I know it's perverse and lazy... but I do quite fancy one of those auto-tuning thingies...

Drew_TNBD

Talking about the Tronical tuning system, or even an Evertune bridge. They just seem to be really damn handy.

But dayum have you seen the price of them?? £220 from Thomann for the Tronical thing.... Who in their right mind is going to pay for that?! I can understand when it comes as part of the guitar, but adding it on afterwards... just don't see it.

If it were £60-80, I'd do it. No questions asked! £220 though... I'll stick with my TU-3 thanks!

guitarfishbay

Evertune looks really useful.  Not managed to try it out though, neither Dawsons nor PMT had them in this month when I dropped in for a look at some stuff.  They come stock on some ESP/LTD guitars now, though being a lefty I guess you'll have even more trouble trying to find one in a shop to try out.

I don't like fancy tuners though I'd much prefer a regular tuner.  Tronical tuners only recommend up to a .56, stating thicker might damage them, which makes them unusable for me currently.  http://www.tronical.com/faqs/

It really doesn't take long to tune a guitar, and there are so many situations where the tronical system won't help - e.g. if you want to retune to record a specific chord more in tune, or if you want to tune to the attack of the note for a more aggressive section, as tuning the tension dead on must be the same as tuning to the decay.  If the tronical system can account for those things I'd be interested to know, but my understanding is that it can't.  Plus more weight on the headstock just doesnt' seem a good idea for a Gibson style guitar IMO.

Also if you have a tuning malfunction that won't save you any time at all.  There have been a couple of videos of people having trouble with them.

axisus

I'm considering getting one (Tronical) for my Taylor acoustic actually. I use different tunings and frankly it's a pain in the ass switching around, particularly when you use some tunings for just one piece! I started having a go at the acoustic version of Game of thrones last year, but in the end I got fed up of retuning just to learn the next bit.

I have no use for it on an electric guitar.

rlw

I have found the G-Force thingy on my LP really very helpful.  
Walk into room pick up guitar, press one button on the tuner, strum slowly and its in tune.

As opposed to
Walk into room, pick up guitar, strum, pluck string, tune string, pluck string again, tune a bit more, compare to next string, repeat five times.
It doesn't take long, agreed, but the other system is more accurate than my ears and just so damn quick and convenient.

And once you master it, open tunings and custom tuning are about four button pushes and a strum away, with going back to standard two button pushes away again.

It isn't 100% accurate but the luthier I spoke to this morning who had fitted one for a client remarked that 99 per cent of the time it was 99% accurate.

impmann

WezV

guitarfishbay said:

I don't like fancy tuners though I'd much prefer a regular tuner.  Tronical tuners only recommend up to a .56, stating thicker might damage them, which makes them unusable for me currently.  http://www.tronical.com/faqs/

 

Thats interesting.   It doesn't really tally up with Gibsons other "innovation" on these the 2015 models - the adjustable nut to allow for a greater range on setups, paired with tuenrs which allow less???

 

anyway, I have nothing against automatic tuning mechanisms, but they always come with a compromise. 

 

The evertune is brilliant, but it needs to be set-up right to feel normal.  bending is a compromise, but you can set up exactly how much of a compromise it is.  i.e.  you can set it so bends are nearly impossible, or that they only engage after you push a certain distance.  If you set it so bends are totally normal then you loose the benefits of the system.   You can change this relatively quickly just using the tuning pegs, they no longer affect tuning within a certain range.  that is still 6+ things to adjust  to change the way it plays

http://www.evertune.com/Bending/

 

for me it simply comes down to having too many moving parts - i like simplicity.  Would love to have chance to install and set-up one though,I have only had a quick play.   its on my list of fancy bridges to use at some point

Drew_TNBD

WezV said:

The evertune is brilliant, but it needs to be set-up right to feel normal.  bending is a compromise, but you can set up exactly how much of a compromise it is.  i.e.  you can set it so bends are nearly impossible, or that they only engage after you push a certain distance.  If you set it so bends are totally normal then you loose the benefits of the system.   You can change this relatively quickly just using the tuning pegs, they no longer affect tuning within a certain range.  that is still 6+ things to adjust  to change the way it plays

http://www.evertune.com/Bending/

Well that's talked me out of it! )

WezV

its a great feature really, you can set exactly how much tuning variance you will accept.   I just wish it was easier to turn it off and on

thankfully evertune are quite open about all this

 

 

They also offended my sensibilities by installing one on a vintage 335 as part of one of their early endorsements. 

steamabacus

WezV said:

its a great feature really, you can set exactly how much tuning variance you will accept.   I just wish it was easier to turn it off and on

Just a thought - if you had an Evertune AND Tronical loaded guitar, you could use the Tronical auto tuning to turn the Evertune tuning variance off and on. A bit OTT, maybe?

EricTheWeary

Someone on here has a tele style guitar built to take the Evertune - looks like a medieval torture instrument by itself but didn't look odd once it was built in. IIRC this was someone who saw themselves as a strictly rhythm player so it was set up to keep them in tune throughout a set however hard they mashed it.

ToneControl

I have 3 with evertune bridges. No problem at all with bends, you just tighten up to just below the end of the sweet spot

the setup is confusing though until you get the hang of it

if you go online, ebay usually, you can get the VGS ones from Austria and Italy pretty cheaply

you could do a Hendrix on one and have the body the wrong way to use as a lefty

the best one is this:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/E-guitar-VGS-Tobacco-Evertune-Bridge/dp/B005PWJBCG/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1424795214&sr=8-4&keywords=evertune

unless you go for the Tommy Denander Europe-made ones for about £2k

ToneControl

btw evertune offers the opposite to tronical:

takes a long time to set up for a string gauge and tuning, but then stays there

the robot-tuner ones will change tuning easily, but may drift out as you play, depending on the nut, trem, etc

btw do robot tuners work mid-song when a band is playing around you - I know that piezo tuners get confused if there is a lot of background music

ToneControl

oooh: new model:

http://www.gak.co.uk/en/esp-ltd-bw-1fm-et-stblk-ben-weinman-signature-with-evertune-bridge/93974

Sassafras

I'm afraid I zoned out when they started talking about zone 2.

With all those tuning gadgets there's just so much more that can go wrong with them than with a good set of ordinary pegs.

They wouldn't be much use to me because I don't use alternate tunings apart from when I'm playing slide, I find it hard enough to play standard tuning.

I'm quite happy with my old style Luddite tuners.

ICBM

Sassafras said:

I'm quite happy with my old style Luddite tuners.

I really like all Luddite hardware. I'd actually quite like to endorse it - I have it fitted to all my guitars.

It's consistently the most reliable, best-looking, lightest and probably sounds better too. I admit some of it does need a little bit of learning the 'knack' to getting the best performance out of it, but once you have you get the added benefit of that satisfied feeling of superiority.

ToneControl

manual gearboxes

Rocker

I too use the old style manual tuners, my Peterson StroboStomp set at 'sweetened' setting results in a guitar tuned as I like it. But I would like those auto tuner gadgets but the cost, €300 per guitar, is too high. €250 too high IMHO. Where are the Chinese manufacturers when you need them?

jeztone2

I wonder if someone will do a Tom Morello & turn the act of tuning into a musical signature & thus make everyone want such devices? I can sort of see if I was playing in a band with zillions of tunings it'd be useful. But for my current needs... Nah!

Sassafras

Life's too short, especially at my age, to go pissing around with things that are bound to go pear shaped.

I watched a 5 minute clip about those Evertune things. That's 3 hours I'm never going to get back.

Chalky

I never understood the fascination with manual gearboxes. Did a lot of early driving in my Dad's 3 litre Granada (for those who remember The Sweeney) with auto box and never looked back... >:D<

Sassafras

Big difference between robot tuners and a good blast in a Granada!