All user reviews of 4/5 for the DiMarzio DP155 The Tone Zone

I had in the bridge position on a guitar made in japan in ash, maple neck and rosewood fingerboard.
I tried to put it in the neck position, testing the standard config (series) but also split and parallel config, and although the series is very nice config.
Of course, my guitar is pretty high-mid focus but the microphone down 1-2mm pickguard balance volume with the bridge pickup is great.
Full bass, low-mids that add to the character of the guitar and it is balanced very well with a double-whammy DP150 in bridge (tone 500kohms and 22nF).
on the other hand, it was not a config really versatile, but it's worth it if it was not a single scratch ...
A guitars!

The ToneZone is one of DiMarzio’s more popular pickups. In fact, I think this was one of their first batch of pickups that really seemed to catch on in the pickup swapping world. This was a pickup extremely prevalent in the 80s. It is a standard four conductor humbucker that can be wired various different ways, depending on how the user wants to run this. Personally, I like to just run pickups in series, but these hotter pickups also enjoy being run in split coil mode. The pickup itself is extremely powerful and has some strong low end, along with some very strong midrange. You’ll want to experiment with the pickup height when you get this. A lot of people seem to run it too close to the strings, and it causes the sound to be a bit too extreme at times. Those who are into the rock and metal genre will love this pickup, and it seems to really get along with alder bodied guitars. It works nicely in basswood, but you have to really be careful of the midrange that’s going on. Those who are into blues and jazz will probably not care for this too much as it’s a bit too compressed and powerful for those genres. I’ve heard that Paul Gilbert used to run this in parallel for a different tone, but I never bothered trying it that way. I did try splitting this with a five way switch. I used the Suhr style wiring with the inner coil split along with the neck pickup, and it gave me some of the best cleans I’ve ever heard. To do this, you’ll want to have one of those multi-pole five way switches or megaswitches. You can find diagrams online on how to wire it up like this. Give it a go if you’re looking for something with more low end and grinding midrange.

Wasn't sure what to expect with this one. I usually gravitate towards boutique pick-ups like Suhr and Motor City but this was on sale at Guitar Center so I figured it was worth a try. I put it in a Charvel So Cal and was pleasantly surprised. I have to say the mids are near perfect with this pick up. You get a great mid-range grind like your favorite 80s hair metal song. Great response and articulation of the notes. Harmonics fly off of the fret board, almost the perfect pick up if you like 80s hair metal and even harder stuff. Lead tones are great and it really cuts through in a live mix. Some pick-ups get lost in the rhythm section but not the Tone Zone. Definitely has a bit of a pissed off characteristic to it which I find the most appealing feature. Whatever the mid frequency range is, I wish I could merge that with the bass of something like the suhr Aldrich bridge pick up. The only issue I can see is the bottom is a bit flubby to me. Definitely has the chunk but it is a loose sound. If that could be tightened up somehow, this would be a perfect pick up. That being said it runs pretty good with my Mototrcity Detroiter and Suhr Aldrich to the point where I have not taken it out. I have played this before in a buddy’s Les Paul and I recall feeling the same way, that something on the bottom wasn’t quite working perfectly. Bottom line is that for the price this is a damn good pick up, not perfect but very good and for the price almost can't be beat. I would say as far as stock pickups go, this and the JB do the job pretty well. This seems to be a bit hotter than the JB which I like. Go get one, you won’t be disappointed overall for the price.

Well at any boost level we feel cash, even when the microphone is accurate saturated ca also sounds great in clear, warm sound is a wish, this microphone really punch. J I replaced my EMG hz on my Korean Ibanez EDR 470ex (Luthite body) by this tone zone, the sound is a little more specific before that, bcp more powerful, the most obvious c cot is really the sound boost . C is a good mic 85. J have an air norton in the neck area and the tone fits perfectly with not mico c is a good but not typ I think I made a good choice, the sound is somewhat "neutral" c may be my only regret, I looking for something more typical that said it fits perfectly with my guitar is ca c Kler and I'm still satisfied. In any case the microphone is supercharged and it jumps to the ears on. Also it is very versatile, I repeated bah lol but this microphone is in Excellent clear sound of my ca surprised, moreover, compared to my old micro and c is saturated bah Kler it is hard to say lol but everyone ca know =). If you are looking for a typical micro not really hot enough precise and relatively well-bah boost c is the microphone that you need I think. (Excelente combi Air Norton and Tone Zone, it is done for the other one is Kler c) Well I take back my guitar, the fact of having to talk makes me want to play

I used this mic several years.

It possde normment bass, good midrange trs, trs well Submitted and little treble. It is far from aggressive as a microphone HS-6 example. It gives a big sound plutt clean. It is really trs trs prcis, compress enough (but not too!) And the grain is very modern and fairly smooth talking rendering "Hi-Fi". Some can see a perfect sound, the other a cold lack of life, or even charming personality. Sr is that it is not "rock'n'roll"!
With its standard output level, it is clearly orient mtal modern.
The palm-mute and stand are percuttant trs trs well.

I did not notice because it is too "bright" (light) for serious tuning (If I'm in now), and I think it sounds a bit soft. On top of that I do not like the grain too smooth and perfect.

For me, DiMarzio has been innovating and our answer to the expectations of a lot of people with this microphone, if that is what we seek, possde an excellent quality price.
But it can be used to fawn on larger guitars hardwood as frne and stocky, which show a lot of treble and little bass to balance it all.
It is also intended to modern shredders because lgato leave it alone and lack of personality made him one allows enough "neutral" after all.

Excellent micro, but to choose according to the guitar and the style that we develop. I'm a fan of Di Marzio, accuracy, their alleged lack of personality that finally let your sound out of the instrument. Of course there are always caveats (yes, that's not music?). For metal rhythm, do not worry. To think outside the box with more polyavalence and especially for the soloists, turn up the guitars on ash or linden (basswood). Question her, it is not as limited as you think. Its only limitation is the guitar itself. I am not convinced by use of gibson, mahogany but is not insurmountable if one has a handle threaded maple key (indifferent), or an easel. on the other hand, alder does not favor for my taste (the microphone eq and wood does not complete but rather is increasing too in the mid and lower medium). Perhaps with a floyd and a maple fingerboard ...

In rhythm, it is wickedly efficient, more rock than metal for that matter. For clean sounds, the lord and some engineers have laid the volume knob ... If your religion does not forbid it, use you, it's worth it. As for the solos (depending on type of wood and bridge) it's more efficient, very compelling rock and Rondat convinced me to shred it also does so (even plugged directly into a bandit 112, n ' did not look uncomfortable ... lol!)

In summary, very good microphone, with the punch, but not suitable for all guitars.

I use it for about 6 months on my Ibanez MC300 Musician. A skyscraper in mahogany with a handle through Saddle.
With this microphone so I harmonics trs trs that take a long time (like many 25seconde, without cheating with Feedback ...), a full-well distortion of its kind mastoc cinderblock. Prcis with all frquences he ct an implacable, trs fair enough, sharp may be a little cold, a little dark. It sends it's all wood, but it does it well. He possde high dynamics and it is certainly possible to spend a clean crunch well saturated with just the shade to mdiator, note however, if the tone volume is satisfactory, there is almost no diffrence between a stamp that could be her sweet trs crmeux its strong and it could be more slamming, it happens all the time its just the same crmeux. It is not great in fact alive.
For large rhythmic rock, hard and mtal is nickel. I wanted a microwave with a lot of potatoes in distortion and trs prcis is Winning Good I realize now that I prfrer sound a bit more rock'n'roll , a little singing, a little more inspiring than this block, l but these are my tastes, I have the wrong microphone.
It gives a nice clean plutt in single, not funky but quite harmonious. Kind of quiet and nice, there is some nuance in the tone, but it's still a. Double acute lack of it on my guitar and it is obvious for someone like me who deuxime his guitar is a Start. I am forced to compromise with my amp if I want to keep the attack and the prsence tonezone stratum without being too garish carrment during the same concert.
Well it's a good mic for large distortion that not all slime which is hard rock and mtal to sound a little lightweight is better to take something else.

It's a good mic so I could have 10. I do not like it then I could have 4 ... I put 7 / 10 because in absolute terms it is doing its job as well prcise rhythm heavy for me even if it lacks sharp and feeling and so versatile.

It might be better on a guitar with wood more acute ... As I had Norton a run I'm the change and found a sound that is much closer to what I wanted. These two pickups are similar not bad, but Norton is a bit more singing, almost funky as a single and more connections with my Start. So I put my neck tone area (yes I know strange) and whether duplicate this position is too powerful carrment it offers a single crmeux his wish and trs trs pr cis which is often the default position handle which tend to promote the sound drooling ... Good not bad but not great, I prferais the Norton ...

Im am in a small group of guitar players that use the Dimarzio Tone Zone pickup in the neck position of a guitar but it is also good in the bridge position, as it should be because that was where it was designed to go.. The Tone Zone came out in 1991 and immediately was known for its vowel like open wah sound. There is a story going around that EVH helped design the pickup and I tend to believe this. When you play with it in the bridge you cant help but think of those 80s metal tones with the loads of chorus on them. In the bridge position of a guitar with a brighter wood it would be really good for 80s metal or even modern metal when used with the right amp and rig. I use an X2N in the bridge so I had to find a pickup that would have similar volume and output so I wouldn’t have a big drop in volume switching from the bridge to the neck. I found that some players have matched the Tone Zone to the X2N so I decided to try it. In the neck the Tone Zone produces a laser like sound. It does not get overly muddy and is perfectly smooth but not so smooth that it gets lost in the mix. The pickup is voiced with a lot of low end so in guitars of certain woods it may begin to sound muddy. With all the mids the Tone Zone had it sometimes sounds as if you are playing with a wah on during your lead playing. This is why the Tone Zone gets a split opinion among guitar players. Some players like this tonal quirk and other players do not. So if you are looking for a neck pickup that matches well with a super hot bridge pickup the Tone Zone may be the way to go.

Installed in the bridge position of a Carvin dc127 with and Alder and maple body matched with a maple neck and ebony board. Typically running into a Framus Cobra head and sometimes A Peavey 5150 or Hughes and Kettner triamp.

This pickup was recommended to me by a couple guitar playing friends of mine when I was looking to get out of the EMG active sound. I always check how a pickup sounds clean first to get a general idea of the EQ. I was really impressed with the clean tone of this especially considering I always hate the sound of bridge pickups clean. The pickup is warm and full and sounded kind of similar to my neck pickup which was a stock carvin at the time. I played around with the height for a bit and found I liked it best close to the strings to get a little more bite out of it.

Switching over to distortion and I quickly realized it wasn't going to work for what I do with this guitar. Low gain sounds were great and the pickup cleaned up nicely with the volume knob. The problem for me was with higher gain settings and faster chord riffing. Leads were still great sounding with high gain but riffs in the lower register were too muddy and lacked attack. The pickup just has too much fullness (sounds crazy I know) almost like the amp was getting too much signal even though it's not that hot of a pickup. Slow chugging riffs were very fat but any type of typical metal playing just didn't have the cut I need.I played around with the EQ settings for quite a while and got the pickup closer to what I need but after extensive tweaking I just felt it was not a good match. Once you start cutting bass and adding high mids with an EQ pedal the pickup starts to lose it's core sound and sound a little over processed.

If you're looking for a pickup versatile in the clean to mid gain styles I'd say give it a shot because it has a great character it just didn't do metal for me

The DiMarzio ToneZone is one of the most famous pickups to ever come out of the DiMarzio line. It’s an iconic pickup used by the likes of Paul Gilbert, Ron Thal, Vinnie Moore, Michael Romeo and a plethora of others. This is the pickup featured in most of the top of the line Ibanez J-Custom guitars, as well. It features four conductor wiring, slugs on one coil, adjustable screws on the other and an Alnico 5 magnet to help make everything sound huge without sounding sterile.

The ToneZone is the solution for those that want a fat sounding high output pickup with tons of mids but still need some dynamics going on. The ToneZone responds nicely to both hard and soft picking, as demonstrated by the ultimate alternate picking guitarist Paul Gilbert on many of his albums and instructional videos. It sounds nice split, and it cleans up when you roll the volume knob down.

This pickup is definitely a love/hate pickup. Those that love it really adore its strong low end and pushed midrange. The dynamics are also a welcome addition when so many other high output pickups can’t clean up to save their lives. Those that hate it think it is too hot and has too many mids. I have mixed feelings about this pickup, and I think it comes down to the wood. You need to match this with just the right guitar, or else it’ll sound too hyped in a certain frequency. I find that neutral to brighter woods tend to work better than those that are a bit darker in tone. This helps prevent any unnecessary amplification of the pickup’s already strong bass. If you have a brighter guitar, it would be a pickup worth testing out. Even if you dislike it, it’s a pretty easy pickup to sell on the used market, especially to Ibanez guys.

I used this mic on an art that I paid 120 passive.Le microphone has a presence and a very strong personality, he is clearly a big fat smooth but a little fuzz there is more rhythm oriented very serious and specific medium a tight side (pressure compressed what ^ ^) in this spectrum, lacks a bit of thrash saturation (at high) Palm Mute does not come out very well because of his hump in the low medium and low are already there (hard to explain). With my guitar it was a big grunt versatile but not perfect for the grunge punk fuzzz blues. used in preference to a wooden sounding treble (ash lite ash) for more versatility in addition to splits. Mudhoney to play the Sunn in any case it will not tear your ears with too much treble here is fun