clay-man

You guys realize you can STILL go wireless by using a wireless system, you just can't do the POD stuff, and you need to use the battery.

Pretty sure going out of business without returning your guitar is theft, regardless.

Very true. You have a problem and it keeps showing up like once a month and you can't recreate it, so you can't send your guitar in and be like "hey fix this" when they can't find it.

The ribbon should lead up to a board somewhere on the bridge. Like I said, if one end is hanging out while the other end is in, it could very well cause a whole side of the guitar to not work. Are all the strings on the same side or is it just random strings that don't work? Like if it's EAD not working, or GBE not working, then it's 99% probably a ribbon cable sticking out on one side. If it's a bunch of random strings all over the guitar that don't work, then that points out to piezos going out. How long have you had this guitar? Did you just get it? If so, I'd talk to the sales person and ask for a replacement and let them handle fixing the old guitar.

Yeah 3 strings dead sounds like a cable is loose. If the strings are all on the same side, chances say that one of those ribbon cables has one side partly out of the socket

A good laptop, low latency audio interface, a good DAW, and of course, the software. I play stream my guitar through my DAW using Virtual Audio Cable and ASIO4all.

The thing that turns the Variax on is a closed circuit. A 1/4 jack will push a prong against another prong to do a close circuit that tells the Variax to turn on. Technically he could solder the 2 points together with a switch in the middle to turn the guitar on and off manually without a cable.

That's cool, but do the regular jacks still work?

How does that work? An extra output or does it replace the original? If it's the latter, how do you get a bypassed tone? Did you say you screw back the cover? Because I'd freak the lollipop out if I had to go around with my guitar's electronics cavity open all the time, you could end up shorting your guitar if something gets in there.

There's no way that the custom knobs shouldn't be working with the tuning selector unless something is messed up with your guitar. Also, why would you be disappointed in the mags not getting pitch shifting? It's the normal analog half of the guitar. The whole point of adding magnetics to the new lines of Variax guitars was to have a side of the Variax that completely functions like a normal guitar, so people can use it completely normal like any other guitar. To throw the mags through processing would defeat being able to play the guitar without a battery. If you want alternative tunings, just use the modeling.

The whole reason alt tuning is possible is because of the separate piezo stings. You cannot tell a processor to weed out each note and pitch it accordingly, because a processor doesn't know which note belongs to which string, because many of the strings can play the exact same note. With 6 piezo pickups, it splits each string to it's own channel, allowing it to be fed through 6 pitch shifters, one per string, which is how the alternate tuning works.

it should work. It works fine for me. All tunings except model should work on every model or pickup selection exactly the same, while the "model" slot on the tuning knob should bring up whatever tuning you programmed on workbench on the guitar model you're currently playing on the guitar. Basically uses the old Variax 300/500/600/700 setting of setting up custom tunings when you put the tuning knob on "model" label, and anything past "Standard" are the tunings you programmed on the tuning knob banks that will apply to ALL models on the guitar, INCLUDING custom bank 1 and 2.

They definitely are NOT noise free. Noisiest guitar I have, or maybe on level with my Tele, but I can't remember. Noise goes away on 2 and 4 but I assume that's because they're wired to cancel hum.

What is the point of buying a digital guitar if you think digital is inferior to pure analogue?

That's Autotune, it would be pretty dumb if one of the top leaders in pitch shifting technology could not produce a superb pitch shifter for their modeling guitar. The only REAL problem with the JTV's alt tuning is the warble. Other than that, the whole crosstalk thing has absolutely nothing to do of the quality of the alternate tunings, and is a limitation from piezos and physics. The Variax alternate tuning, disregarding ATG, is better than stomp box pitchers I've heard, because of one big thing: Natural tonality/formant/timbre preserve. I've said it multiple times. It's not completely perfect, but it's there, and it helps tighten up most of the low tunings, and makes most of the higher tunings not nasally. I've got a morpheus droptune which was supposed to be a famous pitch shifter, and yet the Variax pulls of a more convincingly natural sounding pitch shift, because it has formant preserve, though to an extent.

Really??? When did 1 person's post become a huge determining factor of what holds back the Variax? I mean, yes, it does technically hold it back, but in a huge array of applications, the alternate tuning is superb. I've said this over and over, the alternate tuning tone-wise is far superior than any pitch shifter pedal out on the market for guitars.

Crosstalk is what happens when vibrations from another string transfer to another string's piezo. It only happens on an alternate tuning when all the pitch notes are not the same. It's more prominent on say, palm muting on a Drop tuning. Your hand makes a bridge for the vibrations to travel from a string to a piezo, and since the other string is pitch shifted 2 notes further down than the other, you get another sound that is the A string but 2 notes down. Best way to deal with it is mute the strings your note playing.

This is exactly why I bought new instead of getting a used one on Ebay.

Pickups are the capsules in every saddle on the bridge. They are piezo pickups. Best scenario: You need to adjust string volumes in workbench Worst scenario: You have a bad piezo pickup and either need to clean it with contact cleaner or replace it with a new one (which requires minor disassembly of the bridge and soldering)

It's annoying. People were talking about wanting higher quality guitars with Variax guts, and now we're taking a step back and having crap guitars again for the Variax? JTV line really shouldn't die off, but jesus christ, it's a tough call.

Money says they're getting rid of specialty editions of the base 3 JTV guitars. I believed they got rid of the 59P guitars, next up is the 69s, even though, I think the 69s has a way big appeal of being purchased, because an SSS strat is more popular than a P90 Les Paul, because of course, a SSS strat is the common base form of a strat in the first place. I'm still waiting on that maple neck Standard.

You could clean the jack assembly with contact cleaner if the circuit to tell the guitar it's on is dirty.

Changed the E from a polyweb 46 to a Daddario 49 and it SEEMS like it helped. Any overtones aren't extremely annoying to me so far.

Well, I'm just being brutally honest for the sake of information, though these things, personally do not really bother me. Every once in a while, maybe the palm muting could be tighter. You can compensate through what you dial through your amp. The presence difference is very noticeable when you run the guitar into a completely dry signal. Let's say, a POD with an absolutely clean patch. Switching from Spank to magnetics on a 69s clearly shows the presence difference between modeling and magnetics. Magnetics has a certain snap sound to the attack that the modeling is lacking. The thing about this, is that you're going to be running your guitar through an amp, which restricts frequency response even more, so the lower presence isn't going to be as noticeable, though in some clean amp situations, it can be a bit noticeable, but like I said, that's what the dials on the amps are for. As for palm muting, it's been a known thing for a long time. There has been improvements made, but it's still lacking a lot of tightness a real guitar has when palm muting. I've explained before, the reason this occurs, is because your hand is blocking vibrations to the piezos when you palm mute, so you're killing a lot of frequencies that are vibrating from your palm to the nut of the neck, that get sucked into your hand before hitting the piezos, especially the high frequencies. This is not a problem on normal pickups, because normal pickups sit IN FRONT of your hand where the string vibrates, not behind your hand. I've suggested they do something to detect when you palm mute (They obviously have already, if they enhanced palm muting), and then temporarily higher the presence of that string's signal to compensate the frequencies that were killed off. It's obviously possible, as like I said before, I've made the palm mutes sound tighter through treble boosting effects, but ultimately it makes non-palm muted notes sound way too sharp, so I have to find a perfect balance.

It all depends on what your needs are. As much as I love the Variax, there are a few things that can hold it back from being preferred over another guitar. I love the alternative tunings, and the fact I can get a really low tuning for metal music, but a lot of metal musicians will not like the fact that the piezo design causes for weaker palm mutes compared to a normal guitar. It's real evident in modern metal amp settings for anyone trying to get a "chuggy" palm mute. The pick attack is muffled compared to that on a regular guitar when palm muting, which can be a turn off to people. Another thing is, if someone wants to be really anal about the Variax, the Variax has a little less presence than a real guitar. It's virtually unnoticeable, but in some situations, the presence on the modeling of a Variax is a little lower. HD improved this dramatically, but switching to models to magnetics, it's noticeable in some certain amp settings. Another huge thing, not all Les Pauls sound the same. Even with all the same hardware, there could be differences in some tone from how nature is. It's a different guitar, the pickups weren't wound exactly the same, the wood isn't exactly the same piece of wood as the other guitar, which can contribute to how the guitar resonates with the strings. Let's not forget how much hardware changes have gone through a guitar's life span, whether it's the strat line, les paul line, or whatever. I love my Variax, but guitars are guitars, and as a guitarist, you'll want to mess with another guitar sometimes every once in a while regardless if you have a favorite guitar. It's just human nature. You'll want to try something different sometimes.