6 string pickup shootout. No bull, no frills.

[Edika]

If you have the chance to get your hands on one, try the Tonerider Octane! It's one of the cheaper pickups but it sounds surprisingly good! It's mid-hot output, a lot of clarity and really good for lower tunings as it's semi-scaterwound. I got it not expecting much but was always curious about it and it went way over my expectations!

 

[KnightBrolaire]

For the sake of posterity I'll update this thread with the stuff I posted in the dyad thread.

Initial thoughts: From what I can tell so far it's a pretty hot and compressed pickup. Low end is pretty tight and chug friendly. The high end is pretty cutting but not quite icepicky. Overall clarity is very good, even down to drop A. Split tones aren't anything spectacular, but they're not bad either. Parallel mode is slightly cleaner but it's still pretty hot.




Final thoughts: Low end is pretty responsive and chug friendly, though there is some smearing in the lows, kind of like a black winter. It's more noticeable in lower tunings but in general the pickup holds up down to even F#EADF#B (yes that's the same low F# as the F# on an 8 string). The midrange is kind of throaty/grindy but still with that typical Duncan upper mid spike found in the Distortion/JB/Custom. The high end is pretty clear and cutting, but not quite icepicky imo.
Output wise it feels very hot, like hotter than a Black Winter. It has a fair amount of compression and push to it.
Split tones are mediocre for the most part but they do offer some spankiness and twang that's unattainable otherwise. The south coil is a bit spankier and more single coil esque, but isn't anything special compared to other duncans with more useful split sounds. The split tones just aren't worth installing imo. I only had access to them because of the tripleshot pickup rings. The parallel mode cuts some output and generally sounds a bit cleaner, which works well for lower gain options or when you need even more clarity under high gain. The pickup does not react well to volume swells for the most part, but it can be kind of cleaned up by rolling back the volume. The clean tones aren't anything special either.

The F30 vid should be up tomorrow.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

F30 vid is up:

 

[KnightBrolaire]

FSM /Dyad video: