NGD: Acoustasonic Tele

Lewy

victorludorum said:

So is the pickup passive on this? Could it just be run straight out into an amp?

Everything is hooked into the digital preamp, although the magnetic pickup is a N4 which is passive. When it’s on its “clean” voice I’m not sure how much processing versus straight-out is happening. 

bluechargeboy

Thanks for the updates @Lewy! Glad it seems to be doing the trick.

I'm still highly intrigued by these. I love dreadnoughts but I'm not that big and they give me terrible posture!!

crunchman

Lewy said:

victorludorum said:

So is the pickup passive on this? Could it just be run straight out into an amp?

Everything is hooked into the digital preamp, although the magnetic pickup is a N4 which is passive. When it’s on its “clean” voice I’m not sure how much processing versus straight-out is happening. 

If the preamp dies, then I guess you could strip it out, and run the passive pickups out to something else.  The other thing is what battery the preamp uses.  I know it's low current, but even then a rechargeable battery might have a finite life span.  Is it something standard that could easily be replaced?

I don't know if @MattFGBI would have any of the answers.

Lewy

crunchman said:

Lewy said:

victorludorum said:

So is the pickup passive on this? Could it just be run straight out into an amp?

Everything is hooked into the digital preamp, although the magnetic pickup is a N4 which is passive. When it’s on its “clean” voice I’m not sure how much processing versus straight-out is happening. 

If the preamp dies, then I guess you could strip it out, and run the passive pickups out to something else.  The other thing is what battery the preamp uses.  I know it's low current, but even then a rechargeable battery might have a finite life span.  Is it something standard that could easily be replaced?

I don't know if @MattFGBI would have any of the answers.

I’d say yes to the battery - it looks like a standard one and is very accessible. One thing to note is that the preamp must be fairly hungry because play time on a charge is 20 hours, compared to 200 hours you get in a charge for Fishman’s Fluence pickups. 

My assumption is the same as yours regarding the pickups . If the preamp itself becomes obsolete/irreplaceable then all three pickups (a standard UST, a body sensor and the mag pickup could all be hooked up to something else. There’s plenty of room inside the hollow body to stick pretty much anything in there. 

crunchman

Strat version now available:

Slightly different switching options

Nikc

Nice write up - I can see the appeal especially to a gigging solo artist. Using one of these with a looper into a PA would be interesting. 

MattFGBI

crunchman said:

Lewy said:

victorludorum said:

So is the pickup passive on this? Could it just be run straight out into an amp?

Everything is hooked into the digital preamp, although the magnetic pickup is a N4 which is passive. When it’s on its “clean” voice I’m not sure how much processing versus straight-out is happening. 

If the preamp dies, then I guess you could strip it out, and run the passive pickups out to something else.  The other thing is what battery the preamp uses.  I know it's low current, but even then a rechargeable battery might have a finite life span.  Is it something standard that could easily be replaced?

I don't know if @MattFGBI would have any of the answers.

We can supply replacement batteries. 

impmann

Everyone is so worried about whether or not it’ll still be working in 10 years time.
Most of those same folks struggle to keep guitars for 10 months... ;-)

(For the record, I just set up a Variax v500 from 2004. Still working perfectly... Old Modelling doesn’t necessarily mean obsolete)

Lewy

Had the chance to properly road test the Acoustasonic Tele this weekend at Swanage blues festival...6 sets over two days. Observations:

• As much as a hybrid as this guitar is, the physics of string gauge and set up do dictate that you need to pick a primary role - do you want it to be an acoustic that does electric or vice versa? I had gone in with trying to find a compromise with .011s and wished I had just gone with proper acoustic gauge strings and dealt with having to work a bit harder on the electric bits. When I was playing with energy on the acoustic numbers things were getting a bit plinky in the thin top string. And I also popped it out of the nut a few times (string tree will be going on as a matter of urgency)
• The acoustic sounds really are good at gig levels. It is weird to not be getting any real acoustic feedback from the guitar though. Made me realise when I plug in my Collings how much I’m still hearing the instrument as opposed to just what’s coming out of the PA/monitors (probably goes for everyone less than 15 feet away too)
• For the acoustic sounds, I was going via Flint and El Cap into my AER Compact 60 which worked very nicely. For Electric, same signal path but after a Broadcast going into a Torpedo CAB M. Certainly made the AER sound and behave like an electric amp. The electric sounds of the Acoustasonic are undeniably compressed sounding. It works for what I want, but I would say that if you want that primary role to be an electric that does some acoustic, I think that ever-present compression would get on your tits after a while. There should be an option to have the magnetic pickup going straight out and bypassing the onboard preamp/modelling I reckon, if they really want electric players to buy into these.
• Overall, for what I wanted the concept was solidly proven though. I took backup guitars but they stayed in their cases. Won’t be showing up in the Classifieds any time soon!

Snags

Clearly they are a Swanage Blues Festival afflication   The chap who runs one of the local open mics acquired one a few weeks back, and is also a Swanage regular (although unless you're him, I'm fairly sure he took "real" Tele's this time).

He's been busting out the acousticaster at the open mic though, and it does sound good. I blagged it for a song where I needed to play 'lead' to someone else's rhythm and it's certainly very playable, albeit a bit weird mentally with the lack of acoustic noise. If I could get the Strat electronics in the Tele body with a different top and at half the price I'd be straight in there

TimmyO

Nice write up 

crunchman

Lewy

crunchman said:

Something very interesting in there at the end which is they both seem to allude to the appetite for being to import different models. I’d bloody love the ability to do that, or even just to move the existing models around to more convenient switch positions. It must be doable. Fender have no plans though (I emailed and asked and that’s the response I got...you never know, but nothing planned).

If Fender don’t do it, hopefully someone will hack one of these things at some point.

Jez6345789

I am certainly tempted and worry little about obsolete digital aspect people go on about as said my Variax is still going strong 15 years later. Yeah stuff dies and wears out.

I would like a bit more electric ability on the Strat but I think they are going to be a good seller. 

rossi

Looks like I will have to wait for the Harley Benton original .

menamestom

I still like the look of these, I like the idea of simple plug and play, reduced feedback and a good plugged in sound.

Not as into the electric sounds, I think the sound is too far away from the acoustic sound.  Could have done with a big open pickup like a P90, standard tele pickup of even filtertron type.  I guess they had aesthetics to consider.

Saying that I’d probably just use the acoustic side anyway.  Currently playing in a blues due with a harp player, the tele would fit the bill nicely.

crunchman

I tried one (the Tele version) the other week.  The plugged in acoustic sounds are very good.  Not so sure about the electric sounds though.  That might be tweakable though.

Lewy

crunchman said:

I tried one (the Tele version) the other week.  The plugged in acoustic sounds are very good.  Not so sure about the electric sounds though.  That might be tweakable though.

Depends on what you didn’t like about the electric sounds...if it’s the compression then I haven’t found a way of doing anything about that. If it’s the quite middly tone then I’ve been able to tweak that with EQ. But they still won’t do a big open twang if that’s what you are looking for.

crunchman

Lewy said:

crunchman said:

I tried one (the Tele version) the other week.  The plugged in acoustic sounds are very good.  Not so sure about the electric sounds though.  That might be tweakable though.

Depends on what you didn’t like about the electric sounds...if it’s the compression then I haven’t found a way of doing anything about that. If it’s the quite middly tone then I’ve been able to tweak that with EQ. But they still won’t do a big open twang if that’s what you are looking for.

They didn't have a PA type speaker to plug into when I tried it.  I suspect that the electric sounds would be better through my QSC 10.2, or through a proper PA, than through an acoustic amp.

If not, then it could probably be made better with some kind of eq pedal.

Strat_a_tat_tat

@Lewy ;
Just wondering how you're getting on with your acoustasonic, after a few more months of use (but probably not many gigs in the world of Covid!).  Still delivering the goods for you with regard to acoustic tone?
Thanks