I hear voices in my amp!?!

[rondo]

I'm trying to mic my guitar amp, and it seems the amp is picking up radio or tv signals PLUS alot of buzzing. I have nothing else on in the house (TV, radio or computer). I've tried different plugs in the room and nothing seems to help.

Anyone have any ideas or techniques on how to cut down the noize?

I'm running a mic into a small mixer, then into my hard disc recorder. I've noticed that if I turn the gain down on the mixer, and just boost the signal on the recorder it helps ... but I'm not eliminating the problem buzz and sounds of the amp.

The amp is a Fender Princeton Chorus (if that helps).

I dont remember ever hearing this much noise out of it, but it's my first time trying to record from it. Ususally it was just being used to play live through, so I dont know if I would have even noticed the noises or a buzzing....

HELP!!

[Newest User]

Hey, Its not like Ive never had that problem. Check for fluorecent lighting or a bad bulb somewhere. I would check to see if it happens on all of your outlets. If your using single coil pick-ups in a strat there will be some buzz. Another thing to check is a problem with grounding, my efx rack used to buzz really bad so I used a jumper wire from the rack to 1/4 plug on the guitar cord where it plugs into the guitar. Your guitar cord might have some bad soldering too. In alot of the cases where Iv had buzzes its been 2 or 3 problems all together.

Good luck


Peace,
Dennis

[heinz]

When I lived in Oak Park IL there was a Russian or Lithuanian radio station broadcasting about a block away. That shit would come through clear as a bell on any of my guitars when they were plugged into my amp or rockman units. It actually reached the point where I tried wrapping foil around my guitars, amps, even the room but no effect. Ultimately I ended up working the talking into my music, sounded pretty cool reversed.

[rondo]

N.U. - I'll check into everything you suggested. I never thought about lights .... I have the kind of lights where the switch is wired to one of the outlets. So there could be something going on there....

Heinz - I dont think there are any radio stations around me. I live out in the middle of nowhere. But that is an interesting approach! As Bugs Bunny used to say "If you can't beat em - join em"

That is interesting tho - I wonder what it is that happens when you plug a guitar into an amp that makes it such a good receiver?

Did you guys have any luck with different rooms? A certain brand of cord? A certain brand of aluminum foil ?

[TexRoadkill]

A couple tips.

If possible use a line conditioner with EMI/RFI filtering. Plug all your gear into the same outlet box to avoid ground loops. When using unbalanced cables keep your runs as short as possible. Avoid running power and audio cables parallel to each other. When they have to cross it should be at a perpendicular angle. Use the shortest signal path possible and take out any extra gear that is not neccessary in the chain. Avoid using flourescent lights or dimmers on the same circuit.

Use a noise gate to cut out any amp hum during quiet parts.

[rondo]

Where do I get a line conditioner? Is that a home improvement type thing? Or a music store type thing? What's the cost?

I am already using a UPS (uninterruptable power supply) on my hard disc recorder - could this help (or cause) noise in the amp?

Thanks for all your input! This was really driving me nuts!

[vintagedrive]

Rondo, I recently posted a thread regarding this same problem. I fill your frustration, it's driving me nuts too. I will be checking in on your thread to see if there are any helpful ideas. Good luck.

[NYMorningstar]

I'd move, you obviously have ghosts!

[Richard Monroe]

The most common reason for this kind of radio frequency interference with a guitar is using a speaker cable for an instrument cable. They look about the same, but the speaker cable has inadequate shielding, and is probably turning your axe into an antenna. In a worst case scenario, try a wicked heavy shielded cable such as a Monster keyboard cable, and watch the voices go away. Then use your current cable for what it is good for, a speaker. As for power conditioning, you'll see a lot of units such as Furman PL8 which smooth out voltage and protect from surges, but for RFI control, you need to go up to Furman PM8, about $120, no light modules, who needs 'em? Before you do that, try a better guitar cable.-Richie

[F_cksia]

It's better than having little voices in your head..

[Marcos B.]

Check for ghost !

[goodluck]

i got a tape from 1996,which documents my SWR bass amp picking up about 10 different radio stations. its freaking crazy. bill clinton was giving his "building a bridge to the 21st century speech",a born again christian station, a pop station that played "venus" and "stayin' alive",an economics talk show,etc. i've always wondered why that happened. what really baffled me was the unpredictable way and reason for which one station would fade out,giving attention to another. i wish i knew how to get a cassette tape online,so you could hear it.

[John Byrne]

Strange, I posted a reply yeasterday an it seems to have disappeared - must be those damned ghosts!

Firstly, one of the most common causes of RF (radio frequency) interference is when you use effects pedals/racks. Your guitar string(s) acts as an antennae and your effects and/or tone controls on your guitar behave like a tuned circuit (capacitors and resistors at the input). I'd recommend first trimming the extra string lengths at the machine heads - it might stop the string acting as an antennae.

Assuming you got a guitar plugged into an effects chain, plugged into an amp:

When you've got RF interference, first unplug your guitar from your effects, if the interferrence goes away, then the guitar is part of the problem.

Next, unplug the lead from the last effects output and plug it into your guitar.

Go back to your orginal set-up but remove the first effect from the chain. Go back to your original set-up but remove the second effect from the chain... and so on.

We are not trying to cure the problem at the moment, we are trying to isolate it.

It is almost impossible to advise you on how to cure the problem unless people know what your exact set-up is or how you have tried to isolate the problem.

It's the same as when people say noise. Do they mean hum, buzz or hiss? I'm not trying to be pedantic, but each noise suggests a different problem, and to tell you how to fix a hum problem won't get rid of a buzz problem.

Think of hum as a low frequency relatively smooth noise - 60/120Hz in USA, 50/100Hz in Europe. If you don't know your frequencies then you guys in America play a Bb (sixth string, sixth fret - about 120Hz) on you guitar (fourth string on bass for 60Hz) and the guys in Europe play a G# (sixth string fourth fret - about 100Hz -fourth string on bass for 50Hz). If it sounds like a 60Hz problem, then it's probably in the power supply side to the transformer, if it's 120Hz then it's in the power supply after the transformer or the biasing circuit.
Nobody expects you to whip out a soldering iron and fix the problem yourself, but at least if you have to take your amp in for repair, you have already identified the problem for the tech (if he's a bad guy, he's less likely to rip you off because you sound knowledgeable).

Buzz is generally a low frequency and a high frequency noise which suggests grounding problems somewhere.

Hiss is just high frequency.

Motorboating is a putt-putt sound (suggesting ossilations in the amplifier section).

Again, it's hard to fix the problem unless we know what kind of noise it is and where the problem actually comes from - is it the amp with nothing plugged in or the amp with effects chained or looped, or with the guitar plugged in?

Please tell us how you've set up and how you have tried to find the problem, I'm sure the answer can be found.

I'm appologise to everyone if this sounds like a long-winded sermon, but to describe a remedy for every possible problem would be ten times longer, anyway...

Sod this, I'm off to the pub.

Regards,

John

[HangDawg]

Depending on what it is, you could use it like I did.

HiJappy

http://www.nowhereradio.com/artists/...d=1577&alid=-1


P.S. I live in PA, don't have any Asian type radio stations nearby?

[knownuttin]

Shh! You hear that?
"Give all your gear to knownuttin! Give all your gear to knownuttin!"
-kent

[octoruss]

I had this problem too. But $5 magnetic line conditioners sold by Radio Shack seemed to do the trick. These are magnets that snap around each end of the cable in question and solve the interference issue.

[misanthropy26]

First of all, do the noises come mostly when you use distortion?

If so, I may have your solution.

I have had the same problem before and I found that the solution was very simple! I found that I had my effect pedals and my amp turned up way too high and that would make my guitar more conductive (than it already was) and it would pick up all sorts of weird stuff. I went through all of my effects first and turned them down (just low enough so that I would only hear the guitar and not air noise). Then I turned my amp down to suit my effects and to keep it just loud enough to be heard.

I hope this helps.

[darnold]

Ive seen alot of very good ideas and each one you should definately consider. But there is one thing you said that has stuck into my mind here, the fact that it lessens when you turn up the amp and turn down the preamp on the mixer. Are you sure the sounds are coming from your amp? Get your ear up to the amp and see if you can hear it yourself. If you cant hear it coming out of the amp then my guess is its coming from the non shielded circuitry in your mixer. Just a thought but could easily be wrong. What kind of mixer are you using? If its a Mackie VLZ mixer then that probably wont be the case but its something you should check.

Also, i would like to make a check about Richard Monroe said about the cable shielding. I always knew it to be the opposite having the instrument cables with very little shielding and speaker cables with good shielding. It is something i always thought and something that would make much more sense to me because a speaker cable would have to go through much more lengths than an instrument cable. If a speaker cable didnt have adequate shielding and it very long distances having a balanced signal the signal would be very noisy and much signal would be lost. However, correct me if im wrong because this will definately be something i should know for future reference.

Thanks, and i hope you fix your problem.

Darnold

[octoruss]

I forgot to mention above that the filters you could get are called "FERRITE FILTERS".

[rondo]

WOW - sorry for not replying in so long ... I went to a motorcycle rally over the past week....

thanks everyone for the numerous replies. Much to try when I get home tonite.

I'll check the cords. But I think I am using instrument cords and not speaker. But I'll experiment. I have tried different cords and it doesnt seem to make a difference.

The voices ARE coming from the amp. I do know that. And are definately amplified by the effects pedal. Especially with distortion.

Turning the lights on or off in the room doesn't make a difference to noize.

Strings are trimmed as small as possible to the tuning nut.

Most of the noise I am referring to is like a "shhhh". Like when you turn your distortion pedal on. Just that it's always there. and liek I said before, amplified with effects.

Interestingly enough - I plugged in yesterday and it didnt seem as noisey. I know this doesnt help - but it just adds to my headache.

As far as power conditioning ... would a computer UPS work for this too?

For everyone, this is my setup:

Washburn "strat-type" guitar
A multi-effect pedal = I think it's a Digitech (Tec 4?) ... i can't remember
Fender Princeston Chrous Amp

this is being single mic'ed into a peavy 6 channel mixer and output to my Fostex VF160 hard disk recorder.

Thanks again for all the responses!

[octoruss]

You know, I had the same problem and it used to drive me CRAZY! The RFI came from my studio equipment, but I was never able to completely eliminate the noise from my guitar amps. I was told it was due to old wiring in my building (I lived in an 1890 brownstone that had wiring from the 50s). And when I moved to a newly rehabed brownstone next door, the problem was gone! So if the problem is with your amps and not your studio gear, try a power conditioner. But make sure you can return it if it doesn't solve your problem.

[rondo]

My house was built in the 70's - and i wouldnt doubt it has cheap wiring .... I heard the term power conditioner used before - where can I get one? It is similar to a UPS?

[Richard Monroe]

Rondo- You can get a power conditioner at any decent pro audio outlet, and it's something you should have anyway. The cheap ones smooth out voltage, but do nothing for RFI. Try Furman PM8, not the less expensive PL series. I think PM8 is about $130- Good luck, Richie

[rondo]

thanks for the info on the power conditioner ... dont have the funds for it right now - but I'll definately look into it in the future.

Didnt have a chance to try all of the things you guys have recommended... but will keep you posted on what I find.

thanks again everyone!

[Sangram]

UPS may not be a good line conditioner.

One clear way to cut down on radio pickup is to add a small capacitor across the input of the amp. It should be a small value, <.5nF, and should be connected across the input of the amp. This will eliminate the radio pickup completely. 0.1 nF is a good starting point, so you don't lose any top end on the guitar.

There's not much you can do about the sound that sounds like FM static. It's a hiss component of the amp, and all amps have it to some extent. On my Zoom 505, the Hiss reaches unbearable proportions so I end up never using it at all.

Sang