Learn Guitar Tabs

I am trying to record using Amplitube 3… i plug in my guitar direct to the PC’s input using an audio adapter but the hissing sound and the latency is not tolerable… can anyone advise me?

If you ask me, the best way for you to remove the latency and the hissing sound is to upgrade your sound card. The input coming from your guitar is too hot and the normal sound card of a PC will not be able to handle it. An external audio device interface such as Behringer UCG 102 or Alesis Guitar link is a good starting point. If you have more funds, try going for the M-Audio Fast Track and see better results. Good luck!

I know the hollow body of the 335 generally gives it a warmer tone.. but the low end is near in-audible..

are there any tweaks i can make with pickup height, string gauge etc that will help?
(Ive done amp settings, makes it a little better, but i think the issue is the guitar now)

Cheers

Thicker gauge strings will accentuate the bass. Thinner strings will have less boom. As far as settings, obviously the bridge pickup has more twang than the neck pickup. The closer the pickup is to the strings, the stronger signal it will produce. If you want more or less bass response, move that side of the pickup up or down accordingly. You can also move the individual pole screws on the pickup in or out. Take care not to adjust the pickup too close…the magnetic field of the pickup can damp the sustain of the string. When you press the strings on the highest frets, the closest distance should be the thickness of a coin.

If that doesn’t do it for you, you could always consider a phase/polarity switch.

Nice guitar BTW

it’s a PLEK machine. I am not surprised you idiots had no CLUE.

PLEK, and F you too!

It’s an Epiphone, the guitar will need bridge adjustment as well as truss rod adjustment, i tried doing it my self but i don’t know what the f**k im doing. looking for a general cost for the adjustments and strings. thanks!

I usually pay $30 – $40

I just got a new 60th anniversary Strat yesterday. It rocks, but theres just a few problems. One, sometimes i have some fret buzz. The other two problems are with the tremolo. One is taht when i use it the guitar goes slightly out of tune. Not much, but its enough for some people to notice. (Some strings get higher) The second is that when i just use the tremolo without playing any strings theres a noise coming from the g string. I’m pretty sure its just that the strings are terrible (I havent pu the ones I use on yet) but im not sure. Does anyone know how to fix any of these problems, or should i just bring it in to guitar center?

I would NOT take it to Guitar Center. Find an established luthier in your area —with ELECTRIC guitar experience— and pay them a few bucks to do it right. It’d be great if you could watch them so you could make minor adjustments in the future. It’d be even better if you could be there so they could discuss your playing style with you and make sure they set it up to your liking. No substitute for a beautifully set-up guitar… You’ll LOVE it! Best wishes!

It’s a Epiphone les Paul standard and I want to have one pick up made for metal and leave my other stock pick up in. But I don’t know which side is right for playing metal. I am a beginner (8 months) but I want a better and heavier sound. So would it be the side by the bridge or by the neck/fret board?

Also any suggestions on pick up brands to get for metal?

Wearing the guitar with a strap around your shoulders and looking down at the pick-ups, you’d want to keep the pickups on the right (closest to the bridge) and use the one pickup on the left to replace with your choice of pickup.

Ask you local music dealer what he recommends (and has in stock) for pickups ideally suited to metal playing.

From as little as a couple hundred bucks for a student guitar (Squier bullet) and 10w practice amp – to rigs that cost as much as a new car. You can spend as little or as much as you want.

If you had $1000-1200 to spend on guitar/case a good amp and maybe a stomp box or two – you would have a lot of choices for gear that is plenty good enough to play gigs with. Hope that helps

I was told that I should buy a direct box to get rid of the buzz my guitar makes because of band ground on my electricity. So I ordered one and I was just wondering where do I put it. Does it go Guitar>Direct Box>Effects Board>Amp or like Guitar>Effects Board>Direct Box>Amp what do you do/recommend?
Band ground was a mistype I meant BAD =)

gtarczar pretty much covered the bases. While I use my DI box as a bit of a ‘boost’ effect when placed between my bass & the amp, generally they’re meant to used in place of an amp. You plug into the box & then plug the box into the house P.A. system. The better boxes have controls that let you shape your overall sound that you’ll have coming out of the house P.A.

I even used one when recording, pluging into the DI box and then plugging the box into the computer. Initially I’d plugged the head directly into a mixer that fed into the computer that was doing the recording but a buzz was unmistakenably present. We switched to the DI-box-to-mixer setup & presto! the buzz was gone

I’m planning on getting a Fender HSS standard strat with a Line 6 Spider IV modeling amp. Is this a good setup if I want to get a decent range of mostly rock sounds? I’d like for some sounds to be really specific and spot-on, especially for some green day songs, but really I just want something I can monkey around with. So yeah… is that a good setup?

thanks!

Hello there,

That could be a pretty good rig. I like the Fender Standard Strat. The HSS does give you a little more flexibility. Line 6 Spider amps come in several different sizes. I don’t care for the little 15 watt one. It has the same fault as most other small practice amps, an 8 inch speaker that makes you sound thin and tinny. The 30 watt 1×12 is a much better sounding version and makes a really good beginner amp. The Fender Mustang II 40 watt 1×12 is about the same price with a little more power and more features. You might want to check it out before you buy. It is not that the Spider is a bad amp. I like the Spider and have a 2×12 version. But I think the Mustang II is a little better than the Spider 30 watt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOui83Gh9zs

Later,

Hey I’ve been playing acoustic guitar for quite a while and want to try out electric now. I’m thinking about getting an epiphone les paul because of its relatively cheap price and close similarity to gibsons.

I was told that this guitar would have to be set up before i play it. What does this set up include? Strings? Pickups? Wiring? How should i get it set up? Thankyou for your answers! =]

All guitars should be set up when you buy them.

A setup changes the string height (action) so that it’s comfortable to play, changes the length of the string via the bridge tuners to make sure that it is in tune with itself all the way up the neck (intonation), and may involve adjusting the truss rod if necessary to keep the neck itself straight.

A setup does not necessarily have to include new strings or changing pickups or even changing pickup height – although I prefer to get new strings, surely. New strings do change tension over time, so if your strings start buzzing a few days after a setup, then bend them out a little more… or ask the tech while you’re there how you should maintain your strings, that’s probably the best way to go.

I recommend GHS Fast Fret, its a string lubricant that helps your fingers slide along the strings a lot easier – helps get rid of string squeak, and seems to keep strings living longer, too. Good stuff. Other string lubes include Guitar Honey and some other stuff I can’t remember.

I would swap your pickups out until you know what you want, just guessing can be bad times. Get used to how your guitar sounds, so you can make an educated guess, or go to your tech and say "my guitar plays well, but I’d like some more bass" or "I want better distortion" or something like that. If your guitar naturally doesn’t have a lot of bass, for instance, you’d want to get a pickup that has more bass (technically, has more bass response, since pickups are basically filters, so a pickup that filters out less bass) to balance that out. For better distortion, usually you want a hotter pickup. Your tech should be able to suggest something for you… don’t just ask the guy at the Guitar Center counter, he may not know what he’s talking about, and don’t just get the pickups that your favorite guitar player uses, your guitar/amp/signal chain is probably nothing like theirs, so it really won’t help you all that much.

You can learn how to do your own setup, but I strongly strongly strongly! urge you to have it done professionally the first few times so you know what it feels like and how it sounds, that way you know what to expect when you do it.

And yes, Epiphone is a great brand, I think they’re very good quality. Try to play two or three different models, though, I’ve heard the Les Pauls and SGs are different, and you may prefer how one feels (I think one has a heavier neck) versus the other one.

Saul