Tone caps of different materials in a guitar = different tones?

[Silvertone Jockey]

Hey, I've (home) made the same kind of thing with a roto-switch at the end of the cable going to my pedalboard for stage ! Each "step" brings the capacitive equivalent of an added lenght of cable thx to styroflex caps...

There's a world to explore in "cable capacitance emulation", "coily cords modeling" and so on. Thx for the link!

FWIW, the question asked in this poll was not related to any "advice": I don't recommend any cap (my own personal guitars are all fitted with different ones... when they have a tone pot). I'm just intrigued by the "paradox" of these capacitors-supposed-to-sound-the-same-while-so-many-musicians-say-the-contrary. That's why I've started experiments then involved other persons in the question.

I for one would be interested in reading the results of your research. If nothing else it's a starting point to to try the top picks and then draw my own conclusions

[freefrog]

I find it interesting that things like the Tone-Styler ( Stellartone - ToneStyler <I>GUITAR</I> ) have become popular for the way in which they can alter the pickup's voice, yet they use teeny SMD caps, and nobody EVER does "shootouts" of SMD tone caps, or compares SMD to thru-hole types.

AFAIK, low ESR capacitors are not often commented either (?) SMD components have been took in account here although they are not easy to test in a guitar circuit for obvious reasons. :-/

[freefrog]

I for one would be interested in reading the results of your research. If nothing else it's a starting point to to try the top picks and then draw my own conclusions

The right way to share anything seems less and less easy to find but we'll try...

[J M Fahey]

AFAIK, low ESR resistors are not often commented either (?) SMD components have been took in account here although they are not easy to test in a guitar circuit for obvious reasons. :-/

A low ESR resistor is either an oxymoron (99.9%) or a shorted resistor (0.01%).

Pick one.

[freefrog]

A low ESR resistor is either an oxymoron (99.9%) or a shorted resistor (0.01%).

Pick one.

LOL - Sorry, the TV got me distracted. Low ESR capacitor...

[km6xz]

Not enough information to make a choice in the poll but obviously that was not the purpose of the poll. The purpose obviously was to ask for opinions as to whether one imagined there would be a difference. Musical instruments and reproduction systems are not often tested in reasonable tests to isolate factors that might be in play. A more answerable question is, take two "identical" guitars, swap cap in one, can the audience tell a difference. Yes and no. No, if not pre-alerted to a potential difference, and Yes, probably if they are expecting a difference.
A much harder question to answer is what difference a cap makes. The problem with answering that is that the complex interrelated, interdependent elements that make up the listener's experience has millions of elements that must be controlled for. It has never been done fully and no one would bother. The goal of manufacturers is to sell something at a profit and the more the mystery the better for them. End users only care about total result of all those millions of simultaneously changing elements interacting on one hand and getting on forums and arguing about caps or tubes based on nothing more concrete than a hope, guess or assumption.

All the tests discussed reveal nothing since too many variables are left in the loop, the least controllable one is the player who has the most influence on results, swamping any differences a cap or cable could introduce. Even reamping has its limitations. Why not just play what you have that is enjoyable and forget chasing something that does not mean anything in the long run? A few master class lessons would more than overshadow any results from capacitor swaps. That is, unless fiddling with parts is the real hobby that just tangentially is related to music. There are gear heads and players and very very seldom the same person.

[g1]

Those are good points Stan, but also, in my opinion any component change that the player likes regardless of whether it is strictly psycho-somatic or real, will work to the players advantage to help improve the playing.
Placebo effect can be a very powerful thing.

[tedmich]

There are gear heads and players and very very seldom the same person.

quite true! I remember a guy posting (here or HC?) about speaking with Alan Holdsworth after a concert and quizzing him on his gear. He was dumbfounded when the Yorkshire Terror couldn't tell him what exact 12AX7 he had in his preamp!

(Ayrton Senna probably didn't know the brand of piston ring in his engine either)

[guitician]

I walk into a music store knowing that all this stuff really only differs in it's style/aesthetic and that any tone I hear is all just a psycho-acoustic illusion.
I'm looking for a capacitor and go into the electronics distributor and there's not a sound anywhere... I ask the clerk "Can I hear some of your best capacitors?"
So he comes back with a nice looking Orange-Drop and starts tapping the counter with it..."Hows this?"

[Tooboob]

Those are good points Stan, but also, in my opinion any component change that the player likes regardless of whether it is strictly psycho-somatic or real, will work to the players advantage to help improve the playing.
Placebo effect can be a very powerful thing.

I don't understand why doctors don't prescribe Placebos more often. They are equally effective on all maladies, and they don't have any known side effects.

The patent must have run out. They certainly have a better name than Acifex.

[überfuzz]

I don't really try to listen to how a changed cap in the tone department of my amplifiers affect the tone. If I want to tinker with the tone I mess about with the EQ, or opt for an other instrument, or sometimes a different speakers. However, there are ways for caps to make me ridiculously happy, long lifespan.

[LtKojak]

I'm just intrigued by the "paradox" of these capacitors-supposed-to-sound-the-same-while-so-many-musicians-say-the-contrary.

Some years back I've conducted a blind test to see what was exactly the reason people would pay such big money for old PAFs.

When they knew they were playing the old PAF, everybody said that it was the best they've ever tried.

When blindly listening to the samples, from 1 to 10, the old PAFs ranked 6 and below.

For the record, nobody even recognized his own guitar.

I'm pretty sure it's the same with caps. I personally use Orange drops, Vitamin Qs and Mallorys. All polyester film in oil caps. Should last a lifetime and a half without losing its nominal value.

HTH,

[J M Fahey]

I don't understand why doctors don't prescribe Placebos more often. They are equally effective on all maladies, and they don't have any known side effects.

The patent must have run out. They certainly have a better name than Acifex.

Oh! ..... they DO !!!!

My Father was a Doctor, a Country Doctor at that, and he knew very well his patients mindset.

Some were slightly annoyed when he sent them home after a checkup with just good advice, such as "smoke less and that cough will stop" , and they asked "so you won't prescribe me any medicine at all"? ,vaguely feeling cheated.

So he had an assortment of various coloured pills ready for such cases and told them" "take one of these every night, but for it to have any effect, you must not have smoked during the day" ..... worked like a charm.

When he got his degree, he visited the town "healer" .
She , who knew him since he was a child , asked him: "Ephraim, please don't denounce me to the Police, I beg you
He laughed and said:
"Colleague (she almost fainted when she heard that) , we are both in the same business.
I know most of my patients also visit you.
I trust you to have some practical knowledge about Medicine.
Those which you can cure with mumbo jumbo (which are many), please do ... but if somebody comes, green skinned, with a liver tumor or something similar .... send him to me right away, please don't let him waste valuable time"

AFAIK this arrangement worked very well until she died.

In some cases, he even gave her real medicines, and asked her to crush and mix them with some patient's "snake oil".

Funny thing is that most medicines are very bitter or foul tasting, but when mixed with some fake one, they *expected* something like that and the worse tasting were psychologically considered the best.

Wonders of the Human mind

[Kobaia]

I voted no. The science isn't very well understood, as far as I can see, in the context of passive guitar circuitry. It is understood even less by those that appear to defend magic 'tone caps' the most. Yet, the concept of expensive tone caps is pushed by those that usually have a harness or two to sell, or (presumably) feel the need to justify spending well over the odds on a piss-basic electronic component you don’t even ‘hear’ in the circuit. The worst example I see is on the Les Paul forums, but then those guys claim that Gibson's decision to start putting trussrods in plastic sheaths somehow kills tone. Quite how you can be a tone connoisseur when you favour 24.75 ‘’, mostly-mahogany mud machines, played through amps with baked-in EQ curves beats me. Hey, nothing sounds like a ‘50s Sprague Bumble Bee apparently. Listen to these clowns;

“I normally use Orange drops for the smooth tone under overdrive, however I recently discovered Jensen PIO caps. they make a radical difference to the tone to my ears.

Really articulate, with a lot more harmonics (something I've always found Orange drops flatten out a little), a little bit of fizziness/crunch under drive which really sharpens things up.”

I don’t trust anybody that shells out $100+ for a couple of capacitors but won’t spend $5 on a meter that would actually give us the vital stats.

[Kobaia]

De-Bunking Myths About Capacitors - MyLesPaul.com

Check this out! A guy that sells overly expensive wiring looms just happens to have written a capacitor FAQ...

Myth #3 Do all capacitors sound the same and there is no way that one type can make your guitar Tone sound better?

Many electronic experts will tell you that there is no scientific explanation of why paper in oil capacitors will give you better Tone when used in a guitar circuit. But it is a well known fact in the guitar community that paper in oil will be warmer, smoother and have more "Sparkle" than ceramic disc, mylar or polypropylene capacitors. The original Bumble Bees and Black Beauties were paper in oil and thought of by many to be the "Holy Grail" of Tone as far as capacitors go.

Well what to electronic experts know over and above the empirical knowledge of half-deaf tone lawyers who can play the intro to Had To Cry Today and Funk #49. Also, "sparkle" and "smooth" are contradictory non-scientific stock phrases.

Why can none of these clowns write 22nF or 47nF?