Another polyphonic sustainer option

themoonshook

themoonshook

Inspired
I'm not affiliated with the company, but this is very intriguing.

Aescher Europa

Ever since the Moog guitars hit the market I've been wanting to add that sustainer tech to my arsenal. It's a bit spendy though, roughly $740 USD. I'd like to see/hear a demo before pulling the trigger.

Anyone familiar with this?
 
The thing takes three 9V batteries? And from what I gathered from the instructions, you're supposed to just velcro the battery holder on to the back of the guitar? Well that sure sounds like it'd be comfortable. :| It briefly mentions in the manual an internally mounted model, but I couldn't find any information about it.

Yes, that is a horrible website. Horrible.

A polyphonic sustainer with on/off and normal/harmonic switches for each individual string sounds pretty cool to me. But I think I'll give that one a miss. Especially at that price.
 
I pulled the trigger!

I went for the internal D1i including the XL6i internal midi pickup option. Communications with Dorian has been great! My guitar is a 3 Humbucker guitar (see my avatar) and I decided to install the system in the middle humbucker cavity. He will build and integrate the system with BOTH the D1i resonator and the XL6i midi pickup as one unit!......and to fit within the middle humbucker pickup cavity. Their commitment to improvements and further innovation is described in the link below including using pure silver for some products. Their commitment to excellence is noteworthy:

http://www.aescher.eu/profile.htm

They can manufacture the products "custom" to individual needs with respect o size and colors.

From the site:
"Each unit is an art object handcrafted solely by the founder of AE. In contrast to ubiquitous mass produced products made in dehumanised outsourced factories throughout Asia - AE products are all meticulously handmade 1 at a time, by the same pair of craftsman hands, using the highest quality materials and components on earth. Every unit built to last a lifetime, the original SRG units made decades ago are still working perfectly. Unlike corporate factory made products, AE units can also be bespoke made to customer requirements, and optimised to a specific instrument, with any number of strings."[SIZE=-6]


[/SIZE][SIZE=-6].[/SIZE]Also, he offered me LIFETIME service and workmanship on my D1i.

His quote:

"Incidentally, your D1i will ship with a Lifetime warranty.
In the unlikely event of part failure - ever - you will get a replacement unit or parts at no cost.
Fortunately the oldest SRGs I built 20 years ago are still working perfectly and should last a lifetime. Cheers! Dorian"

You can't beat that!

I'll post a review when the products arrive and I complete install.
 
themoonshook

Another polyphonic sustainer option

It's a bit spendy though, roughly $740 USD
Click to expand...

Sorry for bumping this dead thread.. I couldn't resist adding to it.

The Moog Guitar and Vo96 are the only other truly polyphonic sustainers/resonators/exciters.. whatever you wanna call 'em.
The Moog Guitar is $3450 !!! and the Vo96 is $1500. !!! (the Vo96 only works on acoustic steel string guitars).

So 600. Euros is something of a cheap deal by comparison.

The Sustainiac and Fernandes are both monophonic sustainers (they have only 1 driver) even though they can drive all 6 strings,
there's no individual control of each string, as on the Moog Guitar, Vo96 and the polyphonic SRGs.

No sense comparing the price of bananas to machine guns.


DNW
The thing takes three 9V batteries? And from what I gathered from the instructions, you're supposed to just velcro the battery holder on to the back of the guitar? Well that sure sounds like it'd be comfortable. It briefly mentions in the manual an internally mounted model, but I couldn't find any information about it.
Click to expand...

I just checked out the specs.. the D1 unit has 6 drivers each pulling 500 mW. That's 3 Watt total!
A lot to ask from three 9v batteries. It should take six 9v batteries!

The manual says the kit also includes a 12 volt adapter, so... you can pretty much lose the batteries.

This thing has some pretty impressive custom options!


DNW
A polyphonic sustainer with on/off and normal/harmonic switches for each individual string sounds pretty cool to me. But I think I'll give that one a miss. Especially at that price.
Click to expand...

With that sort of attitude you will miss out on a lot of cool gear.


DNW

Yes, that is a horrible website. Horrible.


Knuckles

terrible website. Products are horribly expensive
Click to expand...

Rook

That has to be the worst website I have come across in quite some time. And wow, their Ebow (universal monophonic) knock off is 400 Euro?
Click to expand...

I can't believe all this whining about web design.. who the #@%$ gives a naff about webdesign?
Have you seen Sustainiac's website lately? LOL Their customers don't seem to mind :p
What the hell does that matter? it's the gear that Matters! right? well..am I Right?

Maybe you guys are all using Macs? The site seems to be set up for 1 (PC) display size.
It looks like Aescher Europa has "issues" with Apple, if you click on the apple slash logo ^^

I'm not sure if a seriously wide bass sustainer with 3 modes can be called an Ebow knock-off.
But the mono unit on the website is 250. Euros not 400.


I don't really see any problem with the website, but maybe it's been updated since you guys started moaning about it. :p

Cool demo vid!

 
I'm investigating this product. I have to agree that the website is abysmal. Product information is difficult to obtain. I've read the user manuals, and they too are abysmal.

Most of my questions are not answered on the site, or in the user manuals. Even the above video demo has horrendous audio, marred my excessive room reflections and poor equalization. The demo itself is awful, providing zero discussion of how the device is used and manipulated to achieve specific results.

I really want to learn more about this, but I am extremely turned off by the complete disregard for coherent product information. Why design and build such devices and completely drop the ball on marketing?
 
All their "marketing" seems to be in the form of forum spamming. I've seen it at various forums, where someone will start a thread going, "Oh look at this cool product I found." And then when everyone else goes, "I dunno, looks a bit shit. And what's with that website?!" or has any criticisms about the product, the OP suddenly gets really defensive. Like say, the mysterious "IanGalvin" above who signed up to make one post defending the product and the terrible website and has never posted again.

It's never, "Hey guys, I'm one of the guys who developed this thing that we think is pretty cool. Have a look, ask any questions, whatever." It's always the dodgy sneaking around pretending to be people not affiliated with the company. Even if the product didn't have some real impracticalities and the website wasn't horrible, the shifty forum spamming is enough to turn me off.
 
DNW said:
All their "marketing" seems to be in the form of forum spamming. I've seen it at various forums, where someone will start a thread going, "Oh look at this cool product I found." And then when everyone else goes, "I dunno, looks a bit shit. And what's with that website?!" or has any criticisms about the product, the OP suddenly gets really defensive. Like say, the mysterious "IanGalvin" above who signed up to make one post defending the product and the terrible website and has never posted again.

It's never, "Hey guys, I'm one of the guys who developed this thing that we think is pretty cool. Have a look, ask any questions, whatever." It's always the dodgy sneaking around pretending to be people not affiliated with the company. Even if the product didn't have some real impracticalities and the website wasn't horrible, the shifty forum spamming is enough to turn me off.
Click to expand...

Exactly my thoughts as well.
 
Not to defend these guys, but I have to say that after spending a career in electrical/software engineering, I have met one helluva lotta folks who are spooky smart but have no social skills whatsoever. Kinda leaves them out of the marketing field, since you have to have at least a few people skills to communicate effectively. Could be that's what's happening here. Guy invented something, but has all the charm and communication skills of an alligator. Not mean or angry or anything, just not cut out to win friends and influence people, and perhaps not aware of how necessary that is to sell a product.
 
Honestly this thing sounds awesome but looks like a major pain in the arse. This tech would need a completely different format and U/I for this to be remotely viable.
 
Cagey said:
Not to defend these guys, but I have to say that after spending a career in electrical/software engineering, I have met one helluva lotta folks who are spooky smart but have no social skills whatsoever. Kinda leaves them out of the marketing field, since you have to have at least a few people skills to communicate effectively. Could be that's what's happening here. Guy invented something, but has all the charm and communication skills of an alligator. Not mean or angry or anything, just not cut out to win friends and influence people, and perhaps not aware of how necessary that is to sell a product.
Click to expand...


+1 on that. Some of the smartest geeks I know, have the social skills of a cardboard box. Conversely, the life of the party, Herb Tarlic sleezy salesman types that could sell a refrigerator to an Eskimo, can't set the clock on a VCR.

Companies usually need both extremes in personalities and skills to be all things to all people.
 
Last edited:
Cagey is spot on with his views with Aescher Europa.

Dorian and his wife Emilia at Aescher have great communications and are prompt it is amazing. His responses are lightning fast...provided it during his timezone working hours of course.

My project guitar shown in my avatar actually is way more involved and intense beyond the norm and it definitely understandably is taking awhile. All the products he has done for that project is out of the norm with some custom options he was more than obliging to perform. We're almost done and he will send the items including pedal board shortly to install. I am not no superstar name guitarist in any respect....but he sure does make me feel this way....and treats me this way. :)

While he's finishing up the pedal board for that gtr project........I ended up having him make some other pickups for my 1980 GL Steinberger guitar which I am also in the process of doing another total customizing makeover on. 2 pickups....1 for the neck and one for the bridge and also a Midi Hex pup. This way I don't lose any downtime during install on my Bergeron gtr (avatar) and would have one of my favorite guitar (Steinberger) ready for shows.

The parts for the Steinberger arrived a couple days ago here:

Arrived Aug. 27th, 2015









Here's the Hex Midi pups including 13pin connections and jack.







I'm in the process of testing the pups.
 
I think it's a shame that the website is so horrendously horrible. One week of collaboration with a good web developer could transform it into something worth navigating. The demo videos could be redone in short order to effectively demonstrate the units' potential and operation, and with better audio quality that doesn't sound like they are in a bathroom.

Seriously; a huge amount of time and effort obviously was spent designing and producing these products. The poor website and user manuals indicate to me that either they have too much business to deal with already (good for them, bad for customers); or they are painfully ignorant of just how bad their information is (bad for customers); or they just don't care (bad for customers). In the end, which one is actually the case is irrelevant from my perspective.

Why do I care? I'm genuinely interested in learning more. But I have limited time, patience, and budget. For a niche product this expensive, I am leery of purchase given the inadequate information, poor web design, poor manuals, and nebulous ordering process. My guess is they are small-volume and have as much work as they can handle, leaving no time or incentive to improve their marketing tools. If so, good for them.
 
Am I missing something, or is this just a high dollar, more complicated version of the Sustaniac pickup system? I have that in my Schecter Banshee Elite 7 FR/S and can do the same things shown in that video with it.

Sustaniac Stealth Pro Overview
 
OK? Palm or other style of muting while fretting the desired strings.

Still not clear on this systems benefits. To each their own and more power to 'em. Competition in the market space always benefits the consumer.

Foot control option might be nice though. I'll concede to that point.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom