Hum/Noise Reduction for Guitars?

[Ben Johnson]

Are there any practical methods (that cost little or nothing) besides tone-sucking eliminators/hush devices?

 

[cobhc]

making sure everything in your guitar is shielded, and making sure you use good quality cable's should keep it to a minimum, but like always, high gain amps will produce some noise/hiss without a noise gate

 

[metalkingdom]

Active pickups.

 

[Flat Fifth Fury]

A main source of noise/hum is power related. If you have power lines crossing your audio cables that often enduces hum/noise. If you look at the wiring of pro rigs you will note that all the power cables are kept to the opposite side of the rig/rack than the audio cables. Also try to keep all the cables as short as possible - they do act as antennas dispite their shielding. Also use well shielded cables, both power and audio. Never coil an audio cable as that often produces an inductance coil which adds noise. Have your amp adjusted with now noise preamp tubes. Use at least a good power conditioner if not a regulated power supply. Get rid of every wall-wart powersupply and replace them with a single multi-tap power supply - they are notorious for creating magnetic fields in your rig that is picked up by every thing (I got rid of mine a while ago and my rig instantly became whisper quiet and no longer needed noise reduction). Your rig will be very quiet if you do the above.

As for the wiring, a well built rig/rack will look like this:

 

[Lopes]

I like the johnnie's super special power transformer box, I've heard that it's quite a step up from the regular special power transformer box.

 

[Kazrog]

Even with good wiring, at gigging volumes you will need noise reduction if you are playing anything resembling fast/tight metal with lots of stops. I am incredibly happy with my new ISP Decimator rack, having tried the Boss NS-2 and Rocktron units, the ISP Decimator is the best on the market.

 

[marcust]

hey,
i use the boss ns2 no problems sucking out tone with it also owned a hush rack
also very good

 

[Kazrog]

hey,
i use the boss ns2 no problems sucking out tone with it also owned a hush rack
also very good

The Boss NS-2 doesn't suck tone, but it does cut off notes when I'm playing lead, forcing me to do tremolo picking and other chagnes to my solos to get the sustain I need. The ISP doesn't, I can leave it on full-time.

 

[Jackal_Strain]

How 'bout the pedal version of the decimator? Any thoughts?

 

[Carcass29]

I use one of these bad boys in my chain....
http://cgi.ebay.com/Hush-Systems-THE-PEDAL-noice-reduction-pedal_W0QQitemZ7392257318QQcategoryZ22669QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
6505+> Boss DD5 in the loop> Front of 6505 Boss TU-2> Rocktron Hush. keeps everything nice and quiet