F512 with or without Baggs pickup

[Cougar]

...any last suggestions before i pull the trigger on the F512 Burst (spruce)?

Super major congrats on a great decision! If it were me, I'd get the new one with the factory installed Baggs. I got a stupid good deal ($1,400!) on my used burst Oxnard F512 since it had been knocked off a stand and had a couple bad gashes on the edges of the lower bout, which I had fixed for next to nothing, and now it's like new. It's just a spectacular guitar -- no two ways about it. I also love to plug in from time to time, so I had a K&K put in it -- probably could have been a better choice, but it's OK. Been playing unplugged a lot lately anyway....

 

[wileypickett]

To my ear no internal pickup sounds like a real acoustic guitar -- which is the sound of strings moving wood moving air. For that reason I prefer a good mic on the soundhole to pickups.

But many people (and whoever is doing your onstage sound) like the convenience of plugged in acoustics and are happy to sacrifice some acoustic purity for ease of use.

While early pickups were awful -- they sounded bad, were subject to distortion, and flattened dynamics -- they're getting better all the time at making internal pickups that approximate the sound of an acoustic guitar. These days you have some decent options.

Since there's a bit of a compromise either way, you have to go with whatever seems to best satisfy your needs.

 

[F312]

Sometimes the sound of an acoustic guitar with a pickup is something that you can justify because that's the sound you're going for, "a certain sound" if that makes sense.

Ralph

 

[Br1ck]

Yeah, the trouble with old guitars is possible neck sets in the present or future. I generally can live with that.

 

[wileypickett]

Sometimes the sound of an acoustic guitar with a pickup is something that you can justify because that's the sound you're going for, "a certain sound" if that makes sense.

Ralph

I think part of what has happened too is that people are so used to hearing acoustic guitars plugged-in in live settings that they want to emulate the sound they've gotten used to hearing.

I find it somewhat ironic / amusing that people love how amazing their guitar sounds, and then put an internal pick-up in it that makes a $4500.00 Martin and a $45.00 Framus sound pretty much indistinguishable from each other.

The pickups have gotten better, I can't argue with that. But I can still tell when I'm hearing a guitar versus something that's made to sound like a guitar.

Electric guitars, they got that all worked out. Acoustic guitars, not so much.

 

[crank]

You can always ad a pup. I vote nay.