I have had many guitars through the years and I have always changed single coil pickups to humbuckers because I can't stand the noise. The humbuckers don't sound bad, just different, as you know. My two go-to guitars these days are a Mexi-Strat and a Players Tele (it's configured with three pickups like a Strat, with a 5 position switch) I installed Bill Lawrence blade type humbuckers in the neck and middle position and a Bill Lawrence mini humbucker in the bridge position on the Strat, and the Tele is still stock. I have recently put the single coil back in the neck position on the Strat because I like the sound of a single coil in that position. My question is, do any of you know if there is a truely noiseless single coil pickup available for the neck position on my Strat and the neck position on the Tele? (the Tele neck pickup is one of those typical Tele pickups with the silver metal cover and no height adjustment screws on the outside) I would like to put the other blade type humbucker on the Tele in the middle position, the bridge pickup on that guitar is already a humbucker which I can live with. I thought I would float this question to you guys in the hopes that one of you has tried one of these pickups and is happy with it.
fender noiseless is about as quiet as your gonna get. you will hear a ant fart over them any day lol. never have been a fan of bills.
The Dimarzio Area pickups are noiseless, and get a ton of praise. The Fender Noiseless pickups are cheaper, though.
It depends on what your doing which is increasing the hum/noise sound. a vintage strat into the vintage amp, is only making a small hum sound. its there but its hardly an issue. [have you noticed it's actually present with all notes too, in the sound of the notes] but if you play those pickups into a customizing amp, then the hum gets increased too. and this can be unbareable. fender noiseless really have no noise with their sound. seymour duncan's antiquities have much reduced noise but a tiny amount is still present. BUT that sound is AWESOME! quarter pounds have a tiny amount of hum like the other SD's. these pickups are very good. the fender texas specials have a much reduced hum compared to the vintage pickups. If you want the right sound, you gotta take the hum. just don't do strange things and blowup the hum to massive levels. if you add coils, you're changeing the notes. once you get into multi coils, then you're got a lot of stuff to listen too/ experience to learn. all of those dimarzio's are mid impedence models. sure they cut the hum but so do the fender noiseless' or gibson PAF. but they aren't mid impedence models, they're high impedence models. so the mid versions change EQ and gain. something you might not want. anything with a stacked coil, is gonna give you double notes too. have a listen to george throughergood, and 2005 era clapton and decide which sound you like more. personally the 'you talk to much' sound is way better even though it's got some minor hum associated with it. less hum more tone, then you go SD's. If you're gonna have a double note, then the gibson PAF type is hard to beat. but it won't fit in the guitar.
There are hundreds of noiseless singles. It depends on what kind of sound you want. Just do some googling. Seymour Duncan and Dimarzio makes some good ones, and they have sound clips too. There are also websites where they compare different makes. I had the L-45's made by Bill and Becky, but I didn't like them. I have some SCN's that sounded awful, but came alive with a 500K volume pot. That is mixed with a medium output humbucker that works well. My 2001 American Deluxe has Fender noiseless, but I have never found anything that matches their sound. Not even close. Apparently they were specially made for that guitar. One option, and it's a good versatile one...is to get the Clapton setup. Fender Vintage Noiseless with the active circuitry. You can dial in any sound you want and they are completely noiseless. It's a bitch to change the battery, but you don't have to do it very often. Just make sure you don't leave it plugged in. I've got some killer sounds out of those. Nothing gets the real sparkle of true singles, but you can get close.
Yup, I'm in the same boat, I hate the noise. I have the Area 58 in neck position on several Strats and like it a lot. The 67 is a little thinner in tone (good for middle), the 61 has more mids but can also be a good neck pickup when balancing with hotter/fatter bridge pickups. Lace Sensor Gold is another great noiseless single-ish pickup for neck position. As for blade pickups, I like wiring them in parallel, gives a more single coil style tone but still hum canceling. Duncan Hot Rails wired in parallel is my fav bridge pickup in single coil size, wired in series it's too muddy for me. YMMV... Here's one of my favorites, Hot Rails (parallel) bridge, Area 58 middle and neck:
I play all kinds of music, but specifically country, classic rock, blues, and Matt Mayr and Chris Tomlin stuff in church. I use several amps but the noise is present on all of them none any worse than the other. Not really chasing a tone, I just like the single coil sound particularly in the neck position, and I would like that in my "toolbox" without the noise. My main amp for work with a band is the MG100HCFX half stack. The problem really manifests itself during quiet passages and my workaround is to roll off the volume or switch to one of the buckers. The Fender noiseless with active circuitry sounds very interesting, I will check them out as well as the regular noiseless.
I have Fender Vintage Noiseless in my Clapton Strat. Love the tone and they are completely noiseless. Have Fender N3 Noiseless in my American Deluxe and think they sound great too. In my Jackson Soloist, I have the DiMarzio Virtual Vintage Heavy Blues II and Injector Neck. Both sound good and are noiseless. Prefer the tone of my Fenders though. DP [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhhH_t4_DvE[/ame]
Find an affordable noise gate, problem solved. If you want to get new pickups lace sensor gold are good and recently found the N3 pickups to be good too.
I've got noise gates on a couple of the pedal boards that I use, and I don't like using them. They work well but I have trouble finding a threshold level that I am comfortable with. I think at this point I'm leaning toward the lace sensors.
As long as you don't mind the modern look they sound great, I have one in the neck of one of my Strats and its been really good.
^This. I dig the noiseless P90s Duncan puts out, but have never heard a Fender type noiseless single coil that gives that gorgeous neck pickup tone available with a straight single coil. They're always a tiny bit strangled. The Decimator keeps it quiet in between tho. Cheers
