Help Needed with Eliminating Buzz/Hum in New Apartment

The problem doesn't exist when there's nothing connected to the input jack, and it's there when something is plugged into it, and it's there like crazy when your guitar is plugged in. That means it's an interference issue—crud is getting into your guitar. You can chase ground problems all day, but grounding isn't the problem, and solutions like Ebtech, which only address ground issues, aren't going to help.

And if you're hearing a buzzing (as opposed to hum), it's always interference—again, grounding isn't the problem.


You need to find the source of the interference. Start turning stuff off all over the house; shutting off entire circuits at once at the circuit breaker will help speed up the process. If the source is in your house, you'll eventually find the culprit.

And if you have those newfangled "curly" florescent bulbs, they are almost certainly giving you grief. They're noisy as hell.
 
Perhaps the computer monitor is closer to you now. Monitors will interact with guitar pickups or you might have a light/lamp too close to your guitar. If you stand far away does the issue go away?
 
The problem doesn't exist when there's nothing connected to the input jack, and it's there when something is plugged into it, and it's there like crazy when your guitar is plugged in. That means it's an interference issue—crud is getting into your guitar. You can chase ground problems all day, but grounding isn't the problem, and solutions like Ebtech, which only address ground issues, aren't going to help.

And if you're hearing a buzzing (as opposed to hum), it's always interference—again, grounding isn't the problem.


You need to find the source of the interference. Start turning stuff off all over the house; shutting off entire circuits at once at the circuit breaker will help speed up the process. If the source is in your house, you'll eventually find the culprit.

And if you have those newfangled "curly" florescent bulbs, they are almost certainly giving you grief. They're noisy as hell.

Yep, seems to be the case with me. Thanks for heads up.

As you stated, the Hum X didn't fix the issue in my new place. The good news though -- it did clear up a grounding issue at my local church :D.
This little thing is quite the voodoo magic.

I'll keep looking around. Last resort, I'll just have to shield up my guitar -- something I want to try out in the future anyway. It just looks like such a tedious task :ambivalence:.

I got some more questions though, for anyone who has had 'light' issues causing interference:
Now I'm not all that smart with electrical doodads, but do dimmer lights only spit out gunk while they're on? Half on? Not on at all?
And how 'effective' are dimmers and fluorescent's though walls?
I ask this because, my old place had dimmers, but they were a good 30ft away, and didn't have any (noticeable) effect.
 
...do dimmer lights only spit out gunk while they're on? Half on? Not on at all?
And how 'effective' are dimmers and fluorescent's though walls?
I ask this because, my old place had dimmers, but they were a good 30ft away, and didn't have any (noticeable) effect.
Most dimmers, when turned all the way off, are not noisy. They're usually loudest when turned partially on. Usually not affected much by walls, though increasing the distance from them will reduce the problem.
 
Dimmers dim the lights by shunting power to ground. This causes "noise". Noise is unwanted voltage. Noise is worse when the dimmers are partially on. Usually they don't cause as much noise when totally off or totally on.
 
Dimmers dim the lights by pulsing the power rapidly on and off (that's what causes the interference noise). If they shunted power to ground, that would be a short, and the resulting light show would be spectacular, catastrophic and brief. :)

strat714 is right in that the interference is worst when the lights are partially dimmed.
 
Question for the EMI experts: its been a looong time since I wrote AT&T's Best Practices for Electromagnetic Compatibility with the help of a team of Bell Labs' EMC/EMI technical experts ... but is dimmer interference from radiated interference or interference that is conducted onto the AC power lines.

I would have thought it was conducted interference, but the OP says no noise when his guitar was not plugged in. That makes me think this was a case of radiated interference. Or maybe the AXE filters out any conducted noise going into the power supply?
 
Question for the EMI experts: its been a looong time since I wrote AT&T's Best Practices for Electromagnetic Compatibility with the help of a team of Bell Labs' EMC/EMI technical experts ... but is dimmer interference from radiated interference or interference that is conducted onto the AC power lines.

I would have thought it was conducted interference, but the OP says no noise when his guitar was not plugged in. That makes me think this was a case of radiated interference. Or maybe the AXE filters out any conducted noise going into the power supply?


From what I've been reading up, I believe it can be a case of both. See article:
http://www.lutron.com/TechnicalDocumentLibrary/360484.pdf

This makes me wonder if the wiring in my house is lined up with anything 'toxic' from my neighbors -- since I'm living in an apartment/townhouse... I hope not :ambivalence:.


And just to clarify, with the TS cable is plugged in, but no guitar, ( AXE -> TS Cable -> nothing ), I still get attack of the killer bees.
With nothing plugged in, I get silence.
(And obviously, there's still noise with the guitar plugged in).
 
Dimmers kick out RFI. They also can put some noise on the power line, but if you have gear that's susceptible to RFI, it's the RFI that'll get you. People are quick to point to "dirty power" when there's audible crud, but power isn't the usual suspect.
 
Theres some good information in that article. Also some wrong information. Example: the article states that shielded mic cables will reduce conducted RFI. It won't.


This makes me wonder if the wiring in my house is lined up with anything 'toxic' from my neighbors...With nothing plugged in, I get silence.
(And obviously, there's still noise with the guitar plugged in).
This means it's radiated RFI, not your power. If the problem was your power, you'd still get noise when you unplugged your guitar cable (think about it :) ).
 
This means it's radiated RFI, not your power. If the problem was your power, you'd still get noise when you unplugged your guitar cable (think about it :) ).

:distant: 'goes to show how great I am at putting 2-2 together. Makes sense!

So, granted I can't find the source; then I assume the only 'fix' is to shield the guitar and find a cold spot somewhere in the house to play in?
How drastic of an improvement do people normally see with shielding a humbucker? I'm sure it helps plenty with single coils, but given the nature of humbuckers,
will there really be a big improvement, assuming the environment is noisy enough to effect one without shielding?
 
Shielding will help, but it's no substitute for tracking down the source and killing it. If the interference is objectionable through a humbucker, the problem is pretty severe.

Shielding guitar cavities is still a pretty good idea, though.
 
I guess that's my next weekend project! Thanks for all the help Rex.

On second note, while I was trying to redial the gate on the Axe, my friend suggested I try using the Intelligent algo.
I didn't even know it existed! It really helped with a few of my high gain patches.
 
I guess that's my next weekend project! Thanks for all the help Rex.

On second note, while I was trying to redial the gate on the Axe, my friend suggested I try using the Intelligent algo.
I didn't even know it existed! It really helped with a few of my high gain patches.
Hey KaLam1ty, did you ever fix your problem? I'm having the same issue. When I turn my guitar just right, the interference goes away, but it's there most of the time.
 
Here are my symptoms:
  • NO Guitar and NO TS Input 1 Cable Plugged in = NO BUZZ
  • NO Guitar WITH TS Input 1 Cable Plugged in = BUZZ (This Buzzing stops if I touch any grounded part of the TS Cable, including a cable from inserted into a headphone jack. Wierd.)
  • Guitar with TS Input 1 Cable Plugged in = LESS BUZZ (But doesn't go away if I touch any grounded part of TS Cable).
  • With Guitar plugged in, I get more or less buzzing when tilting/moving the guitar around. Sounds like interference?

Given these particular symptoms, the one that stands out for me is the part where the buzzing stops when you contact a grounded part.

This strongly suggests that your ground connection (via the AC outlet) is floating. Touching a ground point with your body siphons off some of the leakage currents that should be going down the power cord's ground wire; that's why the hum reduces or stops.

Before you invest in a bunch of speculative fixes, spend $5 on one of those outlet testers. I'm talking about the little widget that has a 3-prong plug and 3 lights; you plug it into the outlet and compare the lights against the legend that's printed on the widget or its packaging.

If the tester shows an open ground connection, fix that. (Call your landlord or an electrician if you don't know how.)
 
Hey Guys,

I recently settled in a new place, which seems to be giving me issues with my sound!
I don't have a lot of smarts in the the field of routing, but was wondering if you guys could help me eliminate the hum issue I'm having.

I live in Chicago, and let's just say that most apartments here were wired a long time ago by people who were high on <insert drug here>. I've had the same issue in a couple apartments. It's also a symptom of living in a city with a lot of questionable wiring from ComEd.

A couple quick questions to diagnose:
  1. Are you on the 2nd floor of your building? This can put you on the same plane as the mains lines and transformers in your neighborhood.
  2. Have you tested the ground lug of your power with an outlet checker? http://www.homedepot.com/p/Gardner-...ter-GFI-3501/202867890?keyword=outlet+checker
  3. Does the hum go away if you touch the strings on your guitar? Sometimes your body can act as an antenna, and the guitar can ground YOU out.
Another thing you can do to check for AC interference is get a cheap stud finder from Home Depot that has built in AC checking. If you press the button in the middle of your room and get the AC alarm, it's entirely likely something is incorrectly wired in that room. I had an issue in my current apartment where some madman screwed up the wiring and had AC voltage running through my radiator (which I found out by electrocuting myself, which was NOT fun).

If, as you say, the hum varies depending on where you point the guitar, I'm fairly positive this is AC interference, either from the room itself, or from a poorly-shielded switching transformer in your neighborhood. My last apartment had a transformer right outside my studio, and it was CRAZY noisy. A switching transformer (especially an overloaded one) is a nightmare since it will basically be arcing back and forth at 60hz, and that generates a lot of nastiness that humbuckers can't fix.

This is a sucky conclusion, because it means there's not much you will be able to do about it short of building a Faraday cage around your room, or moving somewhere else. Strong AC will still get past humbuckers, and things like the Ebtech HumX will not solve the problem since they're designed to fix ground noise issues. Shielding in a guitar also won't make a difference since that blocks RF, not EMI.

The only things you can do are to set some aggressive noise gate settings and try to point your guitar in the direction with the least hum.

On a side note, with my last apartment I did find that the ZexCoil pickups were able to shield me from just about all noise. They were very impressive. The only challenge I had with them is I wasn't fond of their tone, but that's more of a preference thing rather than a testament to their quality.
 
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