What are the differences between a guitar magnetic and optical pickup ?

Most musicians and guitar players are used to play with a single type of pickup. It's common and pretty much standard to find a magnetic pickup on any new electric guitar. A magnetic pickup acts as a transducer, by capturing the vibrations of the string, in order to convert it later into an electrical signal which can be amplified and recorded.

For a magnetic pickup it's required a permanent magnet wrapped with a coil of fine enameled copper wire. This coil should have at least a few thousand turns of enameled copper wire to work properly.
Even if we talk about classic guitars or non-amplified instruments, the solutions out there are based on the same principle that a magnetic pickup uses.

Some alternatives have been emerging into the guitar musical instrument scene for that two decades. A California based company called LightWave have developed an optical guitar pickup that utilizes infrared light to produce the same audio signal that an electrical magnetic pickup would.



Their technology has several advantages. In contrast to a magnetic pickup, this optical technology is not capable of receiving any type of electromagnetic interference from lights, guitar amplifiers and any other electric objects. This makes up for an extreme silent and accurate pickup.
It also produces a very long and clean sustain with an accurate and consistent tone and intonation.

This new type of guitar, carries all its electronic components inside its body, as well as its rechargeable battery. This battery last up to 16 hours of continuing playing according to manufacturer. Owners of this musical instrument are required to re-charge the battery when power is low to avoid complete discharge. You can very easy establish batteries's level by looking at the optical pickup light's intensity. This red dot light shows you the current battery level in an easy and interactive way.

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