty to secure the line off the soundboard of the guitar, and the putty would also carry some of the weight of the line so as to not affect the mic placement itself.
Don’t know if other similar soundboard mounted amplification tools suffer from the same problem. My sensor mic seems to not have this problem; I do tuck the cord under the tailpiece.
@Chiefbigeasy Judging by the list of preloaded IR presets, it's either piezzo or magnetic pickups. I don't know how these pickups that are marketed as contact mics are made but piezo is a form of contact microphone essentially. Either way I figure Jokko mic would work fine.
I did the internal mount and that pretty much removed any noise that would from accidentally knocking the cable. The surface noise is there but I don't find it a problem.
On its own it sounds like a blend of clean electric and piezo. Once he blended that with some sort of gritty electric sound, it was a usable sound overall nothing acoustic guitar about it.
Of course I could just add a cheapiezo just like Vic did but I don't want yet another bug on the guitar unless I can't help it.
Hey, NUX users! Are you using NUX power supply or something you had around the house already that fits?
I got this thing, plugged it in and all I get is garbled noise. Read some reviews where people described something similar and said using the NUX power supply fixed.
But it occurred to me I think the power adapter I grabbed from the pile might be 9V AC output instead of a DC. It still powers up and even connects to the software so I figured if it turns on it's good. I'll check on this tomorrow.
Edit; it was the wrong power supply indeed. It's working fine now.
I played with it a little bit today. I captured a few IRs. My main question is how do I make it sound more open and airy? There's a guy who did a shootout with every other similar pedal and NUX sounds the best to me here. His flattop sounds incredibly close to the mic.
I'll see what I can do to make it work better. I have a sound port on the guitar and just closing the sound port with my hand or leaving it open resulted in a different sounding IR.
To capture the IR I simply played open strings one by one. I don't think it needs anything else. I even think this might even be better way to feed it, it's like a baseline. But these two scenarios have a different sounding IR. And mic position makes a difference. Supposedly you want to err on a weaker side of input level.
Comments
More rabbit hole fodder!
Seriously, guess I’ll hold off until the new Tonedexter shows up. Some users suggest that the Tonedexter is more fussy about the mic you use to record sample, as opposed to the LR Baggs approach using the iPhone internal mic. Don’t know if they’re going to address that or not, and I wonder what’s up their sleeve otherwise.
Will NUX work well with a contact mic, specifically Manouche mic? I think the consensus in the past was a yes but I'd like to confirm this before get one.
Does NUX indicate on their website what pickups they like? Tonedexter has a long list of confirmed favorites, some that work with reservations, others they say don’t.
Interestingly, Tonedexter says they don’t like magnetic pickups, but LR Baggs say they do. I would not have thought that the IR technology would be that different between the two units, but who knows.
If I were to hazard a guess, I’d figure that the Manouche mic is a variation on a style of piezo, so if a piezo works with the NUX, so should the Manouche mic.
Of Interest to anyone who owns the Manouche mic: my bandmate owns one and has been having trouble with feedback and fidelity of sound. He discovered that the cord itself is extremely microphonic and highly sensitive. You can check this yourself by flicking the cord itself when you are plugged in. He had been running the cord underneath the tailpiece and off the back of the guitar for aesthetic and practical reasons, but the pinch against the body by tucking it snugly under the tailpiece was introducing unwanted overtones and sound that interfered with his placement of the mic itself. Letting it hang freely improved the sound quite a bit. I suggested using a small amount of putty to secure the line off the soundboard of the guitar, and the putty would also carry some of the weight of the line so as to not affect the mic placement itself.
Don’t know if other similar soundboard mounted amplification tools suffer from the same problem. My sensor mic seems to not have this problem; I do tuck the cord under the tailpiece.
Maybe there is a better video for our needs but the "magnetic" pickup in this vid does not leave me hopeful for using one with the Nux.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuwbdxX9MZs
www.scoredog.tv
@Chiefbigeasy Judging by the list of preloaded IR presets, it's either piezzo or magnetic pickups. I don't know how these pickups that are marketed as contact mics are made but piezo is a form of contact microphone essentially. Either way I figure Jokko mic would work fine.
I did the internal mount and that pretty much removed any noise that would from accidentally knocking the cable. The surface noise is there but I don't find it a problem.
On its own it sounds like a blend of clean electric and piezo. Once he blended that with some sort of gritty electric sound, it was a usable sound overall nothing acoustic guitar about it.
Of course I could just add a cheapiezo just like Vic did but I don't want yet another bug on the guitar unless I can't help it.
Hey, NUX users! Are you using NUX power supply or something you had around the house already that fits?
I got this thing, plugged it in and all I get is garbled noise. Read some reviews where people described something similar and said using the NUX power supply fixed.
Do you have anything else plugged in to the power supply? Other pedals can cause noise. Especially digital pedals.
Just that.
But it occurred to me I think the power adapter I grabbed from the pile might be 9V AC output instead of a DC. It still powers up and even connects to the software so I figured if it turns on it's good. I'll check on this tomorrow.
Edit; it was the wrong power supply indeed. It's working fine now.
I played with it a little bit today. I captured a few IRs. My main question is how do I make it sound more open and airy? There's a guy who did a shootout with every other similar pedal and NUX sounds the best to me here. His flattop sounds incredibly close to the mic.
I'll see what I can do to make it work better. I have a sound port on the guitar and just closing the sound port with my hand or leaving it open resulted in a different sounding IR.
To capture the IR I simply played open strings one by one. I don't think it needs anything else. I even think this might even be better way to feed it, it's like a baseline. But these two scenarios have a different sounding IR. And mic position makes a difference. Supposedly you want to err on a weaker side of input level.
More to come...