What is the purpose for super accurate tuners?

YUNI

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Happy Thanksgiving 2.0!! (We had ours in Canada earlier haha)

So I have a snark tuner that I usually just use to check that the strings are in tune before playing, and then again if something sounds off. But I've seen more accurate/sensitive ones and I was wondering how people usually use these? I'm.not sure my own ears would notice if something was like a cent or two off (and whether I would bother to fix it every time lol) but maybe I just need to do more ear training :)
 
I do the same as you. If I hear something’s off I investigate. I have two Snarks and a worthless Kala. The Snarks do me fine and always have. I have another tuner for my other instruments, but I don’t use it much. I think people just like to buy stuff — the very best stuff.

Ii’s true though that I wear hearing aids when I’m not playin’. They mostly help with my Tinnitus. :eek:ld:
 
Bragging rights ;)

I suspect many are promising more accuracy than they provide, but they’re within the margin of error from hearing and tuning stability so people don’t notice or care.

I do have to tune more tightly if my wife is in the room than if not. She can hear off notes that I can’t.

I’m more interested in readability and speed when picking a tuner. Pretty much everything modern will get the note close enough on a uke (reading the low strings on a bass well is less common)
 
I have a Peterson StroboPlus tuner that is great. It's very accurate and gives me a good baseline for hearing a ukulele in tune. It has a mic for audible tuning. It has a clip-on attachment to tune by vibration of the neck. And you can plug an uke with a pickup into it (with throughput to the amplifier or pedals). I primarily use it at home. It has helped me to train my ear to hear the correct sound. Yes, I agree, I probably can't hear a 1 or 2 cent difference. I think it's better to start with an accurate tuning and have it drift a little than have a close tuning and have it drift even further.

I like Snarks they are fast and easy to use. But they annoy me. I often put the tuner on my ukes and it says the string is in tune. Yet my ear says it isn't. So, I tighten (or loosen) the string and the Snark then indicates that the string is out of tune. I can strike the string three different times with pretty equal pressure and get three different readings from the Snark. And the Snark is very sensitive to other instruments around me also being tuned.

To me, it's similar to using a calculator verses a slide rule. (Kids, ask your parents or Google it.) The strobe gives a very accurate reading, the Snark is in the neighborhood.
 
I play second and third position chords alot so when I tune, I fret at the 5th fret to get the note and then open string tune to check the difference. I use a D'Addario andPeterson for tuners.
 
For the purposes you describe, Juni, something like a Snark will serve you well. We should remember that there is such a thing as enough. There are people who do need a more accurate instrument, or who simply would like to use something better, but for most of us, a regular electronic tuner is all we'll ever need.

Whenever I read of people being dissatisfied with a ukulele's intonation, I wonder if they can actually hear the discrepancy, or if they are trying to satisfy an electronic device. More than ten years ago, I tried to set up an Ohana SK35G (a soprano) to give perfect intonation at every fret on every string. The nut, saddle and frets were all in the correct relationship to each other, but it proved to be an impossible task.

It is possible to make a soprano uke close enough to be acceptable, that is to say, acceptable to my ears, but the electronic tuner would always find some small (inaudible) disparity.

There is, of course, a wide variation in people's ability to discern musical tones accurately. Mine is average, at best. I can't imagine what it must be like to have perfect pitch. Both a blessing and a burden, probably.

John Colter
 
I can strike the string three different times with pretty equal pressure and get three different readings from the Snark.

Mine does this too :( the readings aren't very different from each other but it makes me wonder :confused:
 
Oh I was also thinking maybe if you're playing with a group is important for the tuning to be more accurate? When I played in high school orchestra and even one or two of then ten violins was slightly out of tune it would make everything sounds wonky.

Or maybe everyone should use the same tuner so at last they are all off by the same amount haha
 
I use the D'Addario/Planet Waves tuners - too many broken Snarks to justify keeping them.

I like to get the quick, digital tuning, then tweak it by ear. When I'm solo, I don't really worry about anything but relative tuning, but when i play with others, we need to all get as close as possible. Some folks I play with only play in the first position, while I've been playing in 2nd and third, depending on the instrument. Some of my instruments are great up to 7th fret, then the intonation starts to degrade. Others are perfect to 14 or 15th frets, but lack great harmonics at 5 & 7. The new Cocobolo is the only one of my stringed instruments (guitars and banjo included in this) that is at pitch between the 3rd string 4th fret and the 2nd string. My ears have always told me that, but the D'Addarios confirm it. The harmonics are also great at 5,7, and 12th frets

However, after all that, I must confess that my preference is an A=440 tuning fork, and tune everything else relative to that string. (unfortunately, I have 3 forks labeled A=440, and they range from 432 to 438. I haven't found a true A=440 fork for years.)

-Kurt​
 
Meh. I don't want to come over as being rude, yet, why wouldn't you want to use an accurate tuner?

Would you want to use a ruler that wasn't accurate?
Would you want to use weight scales that weren't accurate?

Actually scrap the last one. Manufacturers do deliberately make bathroom weight scales to be inaccurate and it does annoy me. They often have written on them somewhere that they are unsuitable for commerce use.

Tuners that have excessive leeway in what they say is in tune annoy me as well.
 
Back in the early '70's, I was in a band that had two guitars, bass, and drums. We didn't have electronic tuners back then (at least the guys and I weren't aware of them). We'd always try to go really early to gigs so that we could have time to get set up and get ourselves in tune while things were still relatively quiet. But we really had no idea where we were in relation to the "A=440" marker. I'm sure that some nights we were higher than that, and other nights we were lower than that, depending on where each of us had his instrument tuned when we all showed up. We'd just stand there and adjust things, usually around some random chord progression, looking at each other, nodding, shaking our heads, until finally we all agreed that we were in "precision tune" with each other. God only knows where we might've drifted by the end of the night, although we were always conscious of keeping in tune with each other, which I suppose was what truly counted. And in that unsophisticated mode... we did just fine! But I'm really glad we have electronic tuners nowadays!
 
Um, for super accurate tuning?
Not to sound smarmy, but why not strive for maximum accuracy?
I find most tuners to be wonky, at best.
My Peterson Strobe tuner is the best.
I just bought an A tuning fork, and am training myself to tune by ear. It cost me 6 bucks.
My Peterson doesn't leave my house, and what if my cheap tuner freaks out or quits? I don't like relying on technology when my ears work just fine.
 
It really comes down to how finely tuned your ear is. Mine isn't sophisticated enough to want a strobe tuner. I'd rather have a D'addario Micro sitting at the ready, 24/7.

Still, tuning by ear is a good exercise. I'll try to tune horribly out of tune ukuleles by ear in the music shop (without a fork) and then check against my phone app to see how close I am. Sometimes I impress myself, other times, I just can't get it.
 
Meh. I don't want to come over as being rude, yet, why wouldn't you want to use an accurate tuner?

Would you want to use a ruler that wasn't accurate?
Would you want to use weight scales that weren't accurate?

To clarify, I understand why people would want to use use an accurate tuner (I would too!), but the strobe one says it can be accurate to 1/1000th of a semitone or something and I wonder about whether it makes a big difference in playing or when that kind of precision would be needed (or wanted?). But in the end everyone has their own preferences and more accuracy can never hurt!
 
Um, for super accurate tuning?
Not to sound smarmy, but why not strive for maximum accuracy?

Haha, fair enough! I just assumed a more accurate one would be more expensive and then you might have to spend more time to get it exactly right, which could be hard depending on what tuners you have on your uke :p
 
I'll try to tune horribly out of tune ukuleles by ear in the music shop (without a fork) and then check against my phone app to see how close I am. Sometimes I impress myself, other times, I just can't get it.

Somewhat off topic, but when I'm browsing ukes in a store I try to find the ones that are most in tune because my theory is that they are the most popular/most played ones? I mean, if everyone is trying them they would probably give it a cursory tune right?
 
Somewhat off topic, but when I'm browsing ukes in a store I try to find the ones that are most in tune because my theory is that they are the most popular/most played ones? I mean, if everyone is trying them they would probably give it a cursory tune right?

Depends on when you visit. At one of the area guitar shops, it falls on the staff to tune every guitar, ukulele, mandolin & two banjos in the store before they open. Each staff person has an assigned area to tune. The owner feels that a customer should be able to take any instrument down and try it out without having to tune it first. Sure, some go out of tune if they have fresh strings, but the corrections are small.

But, you may be right Yuni. If it's a small shop, it may be too much for the staff to tune all of the ukes every day. But I know when I shop at a music store with ukes, I probably try most of the tenors they have. So don't know if your theory holds up. Great question though. Food for thought.
 
Apparently there are some excellent players posting on this thread, and they probably need the better tuners. However, at my fumbling uke pickin’ level, the snarks do me just fine. Now If I only had a tuner for my singin’ voice.

It’s the enjoyment of playin’ and entertaining myself that’s important to me and not the very best equipment. :eek:ld:
 
Assuming your uke is well built and well set-up, all you need is a simple tuner to tune each of the open strings, or to tune to the A note on each string.

The music industry has a system which ensures all instruments and players can play together in harmony. If you stick to the system, your instrument, what ever it is, will come from the set-up tech ready to play. All you need to do is to use your tuner, which is part of the system, to tune the open strings, either to the open note pitch or to a reference like the A note. Then your instrument is ready to play.

The way you play it is what creates the final sound and fine tuning for the pitch. There are no short cuts once you get down to the final few cents of tuning in a well built and well set-up instrument. In wind instruments its breath control, on a stringed instrument it is fretting finger tip control.

However, we have to keep remembering that most ukulele players play for recreation. Having a fancy tuner and exploring the features can be part of the recreation. Discussing accuracy and tuner choices is a valid ukulele pastime. They do not need a reason to get a fancy tuner, other than to enjoy some recreation time.

A fancy tuner that tells something like errors in cents or to which octave the note analyzed belongs, can be fun yes.

TC Electric Unitune is not such. What matters is the fastness and accuracy of tuning. Regarding ukulele strings strobe tuners are not so fast IMO. While unitune has that feature and because of that some mathematical stablizing analysis is needed, it is not my fave mode.

The standard needle display mode, stabilized that too is way enough accuracy. Boosted with color.

I would never go back to a tuner with wavering needle one, then it is a guessing game of what is the middle :)
 
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