There’s a mixture of science and Mojo in miking up a guitar cabinet. As long as you have the time, space, and equipment available, it’s all part of the tone. However, unless we are setting up shop for a few weeks to record the new album, most of us are much more usually trying to get as much done as… Read More »Miking a Cab the Easy Way
USB was originally designed as a replacement for the various serial and parallel connectors for computer peripherals. Back in the mid 1990’s, portable computers were becoming more popular and the industry wanted a standard interface that used a smaller connector. As well as carrying data, USB also added the ability to carry power. A single cable could be used both… Read More »Choosing a USB Power Delivery Power Bank
I thought it would be a fun project to see if I could quickly and easily assemble a full pedalboard of tuner, distortion, delays, modulation, and reverb with a small footprint and for a low cost, just using parts I could get on Amazon Prime with a Mission 529 power supply. Here’s how I did. There’s a full Bill of… Read More »Building a Small Pedalboard
Some people believe that modern switching power supplies and DC-DC converters are noisier, and that using a traditional larger AC power supply is going to be quieter. Others think that using a battery and isolating the pedalboard from wall power is going to avoid AC noise, ground loops etc, and so this will be quieter. So, which is correct? To… Read More »Power Supplies: Which is More Quiet?
A digital multimeter (DMM) is an invaluable piece of equipment for any guitar player. One suitable for most guitar related duties will be under $20, and $90 will get a good one that should last a lifetime. Even if you are not particularly technically inclined, there are a number of simple multimeter tests that can save countless hours in set-up,… Read More »Multimeter: The Invaluable Tool
Here’s a quick challenge: You want to make the most dramatic change possible in both the look and sound of a guitar rig, but can only change one item. What do you choose? Hands up all those who said speaker cabinet. It may not have been the first thing that came to mind, but think about it. How much of… Read More »The Power of Speakers
You may not have thought about it, but when you turn a volume or tone knob on a guitar, or a setting on an effects pedal or amp, some complicated things happen. The little potentiometer that’s hiding behind the knob has some interesting properties. There are already some excellent articles on the web about how pots work, so there’s no… Read More »Of Pots and Tapers
In this blog post, we are going to take some different cables into the lab, and look at how they stack up in terms of some basic, measurable numbers. In our test, we have seven different cables varying in price from less than $6 to over $250. There are a variety of different core materials and jack plating’s, as well… Read More »Cables: Which Are Best?
When I was a kid learning about engineering and electronics, the magazines that we read in the pre-internet days were full of articles, projects, and kits promising hours of enjoyment and even the proposition of making money from my favorite pastime. Electronics kit building kind of fell out of favor during the computer age as the home based technology nuts… Read More »BYOP: Build Your Own Pedal
Ever wonder exactly what people mean by hard clipping and soft clipping? What exactly is modulation? How measurable are the differences between say, a Big Muff and a RAT? One of the neat things about multi-effect devices is they bundle many different effects into a single package, and with a few additional tools we can use them to visualize the… Read More »Playing With Effects