GFS

To be honest, at first I was very excited about these pickups, they surely sound better than the original pickups on my Squier Telecaster Custom. However, with hindsight, I must admit that they aren't as good as I thought they were. They surely sound good, and if you don't have too much experience, they do their job, but with time you turn more demanding and they simply aren't enough anymore. The clean and crunch sounds are good, they are great to play blues! The distortion isn't bad either, powerful and neat, but it lacks mids, for my taste. I feel it lacks something, the sound isn't "whole," and that's what drives me mad about these pickups and why I want to upgrade my Squier with better pickups (Seymour Duncan or similar). But don't get me wrong, they are not crappy, if you set them right, they sound fine, Hi-Gain-like without a doubt, but they sound fine. I think they would be perfect for someone who plays metal! In terms of value for money, I don't think you can do any better than this brand! Everything is relative, at this price point you shouldn't be expecting any miracles, and I think these pickups do their job well! In short, I recommend these pickups to people on a tight budget, but if you have the choice, go for something more high-end :)

I've been using these pickups for six months on a Squier classic vibe. The quality is amazing, considering their price. The guitar has been transformed. I have the powerful and vintage sound I was looking for. There's no loss of precision in the middle positions, but it's perfect for blues, country rock, all styles I play. Here are a couple of examples with a Pod HD : Middle pickup for the solo and middle positions for the rhythm parts: http://www.riffworld.com/Members/chavilbus/twistnroll Neck pickup: http://www.riffworld.com/Members/chavilbus/chicagobluesjam Bridge pickup: http://www.riffworld.com/Members/chavilbus/oceanwalkaway ou en Crunch http://www.riffworld.com/Members/chavilbus/slidingonthecountryside Just a detail, the caps are white "new," so I had to change them for "aged white" to keep a consistent look. I have already bought them again, for my Telecaster Squier Classic Vibe.

-I'm not a "pro," but have enough experience with a soldering iron in my hands, which is why I often end up servicing guitars, like all people from my generation, those from the mid 1900's... - In jazz, electric guitars had just taken over the place of brass instruments, bluesmen coveted the Twin 57 and Bassman combos to explode into what would become rock!! That's it exactly! We were expecting these pickups for an old 335'. -I installed these "neck plus bridge" pickups on an old 335 of a good old friend of mine, a USA Epiphone, whose electronics had reached its limits. I knew "GFS" existed, but nothing more...And the "Vintage" surprise... A very "clean" sound with a Fender, very detailed notes when playing solos and chords......Marshall, Orange and Vox, no problems with Brit rock, it crunches....65'70' They are obviously not identical to the GIBS'57 or S/DUCAN '55, but it makes no sense to try to rival or even "mimic" those two flagships. But you can use them as reference and comparison elements: And YES!!! They respond well to the pots, they really hold up well... They surely have encouraged us to discover other "GFS." Some people say the single-coil pickups of the excellent Squier/Vibe Strats and Telecaster are manufactured in the same factory?? Others say these are "Toneriders"... Does anybody have any info on that? - For such a ridiculous price, they are far from being bad, right? I'd say they are remarkable. And for newer generations...you lucky bastards, leaving aside the economic and social boomerang effects of the "Made In Asia" trend, they are dirt cheap. Indeed, for reasons you can guess, such ridiculously low prices may only play against them.

I bought this pickup some time ago to install it on an Epiphone Les Paul Standard. I relied on various reviews praising this pickup... So, yes, it's not bad, but nothing transcendental...Its sound lacks some balance. It becomes muddled, shrill pretty fast, which isn't what you expect from a supposedly "high gain" pickup. It's okay with clean and crunch sounds, but you can forget about it with OD or distortion...and I'm not talking about extreme gain levels. You need to fiddle with the mids and highs to improve things a bit, but even if you spend hours at it, it's far from being perfect. It bares no comparison to my standard reference, the Dimarzio Super Distortion, which is clean and sounds fine straight away! A pity...I have the impression that the reputation of GFS pickups is a bit superficial. It's the second time I bought their products and the second time I've been disappointed. Their value for money is okay, but the sound quality has nothing to do with the big brands (Dimarzio, Seymour Duncan...) They look great, they seem well built, but in the end, it's the sound that counts! In short, I wouldn't buy it again.

GFS pickups is a brand of pickups sold by a small online guitar parts store called GuitarFetish. They sell all sorts of brand name and no name parts for guitars. They are mostly known for their house brand pickups that are usually very cheap but perform quite well. This is one of their newer pickup models and it is kind of expensive for a GFS pickup. This pickup costs 35 dollars but that is about half of what you would pay for a comparable Dimarzio or Duncan. This is their Power Rails model and you can clearly see what pickup inspired this one. As a long time X2N fan I think it is pretty cool there is a budget alternative out there on the market in case I have a beater guitar that needs more power. Sometimes a guitar isnt worth dropping in a 70 dollar pickup in it. With these cheaper pickups you can do whatever. The bridge model has an output of about 16k which is really hot. The pickups are wax potted to cut down on the noise. This is important on a pickup like this where it is so hot. They also have four conductor wiring so you can split the coils. These pickups have a very modern high end sound to them. They are kind of like active pickups in sound. They have a thick sound with a high end crunch that gives you good clarity. If you are down tuning these pickups work well because they are not muddy at all and retain clarity. I like the bridge pickup but wouldnt recommend the neck pickup. For the neck you want something with a smoother tone to it. These pickups are made for riffs and metal not blues solos. GFS has other pickups that would work better in the neck position. If you are looking for a cheap way to pump up the power in your metal guitar this GFS Power Rails pickup will give your guitar a nice kick.

Bought a pair to put in a BYO LP body with push pull pots to play with the Jimmy Page wiring. These are described as "four wire with ground" yet they are not. They are shielded two wire with a coil tap. One wire is grounded to the shield, one wire is the signal, and one wire (the tap) is the start/stop between the two coils. This is not four wire. The base is no longer brass and is not stamped. Got these direct from GFS so no doubt about authenticity. The impedance measured correct at 8.0 for the neck and 8.3 for the bridge. The KwikPlug seemed to be built rugged enough and I've read about people with concern for failure. If you build a guitar with these and use the KP harnesses, you should be fine. The only problem that would come out of these is if you use the KP stuff with the intent of changing pickups periodically. It's not there for flexibility, it's there for ease of assembly. Not everybody has a solder iron or knows how to wire things up. The price is good, but the wiring prevented me from using these. They will end up in an Epi 335 clone which has 10 year old strings right now, so I cannot give an accurate assessment of tone on that guitar.

General: the Mean 90 is a P90 alnico vintage wound pickup. Output: the bridge pickup has an output of 8.8k. Color: I play a cream soapbar bridge model. Size: because it is a little larger than a regular single-coil, I had to alter the hole in the pickguard. Finish: flawless lushy cream that it's so beautiful I could eat it! Haha! Gear: the P90 is on the bridge position of a Fender Strat Made in Japan around 1989/1990. The strings are Earnie Ball 0.9. The amp is a Fender Sidekick 100b with a Fender Bassman cabinet with two 15' speakers. The pedals are Boss CS-2, GFS Greenie, Boss GE-7, Sansamp Classic. My history: I have been playing guitar for 13 years, played in a few rock bands, done countless garage sessions and recorded few tunes in studios. I have tried the Fender Tex-Mex (which I find organic), DiMarzio PAF Pro (a nice pickup, cuts through the mix, but it is not organic to me), DiMarzio Air Zone (lifeless, artificial and impossible to alter its sound), EMG HZ S1 (anti-organic, but extremely sensitive). Styles: Besides acoustic fingering and clean tone ballads, I play classic rock from the Beatles and grunge from Silverchair and Nirvana. I acquired a brand new pair of Mean 90 pickups at the shop of a renowned luthier from where I live (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil). Because there is plenty of import taxes and the currency is different from the dollar, I can only say the Mean 90 pickups are way below the price range of the famous brands as Seymour Duncan, EMG, DiMarzio, Fender, Gibson and so on. The finish is impeccable and the sound has a defined tonal characteristic when compared to DiMarzio, Fender, EMG and to really cheap pickups as the ones made in Indonesia and Taiwan in the early 1990's. Too middy, out of treble and too hard to alter its sound. It doesn't matter how much I turn down the 1.6k/800hz faders and turn up the 3.2k/6.4k faders of my Boss GE-7 pedal, the sound remains middy with no treble. The bass is ok. Between 0 and 10, I would say its treble is 4, its bass 7.7 and its mid is 9.5 It seems to be very sturdy when I hold it in my hand. However, I can't fully test its construction quality because I got used to take good care of the equipment. This pickup sounds to middy to me. There is absolutely no twang. Perhaps, it would sound better with a 6k output, but I'm not sure. I risk to say I know why John Lennon played a guitar with a pair of P90 pickups at the Roof Top Gig: because his amp was a Fender Twin. I believe a trebly amp as a Mesa Boogie or a Fender Twin/Deluxe would help the Mean 90 to sound balanced, but I have not tested this idea. I also believe it would be more suited to jazz than to rock n' roll. I will give it 4 because it is hard to alter its sound when compared to the Tex-Mex. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

It is a brown pedal 30% larger than a standard Boss pedal. Besides the input, output and 9v jacks, it has three knobs (volume, tone, gain), 3-way switch with different styles of distortion (compact, power and open) and a push/pull button for enabling/disabling the pedal. I have been playing for 13 years and despite writing songs, singing and playing guitar, I am yet to join a real band. I enjoy warm/organic/vintage sounds and atmosphere. I love the Beatles and Nirvana. In addition, I enjoy playing metal, though I do not write metal songs. I practice Metallica and Megadeth riffs from the 80's and early 90's. There is a luthier in my city who sells brand new equipment. So, I traded a Boss CS3 and a Boss DS2 for the Brownie. Just like a surfer searches for the perfect wave, I search for the perfect distortion. I am not truly satisfied with the distortion I get from Boss, so it was the time for changing. <a href="https://www.purevolume.com/develop">https://www.purevolume.com/develop</a> The Brownie is all analog and it is true-bypass. The circuitry is built inside a very sturdy lustrous chassis painted brown. The pedal is stable when on floor for its weight and larger-than-a-Boss dimensions. It looks less hi-tech than a Boss. The tone knob really dumps and clears the sound. The sound is very organic and articulate. It reminds me of Marshall combined with a Peavey. Nice AC/DC sound! It is true-bypass, which means it dos not alter the guitar sound when it is disabled. Middy. The notes sound fat when I want them to sound thinny. I tried the pedal with a Fender TexMex, an EMG S1 and a DiMarzio AirZone. The gain becomes too muddy when it is at max level. This pedal does not do slight overdrive, in fact, I think it is built for hard rock as Glenn Hughes. The 3-way switch sounded meaningless to me. I never caught the difference between those three options available. Even when the gain is on 3 or 4, I cannot identify each of the notes when I play a chord through a single coil. (Mentioned) It fits the bill perfectly for hard rock players of the 60's and 70's for its tonal character regarding the organic timbre and ful sound. It is amazing for humbucker pickups. This review was originally published on http://www.musicgearreview.com

GFS is a small online guitar parts store. They sell straps and bridges and stuff and also pickups. Their pickups are their most notable items. They have gained a bit of popularity among the budget guitar scene. Their most popular pickup is the GFS Crunchy PAT. I think the PAT in the name is a play on the old PAF name. These pickups are your typical hot rodded PAF but a lot better quality than what you would expect for less than 30 USD. The output on these pickups is 14k so they got a bit of punch to them. They also feature four conductor wiring so you can run them with split coils for single coil sounds if you felt like it. They have a hot rodded old school sound. They have the fat thick feel of an old PAF with enough output and hair on top to keep it from sounding muddy. These pickups are very well made for the price too. They are all properly potted and are not as noisy as you would expect from a cheap high output pickup. You can get these pickups in any look as well. You can get them with covers or you can get them uncovered. You can also pick from white bobbins to black bobbins to zebra bobbins. If you have a guitar and you know it needs some better pickups but the guitar just isnt worth shelling out 100 bucks for a Duncan or Dimarzio. These pickups are perfect for that. They are only around 25 bucks and they get you a good decent sound that is way better than what you get in most stock budget guitars. If these pickups had Seymour Duncan written on them people would gladly pay 60 or 80 dollars for them. But they dont and they only cost 22 dollars so you can easily but them in your beater or backup guitar without feeling like you just got ripped off.

The Alnico Fat Pat “Boutique” humbucker is my favorite humbucker by the relatively unknown GFS pickup company yet. They say it adds “meat” to your sound, and it does have a very good low end to it without being too bassy or thuddy. The high end of this pickup is clear, but not super detailed like a real boutique handwound pickup should be. The middle and low end is where this pickup really shines, it cuts very well. The pickup seems to be made well. According to their manufacturer it has alnico magnents, black Delrin bobbins, and nickel plated polepieces. It isn’t an overly hot pickup, but it has a little more juice than a regular vintage Patent Applied For (PAF) pickup found in vintage Gibsons would have. They are not equal to an old school Gibson pup, those are super for classic rock. What these have over the old Gibsons, is that they are wound just a tad hotter and potted very well. They are a very full sounding pickup and have just the right amount of edge to them to get a vintage vibe, but with more “meat” as they like to say. I have no problems with feedback and I run into a Marshall JCM2000 DSL with a decent amount of gain dialed in, it just sounds great. I also like that these are four wired pickups, that allow you to throw in a switch allowing access to the single coil as well as the humbucker tones. Now they don’t sound as good as a standard single coil, so don’t think you’re going to get great Strat tones out of your Les Paul, but they do a good approximation. I mostly stick on the bridge pup, so I don’t have a lot of experience with the neck pickup, but it’s very bluesy sounding and does a great Clapton styled “Woman Tone”. I have bought a few of these for different Les Paul and Paul Reed Smith styled guitars and I think it would be hard to find a better new bridge humbucker for 30 dollars.

The Dream 180 is a vintage voiced humbucker from GFS. They are available in different colors (black, gold, chrome) but mine is the gold version and I put it in a PRS styled guitar with a wrap around bridge and mahogany body. It is a very sweet looking pickup that seems to be built well but that’s about where I stopped loving this pickup. They based this off of the Dream 90 that was so popular for the company. The Dream 90 was a P90 pickup that was raved on the internet for it’s old school tone. Basically GFS tried to make a humbucker version that could match the vintage tone and feel of the Dream 90 and add some of the high end of their Retrotron Nashville line and the bottom end of their PAF pickups. They just came up with a humbucker that doesn’t do anything exceptionally well in my opinion. I like my pickups a little on the hot PAF side, like their Fat Pats, so I was a little let down in the performance of this pickup. GFS says that they wound them “Hot to accommodate modern playing styles” but I felt this pickup was underpowered and mostly just honked in the upper mid EQ and sounded muffled in the high end. I understand that this isn’t supposed to have that kind of output, but I was hoping that the clarity and body of the guitar would still be there. The pickup is fairly quiet electronically and goes into place without a hitch using the included wiring guide from GFS. The pickups just don’t capture that Filtertron tone because they are muffled on the top, and they don’t do PAF stuff well because they are just too thin sounding. String attack and dynamics are represented fairly well though. For 33 USD they aren’t a bad deal, but I wouldn’t bother with getting another one. My advise would to stick with putting it in the neck position. This might let you get a singlecoil-ish tone that you could be able to match in volume with a slightly hotter bridge pickup and get some decent tones. Overall I’d say go for the Fat Pat for a more versatile budget pickup that has several sweet spots and is the same price.

- Accurate to +/- 1cent - True Bypass - Solid construction - Bright Display - Multiple tuning modes - Outputs for Bypass and ouput - Powered by 9v battery of boss style adapter 9v (-) Couldn't be easier to use. Set it up, play guitar, tune. The two outputs are very useful. Bypass allows you to tune at all times, so you do not need to engage the pedal to check your guitar. The problem with this is your audience will also hear you tuning unless you have some form of killswitch later in your chain. Output is the standard tuner out, whereby engaging the pedal mutes the output signal, allowing you to tune without drawing attention to yourself. I should mention that while the pedal is very well constructed, the rubber plate on the back isn't glued down very well. The first time I applied velcro and then pulled it off my board ,the velcro pulled the rubber right off. After that, the battery compartment at the bottom was two high, so I had to remove the cover and cover the slot with velcro. Overall a small issue that doesn't detract from the value of the tuner, but deserves mention. The GFT-90 is an excellent tuner, both accurate and consistent. +/- 1 cent is about as accurate as you will need. It is quite a bit better than the former industry standard, the Boss TU-2 at +/- 3 cents. The tuner also responds pretty quickly which is helpful when you don't want to be taking more than a few seconds checking tune onstage. While there are more fast and accurate models out there, the GFT-90 will definitely get the job done. If you want a professional level, quality tuner without dropping a huge amount of money, this is what you are after. At $40 it is pretty difficult to beat. The only one I would take over this would be the ST-200 Turbo Tuner, but not very many people want to drop that kind of money. I've been using this one for a while now, and have been very happy with it.