# THD Quintet Tone Curve



## z0z0 (Feb 19, 2009)

I saw the following at 12th Fret

http://www.shopatron.com/product/part_number=Quintet SW6/571.0.24500.0.0.0.0










Has anyone used this?
Is it worth paying 10x as much as I would for a tone pot?


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## bduguay (Jul 15, 2009)

That does seem a bit steep for a _passive_ unit. I suppose if you could hear it in action before buying might be an option.
B.


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## mrmatt1972 (Apr 3, 2008)

BC Rich had a similar idea in the 70s:

http://www.mosercustomshop.com/inde...id=118&zenid=5dbe47720ad4ef04dca2fa3b0e017241

and here's the Torres version inspired by Gibson- a lot cheaper

http://www.torresengineering.com/varitonekit.html


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

Well, yes, the caps, inductor and switch for a Varitone DO cost only a few bucks to throw together, but then so do the components for a bunch of things that people are willing to pay several hundred bucks for. What one is paying for with the THD unit or the Stellartone units ( http://www.stellartone.com/ ) is drop-in installation. In the case of the THD, you can see that its form factor makes it easily compatible with a variety of guitars, including Teles.

As much as I like Vari-tone circuits (and I have one in a stompbox), the truth of the matter is they work via selective passive loss. So, if your signal is not hot to begin with, it leaves your guitar even more tepid. For many players, chiefly those who play clean most of the time, it won't matter. For other players, it will. Be careful what you wish for.

My own is built into a stompbox with an Alembic Stratoblaster FET preamp as the front end. That way I can introduce whatever scooping I want, but compensate volume-wise with the preamp/gain stage. Where the THD unit appears to include a trimpot on the board to adjust degree of scoop, I made it a panel-mount control in my stompbox, which I find much handier. On the other hand, if the circuit is installed in the guitar itself, one would not likely be doing in/out switching on the fly, so it may be of less importance.

Note that the Stellartone Tone-Styler, and the THD unit are NOT the same sort of device. The Tone-Styler uses different values of tone caps to produce different treble-cut rolloffs. The vari-tone variations introduce midscoops of different widths/depths without affecting treble. 

They both have a place. In fact, one unit I made was the result of realizing that the basic Vari-tone circuit (resistor, cap, and inductor to ground) could be a bass-cut unit if you bypassed the cap, or could be a treble-cut unit if you bypassed the inductor, or could be a simple passive attenuator if you bypassed both the inductor and cap. A veritable audio Swiss-army-knife.


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## z0z0 (Feb 19, 2009)

Here is the result of the five positions
Seems that most of it is just killing the highend if I am reading this chart right


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## Guest (Aug 21, 2009)

How is it that possible? How do they get a _boost_ with a passive circuit?


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

You *can* get a level boost with a passive circuit if there is a transformer on the output to convert things. Given that the picture only shows a black epoxy block, a trimpot, rotary switch, and in/out solder pads, it is *possible* there is an inductor and a level-converting transformer in there. I don't know if it is probable, though.


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## mhammer (Nov 30, 2007)

Okay. Now that I can actually see the graph, I see that the increase is not that large. I'll assume it is simply a resonance that results in "sensing" more of the pickup's signal at that point.


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