One thing I don't see anyone mentioning at all is how quickly those silver windings are gonna tarnish. Like, unless they kept the pickup sealed in an oxygen-free environment, they're going to quickly oxidize and lose any benefits that you MAY have in using silver over copper. Even still, totally not worth the money.
@@daviddet Good thought but I'm sure the silver wire is enameled just as the copper version has to be, otherwise you'd end up with a completely shorted coil. Important side benefit is the enamel protects against corrosion, just as with copper. So think of them as a great set of $250 pickups that come in a $750 jewelry box...and there goes your last excuse if your tone is still crap!
daviddet silver actually resists oxidation better than cooper and is used for higher end electronics over copper in most cases because unlike copper silver oxide which is basically tarnished silver is just as conductive as bare silver metal.
@@tinman5322 yes it has to be protected but what Mister Duncan didn't told that reason why We don't use silver is because it have issues with length - silver isn't good for long wires it is't effective as cooper. That is why silver is only good for short contacts but if you would wind a coil for let say el motor VS cupper you would notice why silver sucks . Moreover when they compare Silver and Cupper they talk about regular cupper a cheapest wire, but in last x years We use Oxygen free cupper and difference between such Cu VS Silver is so minimal in short wires and again it is much better to use cupper when you need long wires. Silver isn't expensive as they say and for that price of pickups Mister SD sell those that is honestly insane.
Dude, you genuinely have one of the nicest guitar collections out of anybody that I’ve seen on RUclips. I love literally everything on your wall. You sir, have impeccable taste.
@@bleromafia those cheap chinese pickups are alot better than you think, I had a strat pickup that I threw in the neck position of my tele an I don't even have a bridge pickup for it an I don't plan on putting one in, seriously worth the 15 bucks I spent because I'm definitely not spending 600 bucks on something that's really not that much better
@@hardrockrelics2157 much less, like a 1/100... but the point is, the added value in silver is around 50-60$ for the whole set, not 500$ which would justify the argument about "these are so expensive cause wire price"... of course, in top lines you are selling exclusivity, not real performance differences.
Well I could play one note, with a well applied vibrato, through these silver wound pickups and kill a sasquatch so you can make more of your crappy pickups. Wait,...I it's werewolfs...nevermind.
I absolutely LOVE that you didn't give the standard "they sound great and they may be a good investment for people that are particular about their tone." LOVE the honesty. LONG LIVE VALUE!!!
Yeah. Get an amp for that much, some kind of nice tube amp, and that'll make ALL your pickups sound good, even the cheap ass ones. There's no reason to buy these other than as some kinda dumb status symbol. There's surely a market for them though knowing how easily conned "gear heads" are, spending hundreds of dollars on clone pedals that sound identical to the Behringer version or whatever
And it's pretty much a given, that you can wire a copper pickup to sound indistinguishable if you spent a little time. At these currents, there's just not any significant physical advantage. And then, you can do a billion times more with your fingers than by just changing the metal type in a coil.
CrankCase08 Yes, that is what the headstock decal says. Read "Ghost guitars" by Ed Roman and you will realize that the stars do not use "off the shelf" guitars. Lots of marketing voodoo is at work. "The industry is filled with charlatans and snake oil salesmen, and then there is a dark side!"
But some Squiers just sounds better to me. Aside from the build Quality, some of those cheap Squiers pickups is often sounds thinner or fatter than the original Fender Model, but that's what I love. It gives you like a kind of Sound Options for a particular fender model. Just tellin' but I recently pick up Squier Jag CV70s model instead of the original sunburst Fender Jaguar. It's way thinner and bity sounding than the Fender(which I like) and it comes with Mustang bridge already..! (The original Jag bridge has an issue about the strings jumped out). So IMO, Squier is great and physically not that bad, and it could be 9/10 with some upgrades here and there on the hardware.
It's completely true Silver is not very expensive. My mother has 2 silver vases and a big silver mirror, they are handmade and very old , but I do not think that all of them are worth more than 3 k euros.
VIDEO SECTIONS: Part 1 - So what's the big deal? 2:08 Part 2 - Hendrix with a twist! 5:44 Part 3 - What do they actually sound like? 6:50 Part 4 - So are they worth it?? 11:21 ZEYPHR PICKUPS: imp.i114863.net/bXDmg
They sound great! Thanks for the exposure, to something like that! You make mention of modding a Squire mini, have you or would you do something like that? I'd love to see it! Thanks again!
I'll bet that Seymore Duncan is pissed off about the Final Thought on are they really worth the expense ! Oh Well ! They'll get over it ! They sound Great to me, but, I agree with your Conclusion. Texas Specials would be just as good to me ! And, they cost a Great deal less ! Love That Fender ! Thanks, Darrell, For All That You Do !
They sounded beautiful but surely as you said it's not worth breaking the bank for them. But atleast if you're doing a gig and a werewolf starts freaking out in the audience you can just take them out and ward him off with them. Super useful...
Two things: 1: Gold is the least resistant metal known to man. Gold wired pickups would be DEVASTATING expensive. 2: What would it take to put Joe Barden pickups in one of your Telecasters?
I am really enjoying your videos! They are honest and real. Also you inspire me to play guitar. Started a few months ago, and just looking at you play is like «wow»
Hi friends, I come from an audiophile background where tweeky connectors, wire and such are common and make outrageous claims to improve such and such, but are mostly BS. I just wanted to say this, using solid silver wire to wind pickups is a waste of money. Most of the audio signal travels in the outer 5 to 10 percent surface of the wire, which is known as Skin Effect. You could plate a multi stranded copper wire with silver and it would sound the same as solid silver wire for a hell of a lot less. Just saying....
I don't know how expensive is it to make the wire, but silver is dirt cheap. Probably the three pickups have less than 40 bucks worth of silver inside. More likely $10 each.
audiophilia is hilarious.oxygen free speaker wire at $4100 a foot is ludicrous as is a $10,000 turntable that plays the same pops and crackles as a radio shack cartridge in a $20 turn table.
@@dylerthurden7669 silver is not dirt cheap? Okay moneybags lmao. With a mile of wire and whatever gauge the wire is, it’s surface area and volume is probably pretty high. Not to mention the manufacturing cost of pulling the metal into wire and the manual labor of hand wrapping a mile of silver.
I have to be honest_they sounded incredible and i would love to put them in my Strat. I would find it hard to spend one thousand when theres so many great pick up builders out there today.
Can you get these silver pickups relic'd? You know - maybe where somebody spits on them and rubs them in the dirt a little bit to make the silver look old and dirty! Then I might not mind paying the higher freight for these :-)
I really don't think price matters. I can't afford them but if you can, and it inspires you to play more, then it's worth it. It's more of a subjective point. One person can go buy a $50 pawn shop guitar and create a masterpiece and another person might buy a $10,000 high end guitar and do nothing with it. So if it inspires you to play more and create something wonderful, then I think that's what matters most. Great video, btw. You always make great content that puts me in a good mood.
"Inside this box, we're gonna test out the worlds most expensive pickups" How do you even do that? You can't get a guitar into that box, let alone yourself.
Would love to see a comparison with these against a few of the top builders, and then against a few of the mass produced upgrades, then against stock fender pickups. I would love to hear these against Bareknuckle, Fralin, Thro-bak, etc. On a closing note, if they were the best pickups money could buy, Eric Johnson would have tried them.
At the same time, Eric Johnson still plays a Srtratocaster instead of switching to the Excalibur, but I doubt that a family held company producing 500 guitars and basses a year will pay him the same way a hedge fund that holds a company weighting 40% of world's guitar market can... Just put the PUs of your preferred Strat on an Excalibur Supra/Indus/Expert and it's no more your preferred Strat, even if it's a L-series or the latest $20k CSMH... It's structural, and patented... If you fear that the no trussrod neck with 10% of it being a carbon bar won't last, my 2 Excaliburs are celebrating their 30 years now... Moreover, they're all HSH riouted under the pickguard... You may consider having custom PU mades with your preferred Strat PUs and the neck+bridge ones mounted has humbuckers with anything you want. I love the FS-1 and DP-185 that came with my Excalibur SSS and there are things like the Free-Way 10 posn selector...
Hey patrick. I been working on making a 100% gold looking strat. Even got warmoth right now making me a birdseye maple neck with gold frets. Gold gold gold. It will be my glorious golden guitar. The body is a orig 50s aztec gold strat with a gold pick guard and hard ware. Even gold trem and gold input jack. Gold back plate. Gold screws. You get it... Even gold tuners. But anyways... I saw that optima sells gold strings. They are kind of pricey though for strings and I was curious... Do you know if they are any good? I'm used to daddarios personally. I bought some of those neon colored strings from DP... and even though they look kool they sounded pretty weak on the thicker strings sadly...
Think about the guitar tone some guitar players have: John Mayer, Prince, Brian May, Eric Johnson. They customized, personalized and optimized everything. Amp, guitar, pedals, strings, mics etc. So yes even those pickups will make difference in tone. Tone has an important role and audience will hear.
Actually it’s platinum, gold, silver, copper then aluminum for conductivity. I’m a retired electronics instructor. I’m guessing I’d have to get a second mortgage for gold wire. Lol
Surely to get the full benefit of these pickups you would need to have a guitar cable made of silver wire going into an amp using silver wire linked to speaker cabs by cables using silver wire. Just to get an overdriven noise that leaves your ears buzzing hours after the gig. But, at least, it would be the sound of silver buzzing.
If resistance is the concern (which sort of is, sort of isn't--inductance would be the actual measurement, and isn't exactly a linear relationship to resistance) then it stands to reason that simply using slightly LESS copper would provided the same result as whatever amount of silver they wasted on these.
@@DesigneLearningTutorials Why I will never buy any SD pick ups ever again! I would rather pay less than 1/2 the price for BETTER made/sounding locally made pick ups! I know a winder who can make anything Duncan or DM can make and better! (For a lot less money!)
I have to say i have these zephyr pups in HSS Jackson USA, and they are truly the most incredible pickups ive heard. I often get compliments on my tone.
Marketing gimmick. As I've said on my own channel, pickups are only one aspect/variable when it comes to tone. In the right hands with all the variables dialed in (pickups, amp, effects, fingers, etc), cheap pickups can sound amazing, while expensive pickups in the wrong hands (not Darrell's!) with a few variables off, can sound horrible.
Brilliant video , I've always thought there's a difference in sound with quality pick ups .....and you've proved it though its understandable with the inherent qualities of silver. Thank you Darrel....guess what I think ill stick with my Arcane pups.
@@noelhoekstra6852 Well for dumb comments "Its difference between amateurs and pro musician" takes some beating unless you think all pro musicians are logical thinkers. Which I strongly doubt.
Silver Wire? Call me when it's GOLD! But seriously, this reminds me of the hand wired Tube Screamers that really don't sound that much different that any other 808 or TS9. Darrell, I appreciate you doing this video. For this price, you can upgrade with better pickups and still have money left over to upgrade your amp too.
Great pickups for stupid rich musicians/guitarists! Don't know what else to say about these pickups..i was expecting a lamborghini, i mean for $1k there better be a night and day difference but i didn't hear any..sorry.
Most expensive automatically rules me out of ever buying these at least for a long time haha. But I won't lie they sound amazing, not to mention the design is unique! The price seems way out of place
I figured they weren't going to be worth it. It's definitely an interesting set of pickups. I notice not a single famous strat player that anyone has heard of has ever said anything about owning these, and they could actually afford them. Personally, I thought it was getting a little ridiculous when I saw the price on the Hendrix set.
Today is 11/04/2019. I just looked up the price of silver and it's only $17.75/oz. (in U.S. dollars). There's probably not an ounce of silver on each of those pickups.Even if there is, we're talking $60. Double that price to turn it into wire = $120. Pay the person that wound them $120/set, just because your feeling generous. Now you've got $240. The bobbins and magnets didn't cost $60. How long does it take Pro to wind a set of pups? I suspect these pickup winders are only making about $120 per day, not per set of completed pickups. These pickups are absolutely NOT worth the price. It sounds like Seymour Duncan is trying to become the PRS of guitar pickups. And if the rest of the guitar is wired with copper ?
Low key idk y ur hating on PRS (or seymour duncan). PRS makes some of the best guitars under 1000 dollars and u can even get american made stuff under 1000. They do have very expensive stuff but those are for professional musicians who want the utmost quality (not unlike these seymour duncans). Neither company is solely boutique at all! Edit: The top end stuff of most companies is pretty low volume so that jacks up the price!
You have to calculate the equivalent resistance of the entire path of the signal. Soldering will increase resistance, but increasing the circumference of the solder point will help counteract the inherent increased resistance of that conductor type. The difference could be so small that you would have to measure it with a multimeter or oscilloscope in a lab. But is higher resistivity ALWAYS worse? It's all about the tone you're looking for. And thus, it's all completely subjective.
I remember reading about these pickups last year. I think they started out as a conceptual experiment but then actually went into production. Sounds great! I’ve never seen a better demo of these particular pickups. They have a unique sound. Are they worth $300/each? I guess it depends on how much disposable income you have haha! Out of curiosity, what resistance are the pots?
Enamelled silver wire is pretty niche, so you can give them the benefit of not having the scaling of volume for price. But there is only a 7% difference in resistance between copper and silver. Just use a slightly larger gauge wire if you want the pickups with a lower resistance.
keep in mind that in order to be able to draw this and to make the windings without the wire breaking, this would not be pure silver and that it would be alloyed with a lot of copper so the value of that wire would be less than for pure silver
"Are they worth it?" - No is the short answer 😆 The sad thing is, there are going to be plenty of muppets that DO fall for all the sales spiel bollocks and drop a grand on these and then think they're better than everyone else. 😆 Judging by how they sound, I'd say that at 'just' £330 for the set (the price of 1 of these pickups) they'd still be way overpriced, because at the end of the day there isn't a huge amount between the resistance values of copper v silver wire, which is why almost all of the wires and cables on the planet are made from copper, and pickups wound with silver wire sound no better or worse than ones wound with copper wire. 👍
920 D is a great company I bought a loaded pick guard from them and the push pull pot went bad they sent a new pot for me right away no questions ask was easy fix only 2 wires to soldier, and the pick guard is awesome DiMarzio Twin Rail Cruisers in neck and middle with Tone Zone Bridge turned my Fender HSS MIM into a beast.
waited till i watched the whole vid and your take on the sound and i agree not a game changer at all. on the other hand there are some values about the pickups we dont know like the ohms of the windings the type of insulating coating on the silver wire. what was mentioned was that the wire was thin so it was easy to have a more uniformed windings on the bobin anyone following me here? 6,200 ohms is the same no matter what the wire is made of so the same resistance to emf, the only other thing is the messy boogie with its un-focused overdrive tone that would take an engineer with a million dollars worth of studio gear to clean up ha ha
A few years back I put some Seymour Duncan Five-Two pickups into my old Strat @ $75 each. $225 for 3. I think they are better sounding than the stock pickups, but it is all subjective matter of taste etc. I am happy with them. I even think they sound better than the silver. I must be silly. I use a 25 year old Blues Deluxe amp. Tube city. And a line 6 modeling amp. And an Acoustic bass amp. I like my tone.
I agree with you Daz, they are nice, but nothing new/special! I am guessing silver wire would NOT be as bright with a bit lower resonant peak. Kinda 'meh', I stick with my custom wound D'Urbanos from Oz!
Hi Darrel I'm from India... I'd like to have one of your mod guitar, if you're willing can you please ship me one. I'm a big fan of you I keep watching your videos repeatedly... Can you please help me with a guitar I'm requesting you. Pleaseeeeee
I appreciate your honesty. You could've easily said that they're worth their high price tag, but you were just honest about your opinion. Great stuff man! Also wish I could play like you
Hey Darrell, I really do appreciate your honesty. If I had money running out my butt I would probably buy a set. I thought they sounded exceptionally well. I don't think I will ever afford such a luxury as these unless the price dropped completely out the bottom. They do sound good though. Do you reckon Ol' Dave of Pink Floyd could squeeze some long cryin' bended notes on a set these? I agree with you that they do sound excellent... But, I don't think they are really worth such a high cost. I hope the folks at Seymour Duncan don't get too mad at you for giving an honest opinion. Thanks for being an honest person.
Hi Darrel The difference between copper to silver conductivity in room temperature is less than 6%. I'm not sure that this is something you can feel...
Shane Semler Sorry, not even close to audiophile silly! The "state of the art" ac power cord for an amp is over $1000 and $10000 buys a dac. A sota capacitor (Daelund) can cost $1000. These products are not for the masses and are for those who equate pride of ownership with owning very expensive gear.
@@kirarittberg5088 Errm... aren't you the person berating me on this thread for making essentially the same point? And defending the manufacturers for their "creativity"?
It depends on the gauge & quality of the silver SD use for these. Silver with fewer impurities or single crystal structure will provide a purer signal...the same is true for copper.
The purest thing about this statement is the nonsense. It would be extraordinarily difficult, if not impossible, to manufacture a true single crystal in the form of a long thin wire. Anyone claiming to sell such a thing is FOS. Even if you could make this wire, it would cease to be a single crystal the moment you bent it. And why would you even try? The conductivities of copper and silver single-crystals are the same as their poly-crystalline forms. Just the opinion of a physicist who researched molecular interactions on single-crystal metallic substrates.
hand wound is a snake oil gimmick. It's not like you're hand carve an archtop guitar where the luthier constantly listens for overtone as he carves it down.
The cheapest Chinese pickups are probably hand wound. Some dude feeds the wire onto a spinning pickup frame. Far cheaper than making a machine to automate the whole process.
@@Meddled While simultaneously winding another with the wire running through his sandals. These are the highly-sought "Footwound" pickups and sell for up to $3.50.
Malagoli pickups sound very close and cost a fifth of the price of these pickups. ´ There are a lot of hype around famous brands, and unjustified, for sure.
Silver tarnishes which can result in arcing, especially if it's really hot, and it lowers resistance; and no discussion of the number of windings or an overall mass comparison. It looks like these are pretty shiny so they might be nickel-plated, which kind of defeats the purpose. Also, heat is biggest problem for lowering resistance, far more than the difference between copper vs. silver, but is resistance was really an issue for quality sound anyway? If so, a better idea would be pick-ups that are temperature controlled - air or water-cooled, IMO.
I’ve spent a lot more money than $1000 on strat pickups. It was just five or six sets, not one, and some of them were shipped in a complete guitar, not just a fancy box. I’d love to hear the Zephyrs compared to the new Fender Ultra Strat singles. If the SD’s sound better, it might be cheaper to upgrade pickups than entire guitars.
Thank you, Darryl for "running interference" for the rest of us! At that price point I was in no danger of going into debt buying these pickups- but it sure was nice of you to give us a taste of what they sounded like! Also, I trust your opinion that they are not worth the expense! Thanks, again!
![New Pickups For Blue Strat #1 [Mick's Strat Vlog] That Pedal Show](/img/1.gif)
The world's most expensive pickups happened on the nights when I first met my ex wives.
Well played, sir. And... I agree.
🤣🤣🤣
Awesome. Best comment ever.👍
@Angel You are denying two divorce lawyers a down payment on a new Mercedes... you selfish bastard! ;)
Wtf! So funny man!
Those pickups must be pretty greasy with all the snake oil all over them.
One thing I don't see anyone mentioning at all is how quickly those silver windings are gonna tarnish. Like, unless they kept the pickup sealed in an oxygen-free environment, they're going to quickly oxidize and lose any benefits that you MAY have in using silver over copper. Even still, totally not worth the money.
@@daviddet Good thought but I'm sure the silver wire is enameled just as the copper version has to be, otherwise you'd end up with a completely shorted coil. Important side benefit is the enamel protects against corrosion, just as with copper. So think of them as a great set of $250 pickups that come in a $750 jewelry box...and there goes your last excuse if your tone is still crap!
Woo woo for the gullible.
daviddet silver actually resists oxidation better than cooper and is used for higher end electronics over copper in most cases because unlike copper silver oxide which is basically tarnished silver is just as conductive as bare silver metal.
@@tinman5322 yes it has to be protected but what Mister Duncan didn't told that reason why We don't use silver is because it have issues with length - silver isn't good for long wires it is't effective as cooper. That is why silver is only good for short contacts but if you would wind a coil for let say el motor VS cupper you would notice why silver sucks . Moreover when they compare Silver and Cupper they talk about regular cupper a cheapest wire, but in last x years We use Oxygen free cupper and difference between such Cu VS Silver is so minimal in short wires and again it is much better to use cupper when you need long wires. Silver isn't expensive as they say and for that price of pickups Mister SD sell those that is honestly insane.
You know what makes every guitar sound better? A tuner.
Genius
Big brain
He is slight bit outta tune there all right.
Lolll
All of my guitars sound best when someone talented plays them. That would NOT be me.
Me: Mom can we have AC/DC?
Mom: No, we have AC/DC at home.
AC/DC at home: 9:07
One of my favorite bands is AC/DC
Thunderstriked
Greg HallJr Bro who cares
I knew exactly what you were talking about the moment I read it.
@@joshuaharris6638 - Almost :)
Dude, you genuinely have one of the nicest guitar collections out of anybody that I’ve seen on RUclips. I love literally everything on your wall. You sir, have impeccable taste.
Put them up against those 15$ (for 3) Chinese pickups and do a blind test. Then we will see how good they are.
This.
You can’t be serious
Morpho Polis yeah if you’re going for that lo fi slave labor tone
I agree. Want that "vintage sound" ? buy Amazon pups.
@@bleromafia those cheap chinese pickups are alot better than you think, I had a strat pickup that I threw in the neck position of my tele an I don't even have a bridge pickup for it an I don't plan on putting one in, seriously worth the 15 bucks I spent because I'm definitely not spending 600 bucks on something that's really not that much better
Silver? Pff... get back to me when they got Mithril pickups.
Im waiting until they realese the orichalcum wire ones
Unobtainium pickups are what's needed, but people just don't get it.
lol
Mithril is so middle earth i want Adamantium or ill stick with copper and some pedals.
They would be worth the whole Shire
So that's what John Travolta had in the suitcase in Pulp Fiction
Nah, those had gold wire
Did have the same thought
Funny, I thought the same thing!
We happy?
@@MrTw2009 Yeah, we happy.
My ex girlfriend was very “touch sensitive “ but she never cost me $1k
Yeah, she did it for $10 in highschool.
She was far far more expensive than that, my friend.
Also, could she hit the "high notes."
Hey-ohhhhhhhhhh
far more im sure...........
How'd you manage that?
I didn't realize how much money I was really making until I was single.
@@ursafan40 fr my parents thought i got a new job lol
SILVER GOES FOR ABOUT 20$ AN OZ , NICE BUT WAYYYYY OVER PRICED
What does copper go for?
@@hardrockrelics2157 much less, like a 1/100... but the point is, the added value in silver is around 50-60$ for the whole set, not 500$ which would justify the argument about "these are so expensive cause wire price"... of course, in top lines you are selling exclusivity, not real performance differences.
That's what I was gonna say, man, silver is a precious metal, but it ain't THAT expensive.
how many OZ in a mile of silver? nobody knows.
It's probably about economies of scale. There's plenty of copper wire being made. Silver wire probably not nearly as much
I could definitely hear the silver coming thru. Rumor is they sound even better with gold tuners and a diamond pick tho...
You need a platinum bridge and platinum frets too
Also a crystal Guitar Body for the right resonance
Gold strings are what you need! Optima 24K
Emerald-tipped trem w/ruby fretboard inlays
Yeah but only if the pick is made out of Tone Diamonds .
They sound like at least 600 bucks being flushed.....
I agree.
Gimmicks for people with more money than brains. Silver makes no difference unless you have a few miles of wire.
probably buying SSL1 would sound as good if not better
all i here is a strat with clean and overdrive ,so?
More than $600
My pickups are even more expensive and EXTREMELY rare. They are wound with Sasquatch hair and they really GROWL!
lol
DB Cisco 😎
made by BARE FOOT?
Well I could play one note, with a well applied vibrato, through these silver wound pickups and kill a sasquatch so you can make more of your crappy pickups.
Wait,...I it's werewolfs...nevermind.
Strick nine HOLY CRAP!!! Coffee literally just streamed out of my nose as I read this! Nice! 😂
Would have been nice to hear back to back riffs with these vs the original pickups. Without that, I agree those pickups are not worth that much.
They sound like high-output, modern Strat pickups. Nothing special at all.
I disagree. I think they sounded horrible. They gave me a headache.
Agreed
That's what I said,Tex spec sound better to me !
Agreed
Should have got clear pickup covers to show off the silver.
Agreed
I agree
I absolutely LOVE that you didn't give the standard "they sound great and they may be a good investment for people that are particular about their tone." LOVE the honesty. LONG LIVE VALUE!!!
Diminishing returns are in full effect for this type of gear. They sound great, but not an extra $800 great.
Facts
Yeah. Get an amp for that much, some kind of nice tube amp, and that'll make ALL your pickups sound good, even the cheap ass ones. There's no reason to buy these other than as some kinda dumb status symbol. There's surely a market for them though knowing how easily conned "gear heads" are, spending hundreds of dollars on clone pedals that sound identical to the Behringer version or whatever
A good 100$ EQ pedal and a decent boost pedal and you can have whichever pickups you like without doing a thing.
And it's pretty much a given, that you can wire a copper pickup to sound indistinguishable if you spent a little time.
At these currents, there's just not any significant physical advantage.
And then, you can do a billion times more with your fingers than by just changing the metal type in a coil.
Imagine a middle-aged white guy trying to sound like Urkel "WORD"
Pickups for the guitarist who loves to tell you how much his gear costs, whilst he sneers at your Squire!! Met a few of those!
Yet Justin Hayward (Moody Blues) regularly plays a Squier Strat.
CrankCase08 Yes, that is what the headstock decal says. Read "Ghost guitars" by Ed Roman and you will realize that the stars do not use "off the shelf" guitars. Lots of marketing voodoo is at work. "The industry is filled with charlatans and snake oil salesmen, and then there is a dark side!"
So long as you can play that Squire 10 times more proficiently than the sneering dude, you'll always sound 10 times better!
But some Squiers just sounds better to me. Aside from the build Quality, some of those cheap Squiers pickups is often sounds thinner or fatter than the original Fender Model, but that's what I love.
It gives you like a kind of Sound Options for a particular fender model.
Just tellin' but I recently pick up Squier Jag CV70s model instead of the original sunburst Fender Jaguar. It's way thinner and bity sounding than the Fender(which I like) and it comes with Mustang bridge already..! (The original Jag bridge has an issue about the strings jumped out).
So IMO, Squier is great and physically not that bad, and it could be 9/10 with some upgrades here and there on the hardware.
And then you play circles around his ass and make him look silly.
Silver is only 18$ an ounce. It’s not the silver that makes them expensive. It’s the pamphlet with all the snake oil bs in it.
It's completely true Silver is not very expensive. My mother has 2 silver vases and a big silver mirror, they are handmade and very old , but I do not think that all of them are worth more than 3 k euros.
I know it’s likely not just the silver that makes these pickups that expensive, but an ounce of copper is 0.28$. 64 times cheaper.
ok, I'm drinking the koolaid, they sound great
I wind my pickups with strands of cotton candy and they sound really sweet.(LOL !!!)
You also need a pick of destiny to get that AaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaashH and the heavens might open !!!
VIDEO SECTIONS:
Part 1 - So what's the big deal? 2:08
Part 2 - Hendrix with a twist! 5:44
Part 3 - What do they actually sound like? 6:50
Part 4 - So are they worth it?? 11:21
ZEYPHR PICKUPS: imp.i114863.net/bXDmg
Yep, put em in a Squire, then you'll have something special!
They sound great!
Thanks for the exposure, to something like that!
You make mention of modding a Squire mini, have you or would you do something like that?
I'd love to see it!
Thanks again!
I'll bet that Seymore Duncan is pissed off about the Final Thought on are they really worth the expense !
Oh Well !
They'll get over it !
They sound Great to me, but, I agree with your Conclusion.
Texas Specials would be just as good to me !
And, they cost a Great deal less !
Love That Fender !
Thanks, Darrell, For All That You Do !
They sounded beautiful but surely as you said it's not worth breaking the bank for them. But atleast if you're doing a gig and a werewolf starts freaking out in the audience you can just take them out and ward him off with them. Super useful...
Two things:
1: Gold is the least resistant metal known to man. Gold wired pickups would be DEVASTATING expensive.
2: What would it take to put Joe Barden pickups in one of your Telecasters?
It`s really honest of you saying those pickups aren`t worth such an amount of money. Way to go dude!
I am really enjoying your videos! They are honest and real. Also you inspire me to play guitar. Started a few months ago, and just looking at you play is like «wow»
Unfortunately they still sound like Seymour Duncans
abc123 ziiing
Took the words right out of my keyboard. A grand for... Not really much? The cleans sound OK. But eh.
Honestly I don't care for the sound of them. I like bright chimey
I AGREE
I get the same sound from a $25 loaded pick guard from Amazon.
Fender Original '57/'62. Search over! :)
Doesn't sound like a Strat. More like a very cheap Les Paul.
I agree too they sound strange!!!
They sound just like the $20 pickups from GFS.
😂
Hi friends,
I come from an audiophile background where tweeky connectors, wire and such are common and make outrageous claims to improve such and such, but are mostly BS. I just wanted to say this, using solid silver wire to wind pickups is a waste of money. Most of the audio signal travels in the outer 5 to 10 percent surface of the wire, which is known as Skin Effect. You could plate a multi stranded copper wire with silver and it would sound the same as solid silver wire for a hell of a lot less.
Just saying....
I don't know how expensive is it to make the wire, but silver is dirt cheap. Probably the three pickups have less than 40 bucks worth of silver inside. More likely $10 each.
Oh, you and your "facts" and "science." Embrace the snake oil! Let it rain down on you!
audiophilia is hilarious.oxygen free speaker wire at $4100 a foot is ludicrous as is a $10,000 turntable that plays the same pops and crackles as a radio shack cartridge in a $20 turn table.
@@dylerthurden7669 silver is not dirt cheap? Okay moneybags lmao. With a mile of wire and whatever gauge the wire is, it’s surface area and volume is probably pretty high. Not to mention the manufacturing cost of pulling the metal into wire and the manual labor of hand wrapping a mile of silver.
Well at least we can confirm that Darrel's not sponsored....
Not any more at least
I have to be honest_they sounded incredible and i would love to put them in my Strat. I would find it hard to spend one thousand when theres so many great pick up builders out there today.
Wait,.. that's the same box my ex keeps my soul in...must get pickups...
Strange looks like same box my ex keeps one of my balls in.......got to keep one for OLD TIMES SAKE! Must get pickups.....
Looks like the box where my ex stores my heart, nothing I need anymore, gotta get pickups
Looks like the box where my ex wife kept my wallet... Must get pickups.
Looks like the box my wife will keep my ashes............
Awesome. This is also the best comment ever. Boy, I must not have realized how strongly I feel about her this morning.
Can you get these silver pickups relic'd? You know - maybe where somebody spits on them and rubs them in the dirt a little bit to make the silver look old and dirty! Then I might not mind paying the higher freight for these :-)
They're so valuable you should get them bronzed!
Relicing is an extra $100 each.
And who's spit and the dirt from where are all important factors monetarily if not tone wise.
DB Cisco I'd have given you a thumbs up too, but I didn't like how you spelled "relic'ing". ;)
@@freecitizen2760 lol
I really don't think price matters. I can't afford them but if you can, and it inspires you to play more, then it's worth it. It's more of a subjective point. One person can go buy a $50 pawn shop guitar and create a masterpiece and another person might buy a $10,000 high end guitar and do nothing with it.
So if it inspires you to play more and create something wonderful, then I think that's what matters most.
Great video, btw. You always make great content that puts me in a good mood.
You genuinely have a beautiful way of playing!
"Inside this box, we're gonna test out the worlds most expensive pickups"
How do you even do that? You can't get a guitar into that box, let alone yourself.
Oh he has his ways!
Literally!
Would love to see a comparison with these against a few of the top builders, and then against a few of the mass produced upgrades, then against stock fender pickups. I would love to hear these against Bareknuckle, Fralin, Thro-bak, etc.
On a closing note, if they were the best pickups money could buy, Eric Johnson would have tried them.
At the same time, Eric Johnson still plays a Srtratocaster instead of switching to the Excalibur, but I doubt that a family held company producing 500 guitars and basses a year will pay him the same way a hedge fund that holds a company weighting 40% of world's guitar market can... Just put the PUs of your preferred Strat on an Excalibur Supra/Indus/Expert and it's no more your preferred Strat, even if it's a L-series or the latest $20k CSMH... It's structural, and patented...
If you fear that the no trussrod neck with 10% of it being a carbon bar won't last, my 2 Excaliburs are celebrating their 30 years now...
Moreover, they're all HSH riouted under the pickguard...
You may consider having custom PU mades with your preferred Strat PUs and the neck+bridge ones mounted has humbuckers with anything you want. I love the FS-1 and DP-185 that came with my Excalibur SSS and there are things like the Free-Way 10 posn selector...
I really like them! You really need to hear these using some good headphones.
Now use these with the world's most expensive strings.
...silver wound headphone speaker coils obviously...
You need the worlds most expensive head phones ... one for everyone in your audience. ')
Optima sells 24K Gold Strings
@@patricksommer3971 heck yeah! Now to finish off the expensive theme, use the most expensive pick along with most expensive cable
Hey patrick. I been working on making a 100% gold looking strat. Even got warmoth right now making me a birdseye maple neck with gold frets. Gold gold gold. It will be my glorious golden guitar. The body is a orig 50s aztec gold strat with a gold pick guard and hard ware. Even gold trem and gold input jack. Gold back plate. Gold screws. You get it... Even gold tuners.
But anyways... I saw that optima sells gold strings. They are kind of pricey though for strings and I was curious... Do you know if they are any good? I'm used to daddarios personally. I bought some of those neon colored strings from DP... and even though they look kool they sounded pretty weak on the thicker strings sadly...
The audience will never hear the difference, live or recorded.
People say that to me,its not for the audience it's for me
That's because there is no difference.
Think about the guitar tone some guitar players have: John Mayer, Prince, Brian May, Eric Johnson. They customized, personalized and optimized everything. Amp, guitar, pedals, strings, mics etc. So yes even those pickups will make difference in tone. Tone has an important role and audience will hear.
And the difference is not better or worse. It's just that. Different.
@HUUUUUURRRR Why :(.
I'm not a guitar player, but while watching the TV show Gunsmoke, there was a line that said "humbuck him" - humbuck: to smooth talk.
Actually it’s platinum, gold, silver, copper then aluminum for conductivity. I’m a retired electronics instructor. I’m guessing I’d have to get a second mortgage for gold wire. Lol
Was looking to see if anyone already said this.
Oww, glad you weren't my instructor. silver is the best.
i am ready for those platinum pickups
@@joshuabenton3785 so responsive they predict what you'll play before you play it 😳
If everyone on the channel gets together and sells our souls then we might be able to get them with platinum wire.
Wow, That’s really honest. I’m impressed. I’d love to hear a comparison them and the copper counterpart. That’s where the truth lies. Thanks!
Wiping your hand oil on the silver?!?! Darrell! 🥺
The silver will be varnish coated just like copper is, otherwise it's just one metal lump instead of a coil.
Geez, just throw'em out and get some new ones already
...and for their next trick, superconducting coils. Hook up to a liquid helium cryo and off you go.
Surely to get the full benefit of these pickups you would need to have a guitar cable made of silver wire going into an amp using silver wire linked to speaker cabs by cables using silver wire. Just to get an overdriven noise that leaves your ears buzzing hours after the gig. But, at least, it would be the sound of silver buzzing.
Silver has about 5.6% less resistivity than copper (at 20º), not a noticeable difference and probably not worth the price.
Correct (6.06061% difference).
If resistance is the concern (which sort of is, sort of isn't--inductance would be the actual measurement, and isn't exactly a linear relationship to resistance) then it stands to reason that simply using slightly LESS copper would provided the same result as whatever amount of silver they wasted on these.
Was thinking of buying these, then I remembered that I have a tone control on my guitar, and a few more on my amp etc.
I was thinking of buying them, too...then I remembered I'm pert near solely a bass player...[waiting for the bass version now...c'mon SD, get widdit]
I was thinking of buying them, then I realised practicing will make me better but hardware won’t
It's all wank! Duncan has jumped the shark!
@@DMSProduktions Duncan just see a way to make extra money. There are a lot of rich people who will pay, so you might as well take their money!
@@DesigneLearningTutorials Why I will never buy any SD pick ups ever again! I would rather pay less than 1/2 the price for BETTER made/sounding locally made pick ups! I know a winder who can make anything Duncan or DM can make and better! (For a lot less money!)
As always, with me anyway, I still haven't heard a Duncan pickup that sounds good. They just don't have it right for this country boy.
The regular old crap works for country just fine
Dr Groovy what pick ups do you recomend? Both Humbucker and single coil?
Right
I have to say i have these zephyr pups in HSS Jackson USA, and they are truly the most incredible pickups ive heard. I often get compliments on my tone.
Not sounding good to me through my headphones.
Thank you Darrel for being so candid and honest in your reviews
In ur opinion what sounds better?
I would love to see these as humbuckers wound like a paf or jb
Marketing gimmick. As I've said on my own channel, pickups are only one aspect/variable when it comes to tone. In the right hands with all the variables dialed in (pickups, amp, effects, fingers, etc), cheap pickups can sound amazing, while expensive pickups in the wrong hands (not Darrell's!) with a few variables off, can sound horrible.
A fool and their money are soon parted.
I agree, I think they will sell them though. The build you did on that Donner sounds just as good.
Exactly!
Today silver is worth $17.25 per ounce. At $1000 I could purchase over 3.5lbs of silver. 3:55
Glad you told me. I was headed to Guitar Center.
Brilliant video , I've always thought there's a difference in sound with quality pick ups .....and you've proved it though its understandable with the inherent qualities of silver. Thank you Darrel....guess what I think ill stick with my Arcane pups.
They sound good, but you could buy a new guitar for that much.
Uh oh! Looks like someone wasted a grand on these and is sensitive 😂
@Seamus O'Dork what's with the hostility? He was merely making a point. I agree they sound good but not worth a thousand bucks
Give Dorkus malorcus a break here guys. He's a dork. It's in the name lol.
@@noelhoekstra6852 Well for dumb comments "Its difference between amateurs and pro musician" takes some beating unless you think all pro musicians are logical thinkers. Which I strongly doubt.
Ooookay, I can't even afford to drool on those pickups. And I have to agree with your conclusions.
Silver Wire? Call me when it's GOLD! But seriously, this reminds me of the hand wired Tube Screamers that really don't sound that much different that any other 808 or TS9. Darrell, I appreciate you doing this video. For this price, you can upgrade with better pickups and still have money left over to upgrade your amp too.
Great pickups for stupid rich musicians/guitarists! Don't know what else to say about these pickups..i was expecting a lamborghini, i mean for $1k there better be a night and day difference but i didn't hear any..sorry.
Max Cruz he want even using monster cable platinum cables! That’s why! /g
darrel , i like you thumbnail once i saw it , i spilled out my coffee hahah
I'm going to stick with my superconducting windings on my strat. Liquid nitrogen container in the pick guard and I'm ready to rock.
lol
Word on the street is that your hi-tech pickups lack warmth. 😐😬😐
Wait, the heavens didn't open up and shine down upon him? Sounded like a strat.... Go figure. A really nice strat I'll give you that.
Most expensive automatically rules me out of ever buying these at least for a long time haha. But I won't lie they sound amazing, not to mention the design is unique! The price seems way out of place
I figured they weren't going to be worth it. It's definitely an interesting set of pickups. I notice not a single famous strat player that anyone has heard of has ever said anything about owning these, and they could actually afford them.
Personally, I thought it was getting a little ridiculous when I saw the price on the Hendrix set.
Awesome videos!! Just checking in every day on your channel makes my day. Keep it up!
Today is 11/04/2019. I just looked up the price of silver and it's only $17.75/oz. (in U.S. dollars). There's probably not an ounce of silver on each of those pickups.Even if there is, we're talking $60. Double that price to turn it into wire = $120. Pay the person that wound them $120/set, just because your feeling generous. Now you've got $240. The bobbins and magnets didn't cost $60. How long does it take Pro to wind a set of pups? I suspect these pickup winders are only making about $120 per day, not per set of completed pickups. These pickups are absolutely NOT worth the price. It sounds like Seymour Duncan is trying to become the PRS of guitar pickups.
And if the rest of the guitar is wired with copper ?
Low key idk y ur hating on PRS (or seymour duncan). PRS makes some of the best guitars under 1000 dollars and u can even get american made stuff under 1000. They do have very expensive stuff but those are for professional musicians who want the utmost quality (not unlike these seymour duncans). Neither company is solely boutique at all!
Edit: The top end stuff of most companies is pretty low volume so that jacks up the price!
Are they worth the $$$$? I could have told you HELL NO without hearing them. ;)
well,i can say hell no after hearing them
And for a G, i wouldnt be puttin my nasty fingers on the windings either.
I'm seeing a logic flaw with this.
Wouldn't the soldering ruin the whole point??
And having the same nickel pickup ends.... If you want HI Def you need Hi Def at every point in the chain. Good catch.
You know I thought the same thing. All the wiring, if not silver will simply be a reduction in quality.
You don't use molten silver solder bruh? 😆
No, because the total resistance is still lower.
You have to calculate the equivalent resistance of the entire path of the signal. Soldering will increase resistance, but increasing the circumference of the solder point will help counteract the inherent increased resistance of that conductor type. The difference could be so small that you would have to measure it with a multimeter or oscilloscope in a lab. But is higher resistivity ALWAYS worse? It's all about the tone you're looking for. And thus, it's all completely subjective.
The clear guard looks amazing don't change it!
I remember reading about these pickups last year. I think they started out as a conceptual experiment but then actually went into production. Sounds great! I’ve never seen a better demo of these particular pickups. They have a unique sound. Are they worth $300/each? I guess it depends on how much disposable income you have haha!
Out of curiosity, what resistance are the pots?
Silver Price: $18 per ounce. So, they are charging $200/ounce. Hmmm
Enamelled silver wire is pretty niche, so you can give them the benefit of not having the scaling of volume for price. But there is only a 7% difference in resistance between copper and silver. Just use a slightly larger gauge wire if you want the pickups with a lower resistance.
🤔
@@Markle2k That's true - 41 gauge would probably get you in the ballpark and 40 gauge definitely would!
Well I'd say drawing the silver into wire is an additional expense but your right this is ridiculously over priced.
keep in mind that in order to be able to draw this and to make the windings without the wire breaking, this would not be pure silver and that it would be alloyed with a lot of copper so the value of that wire would be less than for pure silver
"Are they worth it?" - No is the short answer 😆
The sad thing is, there are going to be plenty of muppets that DO fall for all the sales spiel bollocks and drop a grand on these and then think they're better than everyone else. 😆
Judging by how they sound, I'd say that at 'just' £330 for the set (the price of 1 of these pickups) they'd still be way overpriced, because at the end of the day there isn't a huge amount between the resistance values of copper v silver wire, which is why almost all of the wires and cables on the planet are made from copper, and pickups wound with silver wire sound no better or worse than ones wound with copper wire. 👍
Right. Even guitar center has 18 models of electric guitars that range from $15k-$50k. Some people like to spend money even if it is wasteful.
Good pots or specific ones make a huge difference
Love the honesty! I’d like to hear more clean tones but that’s just my personal preference. Big fan of the channel
, keep it up!
Yeah, me too. The "clean" tone used here was as clear as mud.
920 D is a great company I bought a loaded pick guard from them and the push pull pot went bad they sent a new pot for me right away no questions ask was easy fix only 2 wires to soldier, and the pick guard is awesome DiMarzio Twin Rail Cruisers in neck and middle with Tone Zone Bridge turned my Fender HSS MIM into a beast.
waited till i watched the whole vid and your take on the sound and i agree not a game changer at all. on the other hand there are some values about the pickups we dont know like the ohms of the windings the type of insulating coating on the silver wire. what was mentioned was that the wire was thin so it was easy to have a more uniformed windings on the bobin anyone following me here? 6,200 ohms is the same no matter what the wire is made of so the same resistance to emf, the only other thing is the messy boogie with its un-focused overdrive tone that would take an engineer with a million dollars worth of studio gear to clean up ha ha
You think those are expensive pickups? Just wait for DiMarzio to launch their limited line of Platinum wired pickups!
Lol the pickup would be the worst. Platinum has a very high resistance lol
With amber potting !
A few years back I put some Seymour Duncan Five-Two pickups into my old Strat @ $75 each. $225 for 3. I think they are better sounding than the stock pickups, but it is all subjective matter of taste etc. I am happy with them. I even think they sound better than the silver. I must be silly. I use a 25 year old Blues Deluxe amp. Tube city. And a line 6 modeling amp. And an Acoustic bass amp. I like my tone.
The socks 😭
I agree with you Daz, they are nice, but nothing new/special! I am guessing silver wire would NOT be as bright with a bit lower resonant peak.
Kinda 'meh', I stick with my custom wound D'Urbanos from Oz!
Hi Darrel I'm from India...
I'd like to have one of your mod guitar, if you're willing can you please ship me one. I'm a big fan of you I keep watching your videos repeatedly...
Can you please help me with a guitar I'm requesting you. Pleaseeeeee
I appreciate your honesty. You could've easily said that they're worth their high price tag, but you were just honest about your opinion. Great stuff man!
Also wish I could play like you
Hey Darrell, I really do appreciate your honesty. If I had money running out my butt I would probably buy a set. I thought they sounded exceptionally well. I don't think I will ever afford such a luxury as these unless the price dropped completely out the bottom. They do sound good though. Do you reckon Ol' Dave of Pink Floyd could squeeze some long cryin' bended notes on a set these? I agree with you that they do sound excellent... But, I don't think they are really worth such a high cost. I hope the folks at Seymour Duncan don't get too mad at you for giving an honest opinion. Thanks for being an honest person.
You can put any cheap guitars in SRV's hands & fingers and I'm sure 100% they will sound way more expensive than those fancy silver pickups...
It sounded so beaitiful. I almost cried... must buy item
Hi Darrel
The difference between copper to silver conductivity in room temperature is less than 6%. I'm not sure that this is something you can feel...
Yep, they're functional pickups. We're in audiophile, silly territory here.
Shane Semler Sorry, not even close to audiophile silly! The "state of the art" ac power cord for an amp is over $1000 and $10000 buys a dac. A sota capacitor (Daelund) can cost $1000. These products are not for the masses and are for those who equate pride of ownership with owning very expensive gear.
@@kirarittberg5088 Errm... aren't you the person berating me on this thread for making essentially the same point? And defending the manufacturers for their "creativity"?
@@kirarittberg5088 so basically guitar player equivalent of solid gold toilet.
"Ooh wow I wonder how much the world's most expensive pickups can possibly cost"
*less than my graphics card*
". . . . am I a bad person"
It depends on the gauge & quality of the silver SD use for these. Silver with fewer impurities or single crystal structure will provide a purer signal...the same is true for copper.
The purest thing about this statement is the nonsense. It would be extraordinarily difficult, if not impossible, to manufacture a true single crystal in the form of a long thin wire. Anyone claiming to sell such a thing is FOS. Even if you could make this wire, it would cease to be a single crystal the moment you bent it. And why would you even try? The conductivities of copper and silver single-crystals are the same as their poly-crystalline forms. Just the opinion of a physicist who researched molecular interactions on single-crystal metallic substrates.
To esoteric for me. They will have a short life. Sweet build. But impractical for the working man.....
Gain setting almost sounded like there was a bit of octave going on there. Very nice!
hand wound is a snake oil gimmick. It's not like you're hand carve an archtop guitar where the luthier constantly listens for overtone as he carves it down.
And then says "OOOPS. I carved too far".
As if!
Like a hand carved Turkey lol
The cheapest Chinese pickups are probably hand wound. Some dude feeds the wire onto a spinning pickup frame. Far cheaper than making a machine to automate the whole process.
@@Meddled While simultaneously winding another with the wire running through his sandals. These are the highly-sought "Footwound" pickups and sell for up to $3.50.
Not expensive enough for a man of my means and status.
You need the custom ones with mammoth ivory bobbins and moon rock magnets.
Malagoli pickups sound very close and cost a fifth of the price of these pickups. ´
There are a lot of hype around famous brands, and unjustified, for sure.
MALAGOLI SEMPRE!!!
Silver tarnishes which can result in arcing, especially if it's really hot, and it lowers resistance; and no discussion of the number of windings or an overall mass comparison. It looks like these are pretty shiny so they might be nickel-plated, which kind of defeats the purpose. Also, heat is biggest problem for lowering resistance, far more than the difference between copper vs. silver, but is resistance was really an issue for quality sound anyway? If so, a better idea would be pick-ups that are temperature controlled - air or water-cooled, IMO.
A good demo and a honest review/opinion; thanks Darrell!
I’ve spent a lot more money than $1000 on strat pickups. It was just five or six sets, not one, and some of them were shipped in a complete guitar, not just a fancy box. I’d love to hear the Zephyrs compared to the new Fender Ultra Strat singles. If the SD’s sound better, it might be cheaper to upgrade pickups than entire guitars.
The next video:
The poorest guitar yter of the world
Thank you, Darryl for "running interference" for the rest of us!
At that price point I was in no danger of going into debt buying these pickups- but it sure was nice of you to give us a taste of what they sounded like! Also, I trust your opinion that they are not worth the expense!
Thanks, again!
4 pounds of silver ($15/ou.) is worth $1000. Just saying.........
super responsive and dynamic sounding,man i want them