My main schecter guitar pickups say "Duncan Designed" on them. Probably pretty low grade I would guess, wouldn't you?

How often do you give the advice to students to chunk your pickups, they suck?


See, I use a pod xt and it is like when I go to cleaner tones with less drive I just lose all my sound. Especially the higher strings. I moved the pickup up and down but did not see very much difference.



Do good pickups make a huge difference or are they just better.

Good pickups do make huge difference and they are better,
it's kind a hard for me to say if YOU really need to change them.
Problem is this, not every piece of gear reacts the same,
with tube amps and preamps you have better response, dynamics etc,
you can really hear everything that is coming or not coming from the pickups.
With digital units is so much harder imo and most of the time we are "blind" there.

I would bring your guitar to a guitar tech and measure the output,
then he'll be able to say how much power those pickups actually have,
maybe give you some advice , recommendation etc.
I give that kind of advices to my students in private here and there
but ONLY after I try guitar myself, it's hard to tell without any checking indeed.

Dear Muris,
I'm asking YOU because you're my "Guru" in GMC...
I'm thinking of buying the Ibanez RG1550...
I read a lot of good things about the guitar, but every once in a while, some guys say that the pickups suck!!!
The factory pickups are the V7 (Neck) Humbucker, The S1 (midle) single coil, and the V8 (bridge) Humbucker.
Have you ever played one of these? If yes, what do you think?

Another thing is the Fretboard. Is there a big difference between Rosewood vs Maple fretboars, other than the look?

Thank you!

I think Muris isn't active anymore sadly, at least not now but I try to help you now.

Those pickups are pretty bad but the Ibanez guitar is a very high quality guitar so you could just upgrade the pickups and you get a great guitar.

A rosewood fretboard sounds warmer and has more highs while maple fretboards sound darker

So, would it be better to go direct to the Ibanez RG2550, which is basically the same, but with Dimarzio/IBZ Pickups? Or RG3550 w/ pure Dimarzio PU?
Or the Dimarzio pickups are not worth the increase in price?

Thanks!

The upgrade to the the rg 2550 is not worth the money as the DiMarzio/IBZ are just as bad as the V7/V8 pickups (they are no real DiMarzio high quality pickups, just some low end pickups made by DiMarzio for Ibanez)

The RG 3550 however has REAL DiMarzio pickups so the money is well spend on this one if you like the ToneZone/True Velvet/AirNorton pickup combination. If you want some other pickups in your RG you could just get the rg 1550 or 2550 and upgrade them with the pickups of your choice and it will cost you the same as the rg 3550 in the end.

Those 3 guitars are almost identical from their specs and build quality so it is up to you if you like the Rg3550 and it's DiMarzio pickups or if you want to buy one of the other RGs and spend the rest of the money on the pickups of your choice!