Digital vs Analog

[prodigy84]

Electric guitar is one of the few string instruments which their playing techniques don't affect the tone vastly.

Instead our tones are greatly affected by the effects we use. If we have a good setup, it's complimentary to our techniques. If we don't, we end up sound bad.

Then there's the issue of Digital vs Analog. With the digital technology far surpassing the analog in terms of growth, it's hard to remain old school on this.

With digital multi-effects now plugged with ridiculous number of effects, superior Amp rack simulators..etc, it feels like a losing battle. I know compact pedals are still used religiously by a lot of guitarists, but they might come a time when digital actually takes over completely, and analog pedals become an vestige of the past. Maybe even sooner than you think.

What are your thoughts? Are you adamant on analog? Or do you fully endorse digital?

[DepressedNazgul]

Well, I have a Musicman Silhuette plugged into a Marshall solid state amp, and I get great tones out of it. Not one damn effect pedal, no racks, no processors. It sounds amazing.

I also know someone with a custum-made PRS guitar, who sounds like ****. If you hear a recording of him, you won't believe that he's using such an expansive guitar.

The point is - It's all about playing technique. If you feel that your sound doesn't reflect your technique and dynamics, you're using way too much processing.

[nuclear81]

I don't know if I understand your digital vs. analog question. electric guitars don't give out a digital signal. Just because they have a current passing through them does not mean that data that comes from the amp is digitized. It is still analogue signal. I could go on for about 10 pages on the differences between digital vs. analogue but i won't since I am lazy and no one will read all that:p I think electric guitars are becomming bigger because you can add all kinds of effects to make the sound change entirely. By just tapping your foot on a pedal you can make it seem like an all new instrument.

[oRg]

Well I think analog has done all it can for the music world and we've gotten many good effects from it. For example I remember using an old analog tape echo effect. i can't remember how to use it but it was given to me by a friend of my dads. Sadly enough it was broken during a mosh pit and I've missed it since. Not to mention there's the cool studio tricks you could do to get the "flanger" sound. That is I believe you lightly press on one side of the tape reel and creates the flanger effect.

I think they both have their definite benefits. With analog you get a more "true" sound. That is with analog you have the actual thing right there. In digital you have a digitized copy of that effect using "amp modeling" technology. There is a small difference between the two when it comes to amps though. With analog amps such as Marshall JCM-800's and Plexi's, the longer you play the hotter the tubes and resistors get which does alter your sound in some way over periods of time. In digital amps this is hardly the case becuz obviously digital amps like the PODxt and V-Amp don't use tubes. Instead they use digital technology with I imagine Flash memory (NOR logic most likely), and microcontrollers that all pretty much operate with voltages from 5V-12V, meaning resistors stay alot cooler in the microcontroller, though there are instead millions of resistors, operational amplifiers, and transistors that heat up. But if you compare to the power dissipated from a digital amp to an analog amp there is a LARGE difference. That;s why there's a larger demand nowadays for digital technology especially in the studio. It's smaller, faster, more compact, and with "amp modeling" technology now becoming mainstream you can pretty much have an entire $2400 effects rack setup at your disposal for only $300.

That s another benefit of digital technology. It's more cost-efficient (production-wise) than let's say analog technology. You can easily use a fully automated factory to assemble digital components (which also cuts down on the amount of human workers you have to employ) while in alot of analog manufacturers they used good ole' humans (obviously it's just a generalization. I'm sure Marshall now has a semi-automated factory to print and solder all those PCB's).

As far as my opinion on it I choose to side with sound and not worrying about whether it's digital or analog. It all depends on what sound I get. Remember that most digital effects are modeled in some way after their analog ancestors.

Nuclear is right though about the guitar signal being analog. I'll go into it just a little bit but not too much. Well the guitar pickups that people use are actually oversized inductors (which means they store energy in a magnetic field) and when the nickel wound strings vibrate they cause a disturbance in this magnetic field causing a surplus of voltage to be sent to the amp. From there it gets real complicated depending on what kind of amp your using. Now the signal sent from the guitar is usually in the shape of a trigonometric function (sine, cosine, but not tangent). If you've taken some high school trigonometry you'll see that sine and cosine are the same but one is phased out by 90 degrees or by pi/2 radians. Well anyways, digital logic operates on something called a binary number system. Meaning that there are only two states at which something can be. That is 1 and 0. Meaning that instead of a sine wave which goes from 5V to 1V gradually (as in the analog case), you have a signal whic goes from 5V to 1V rather abruptly (though there is a small fillet curvature do to the amount of time switching takes, usually in the area of nanoseconds). So a digital waveform looks like a whole group of rectangles. I would post pictures but unless I see some further interest I keep it at this for now. I can post pictures of the two different waveforms if you would like to see though.

[ashc]

5V logic - not much of that these days :D

[mattblack850]

Had a similar discussion with a freind who is really into using all the latest techno gear that he can.

Me, personally, I prefer to use individual stomp boxes,whereas he advocates the use of multi-FX boxes and digital sound processing;

My arguement:- better original sounds, more infinate adjustment
His arguement:- If Hendrix was alive, what would he be using these days?

A very perplexing arguement to which there is no definate right or wrong, it's all subjective to the individual.
Personal taste, finance and fashion/image can be just as damaging to your quest for tone.

[prodigy84]

I don't know if I understand your digital vs. analog question. electric guitars don't give out a digital signal. Just because they have a current passing through them does not mean that data that comes from the amp is digitized. It is still analogue signal. I could go on for about 10 pages on the differences between digital vs. analogue but i won't since I am lazy and no one will read all that:p I think electric guitars are becomming bigger because you can add all kinds of effects to make the sound change entirely. By just tapping your foot on a pedal you can make it seem like an all new instrument.

My bad on being vague. I kinda thought that everyone would realize I was talking about the effect pedals intrinsically.

[Koala]

Well, I dont think analog will actually end up disappearing. I believe they sound different, very different. Hopefully at some point manufacturers will realize such situation isntead of trying to simulate analog sounds. Personally I use both technologies depending on what sound I want.

[prodigy84]

My arguement:- better original sounds, more infinate adjustment
His arguement:- If Hendrix was alive, what would he be using these days?


Gosh. That thought seems sacrilege enough. I am certainly glad Hendrix isn't here today 'cause his greatness was solidified by his legacy of groundbreaking techniques, playing styles and songs, and also his memory. Think about it. Back then, Carlos Santana was the foremost innovative guitarist experimenting with amplification, feedback..etc. So was Clapton. Now, they are nothing but a bunch of burnt-out guitarist who are trying to re-live the height of their popularity they once felt when they were on the top of their game.

Would Hendrix be different had he lived? I guess we will never know. So that would save us some disappointment if he had turned for the worst.

[debaser]

Well, I dont think analog will actually end up disappearing. I believe they sound different, very different. Hopefully at some point manufacturers will realize such situation isntead of trying to simulate analog sounds. Personally I use both technologies depending on what sound I want.


Exactly. Both have great, and very different applications, so why limit your options?

[mattblack850]

His main point of view was that even if you look back to when Hendrix was at his height he was using the available gear at the time BUT then having it modified, ( at Manny's in NY), so even then he was experimenting with new sounds.

If he had of continued in that vein then surely he would have been at the forefront of this technical revolution? Pushing the envelope of sound vs technology?

[oRg]

I definitely don't think analog will be fading away becuz in my opinion I still like the sound and tone of Tube Compression than I do digital compression.

I think though in the world of "amp modeling" technology still has a large distance to travel before it can efficiently convert the tone and sound of a certain amp into digital. Line 6 and Behringer have done good jobs at this but their algorithms still need to we worked through. I think maybe in the next 10 years there will be a product that will allow you almost perfectly mimic various amps. I say if were able to creates transistors on the atomic level (meaning a transistor being no bigger than like 6 atoms) then I think we could very closely simulate the sound and tone of various amps. It all boils down to a science really.

[prodigy84]

His main point of view was that even if you look back to when Hendrix was at his height he was using the available gear at the time BUT then having it modified, ( at Manny's in NY), so even then he was experimenting with new sounds.

If he had of continued in that vein then surely he would have been at the forefront of this technical revolution? Pushing the envelope of sound vs technology?

I was only commenting my thoughts on that statement, not arguing against it. lol But since you brough it up, Hendrix, like Eric Clapton and Santana, were doing new stuffs that no one every thought of then. Maybe he would have turned out alright or maybe his drug usage would have still inevitably made him turn for the worse. Therefore I concluded before that not knowing ever maybe would save us some disappointment.