[Firebeard]

If you're asking would anyone here take a cheap guitar with our personal favorite pickups over a neck thru guitar we could upgrade the pickups in later? I personally would rather take the neck-thru guitar any day of the week.

[noodles]

Is it just me, or are pickups like car stereos? I wish I could buy guitars without pickups and cars without stereos, since I'm just gonna rip the shit out anyway.

If I had to pick a good stock pickup, it would be the minibuckers in the 70s-era Gibson Les Paul Deluxes and Firebirds. They absolutely screamed.

[jim777]

I like most stock Gibson pickups, and some stock Fenders. The pickups in my '94 Explorer rule, no question about it. Carvin 6 strings come with pretty good stock pickupsl. But, a good tube amp has a way of making mediocre pickups sound a lot better as well

[Mind Riot]

My Schecter had the best stock pickups, since it came stock with real Duncans.

[bostjan]

Originally Posted by noodles

Is it just me, or are pickups like car stereos? I wish I could buy guitars without pickups and cars without stereos, since I'm just gonna rip the shit out anyway.

If I had to pick a good stock pickup, it would be the minibuckers in the 70s-era Gibson Les Paul Deluxes and Firebirds. They absolutely screamed.

I always thought the same thing about pickups. Never made the analogy to car stereo, but I can totally understand.

My BC Rich came with good stock pickups, and the stock pups on my Parkers are better than just decent.

On the other hand, pretty much every other guitar I've owned has had some lame duck pickups. The hall of shame award goes to my Epiphone Les Paul six string. The pickups not only sounded like a constipated sumo wrestler, but died after two years. I mean totally died, as in something inside of them broke and they became paperweights. The bridge pickup went about two months before the neck pickup did. So I took some old Washburn stock pickups and threw those in there, and it actually sounded 100x better than it did brand new. Like that poor sumo wrestler inside the guitar finally took some ex-lax and voice lessons, to boot.

[noodles]

Yanking out the Epi-foney pickups is the first thing I always did with those LP's. You description of them is absolutely perfect. The only stock pickups that were as bad came on my Mexican Fender Strat. They were the sonic equivelent of Steve Bescemi. Thin and ugly.

[bostjan]

Man, noodles, you and Zimbloth are both on a roll today!

[rogue]

do you guys find stock 7's are generally worse than stock 6's pups. because stock 7s are often just extended 6s whereas people like dimazario actually redesign them with the low notes in mind.? or is this just me lol

[jtm45]

Originally Posted by noodles

If I had to pick a good stock pickup, it would be the minibuckers in the 70s-era Gibson Les Paul Deluxes and Firebirds. They absolutely screamed.

Yeah,they can be really nice pickups man!

Gibson pickups get slated a lot but some of the older ones are fuckin' outstanding.I don't know if they sounded as good when they were new or whether they just age nicely,lol.

I've got a 100% stock '79 Gibson Flying V and the neck pickup in particular has a phenomenal tone to it. I can't imagine a sweeter sounding neck-pickup!
The bridge-pickup is great on that guitar too but it's a little under-powered by today's standards but it'll still scream through a cranked Marshall with a Tubescreamer in front.

Originally Posted by rogue

do you guys find stock 7's are generally worse than stock 6's pups. because stock 7s are often just extended 6s whereas people like dimazario actually redesign them with the low notes in mind.? or is this just me lol

I agree.
often 7 stock pickups have no clarity in the bass.