Hexaphonic Pickups?

[rsf1977_again]

I'm looking to get into hexaphonic pickups. I was wondering which ones are considered the best and what people are using for rack sound modules? I'm mostly interested in piano and organ sounds.

 

[Roland]

The Roland GK is the market leader for magnetic hex pickups. The closer you can get the pickup to the bridge the better the tracking. I used one for years, and then switched to using piezos and a Graphtech Hexpander circuit because I found it even better. For sounds I've always used GR-33, it does the analogue/digital conversion and sound generation in one box. There are other, better sounding, modules. You can also look at separate ADC and sound modules, and but I was always worried about introducing midi latency.

 

[dpavel]

Roland GK 3

 

[Dancing Frog]

I have used both a built in Graphtech Ghost system with a Hexpander and the Roland GK-3. They both seem to perform equally well. I think how well they do is really dependent on the underlying guitar. My experience is the guitar that is less resonant is better for synth applications. You seem to get less tracking errors. I use a GR-33 for most synth applications, but I have been toying with GR-55 for other applications. I think Roland Guitar products have been going backwards the last few design cycles. Roland dropped the subsonic filtering circuits in VG-99 and GR-55 which resulted in tracking issues, so you need a Filter/Buffer box with subsonic filtering to correct that problem.