I think they use it to change the number of coils that are active in the pickup. I think this is outside of/as well as supporting existing features like coil tapping humbuckers.
I think they use it to change the number of coils that are active in the pickup. I think this is outside of/as well as supporting existing features like coil tapping humbuckers.
The Fishman pickups are stacked PCBs where each PCB has it's own coil/loop. They are then connected in a way where the polarity reverses from coil to coil so they get hum cancelling even if there is only one "virtual coil".
They've got something else going on inside the circuitry that lets them manipulate the characteristics of the resulting coil as well to get all the different sounds different traditional pickups get.
I don't have a guitar with the Fishman pickups but have tried them and saw a demo from the Fishman team and talked with the product manager, etc.. I live pretty close to their HQ and they came to a school where I was taking lessons years ago.
Very cool stuff, but the thing is there are other much simpler solutions that don't require a battery or computer in the guitar once people can get out of the mindset of "it must be exactly as Gibson or Fender did it in the 50s." Even Leo Fender had come up with a lot of stuff that was a lot better by the time he died that Fender to this day doesn't use but does get used in say G&L guitars.
The whole nonsense of guitarists thinking "it must be just like Fender and Gibson did it in the 50s" limits the market for both the stuff Leo Fender came up with later and stuff like Fishman's novel pickups.
The issue is that I want to sound like Iommi when I'm playing that music- so if I can't, then I'm not as interested.
Tone, is in the hands