JohnA

That's a really cool pickup mounting technique.

also.... nice hat

I wanted some other people's opinions, and some users of these pickups to chime in.

Okay, the deal is this: getting a new guitar soon. It's mahogany bodied, maple neck, rosewood fret board, double humbucker wraparound bridge style guitar (Ibanez). I will be using this guitar to play METAL. I already have a great guitar for clean sounds. Whether or not the pickups you reccomend have a good clean sound is irrelevant to me.

The bridge pickup needs to have a well defined 'chunk', and a precise sound where the notes don't smear together under heavy distortion. Probably have a high midrange response, but I am flexable, as long as it has that sound. I want the neck pickup to have a smooth sound, like Satriani or Vai, where it sounds real natural and legato. I want a bright neck pickup. No Air Nortons.

The combos I was considering are:

X2N/PAF Pro

Steve's Special/PAF Joe

SD Full Shred/PAF Joe

I'd love to hear your feedback on these combos, or your suggestions for others.

ALSO: No suggestions for EMG's. If I decide to get those, I already know what combo I want.

thx This is really long, but please respond.

I hope this is the right place to put this...

For what you are describing, I would say there is no tone difference, at least not a discernable one. But it is easier to change the height of the pickup with the float method.

Floating a pickup by attatching it to the pickguard of a hollowbody, however, does indeed have tonal benefits, as it allows the top to vibrate more freely than it could have if there was a chunk of metal screwed into it (other than the bridge )

Hi. Where did you read that the pickguard needs modification? I think it should just screw right in, the only routing being what you would need to do for the battery cavity.