Vibramate SR1

July 2011 Guitarist 129
CONTACT: Sound Technology PHONE: [phone] WEB: www.hardwirepedals.com
CONTACT: Barnes & Mullins PHONE: [phone] WEB: www.shadow-electronics.com
The display is rather small and hard to see
QUICKTEST
MISCELLANEOUS
Shadow SH E-Tuner
approx £45
The ultimate stealth tuner?
Let’s face it, there’s no shortage
of guitar tuners on the market,
but mounted in a slightly over-
sized humbucker ring, this one
is unique. Both black and cream
rings are available for guitars
with f lat fronts, curved tops or
vibratos. Installation is easy
enough; the main electronics
are housed in a humbucker
magnet-sized box, which fits
under the pickup. You poke the
battery connect cable (with
push fit connector) into the
control cavity along with a hook
up wire that needs soldering to
the volume pot so the tuner can
sense the strings even with the
volume turned down. Connect
the battery holder – a 3V disc
type (with a quoted life of 2,000
GUITARIST RATING
there – there are plenty of
excellent headstock tuners that
are less than half the price, not
to mention smartphone apps –
and, of course, it’s instrument
specific. While that means your
guitar will always have its own
tuner, you can’t tune anything
else with it. That could well be
exactly what you’re after. [DB]
tunings) housed is in its own
little plastic pouch – and there
you have it.
In Use
There’s a small push button
next to the display that turns it
on, the note indicator, in tune
and sharp/flat LED indicators
are very bright. Tuning is quick
and accurate. However, the
display is very small – if you
have reading glasses, you’re
gonna need ’em on to see the
specific note display.
Verdict
It’s hard to fault the function
here. Yes, it’s small and for some
will be hard to see, but it works.
It’s not the cheapest tuner out
The Bottom Line
We like: Stealthy size;
excellent function; relatively
easy to fit
We dislike: Very small
display; instrument specific
HardWire HT-6
Polyphonic Tuner
£99
A challenger to the PolyTune’s crown?
Once TC Electronic released its
PolyTune and changed the face
of onstage guitar tuning
forever, it was only going to be
a matter of time before other
companies added a polyphonic
tuner to their rosters. A year on,
DigiTech is first on the scene
with the HT-6.
In Use
The HT-6 has five tuning
modes – you can set it for
standard guitar tuning, drop D
and four-, five- and six-string
basses. There’s a USB socket for
updates so, presumably, more
may be added later. Strum your
guitar and, if you are in tune,
the display shows all six strings
as a vertical array of LEDs – a
central blue line with yellow
each side. Any out-of-tune
string is indicated by red LEDs
to the left (f lat) or right (sharp).
Plucking an individual string
results in the HT-6 performing
like a chromatic tuner, with a
choice of normal (similar to the
polyphonic) or strobe displays.
You can also easily set the tuner
to work polyphonically for
lowered tunings of up to six
semitones, or for using a capo
on the first six frets.
With a quoted tuning
accuracy of +/- 1 cent, the HT-6,
on paper, appears not as highly
specified as the PolyTune, but
considering that many of us are
still using the BOSS TU-2 (+/- 3
cents) would we really hear
that? We think not.
Verdict
It’s quick, accurate and easy to
see on a dark stage – all you
need from a stompbox tuner.
There are now two polyphonic
choices – take your pick. [TC]
The Bottom Line
We like: Solid build quality;
quick response; display;
works with capos
We dislike: It’s a bit bigger
than a TC PolyTune
GUITARIST RATING
GIT343.rev_quick 129 5/19/11 5:06:17 PM