I have noticed you can't swing a Stray Cat without hitting an ad for a wireless guitar system anymore and that has had me wondering. So I popped on a cheap one. Off Amazon, I ordered the Swiff WS-50, and have been playing it instead of cables for a few days. I thought I'd share how that's going.
These: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07KR ... =UTF8&th=1
First, I have to say I love not being constrained by a cable. I did not realize until this week how big a difference that would make, whether it's moving around or even just swinging a chair around, it's freeing.
It was under $60, so let's not have any delusions comparing it to any pro system. If I gigged, I'd happily pay many times what this thing cost because the differences matter. But most of my guitar time is writing and practicing.
I chose this one over the 2.4gHz and 5.8gHz systems because it advertised more channels, which to me means more flexibility for different environments. I don't gig, but I do meet up with others at their places sometimes, and radio noise varies by location. I wanted to be able to find a reasonably clear channel wherever. This one operates between 500 - 940 mHz UHF, and so far so good. I figured 2.4gHz is getting crowded, 5.8gHz probably will also get crowded, but UHF use is declining, so why not? So let's get to observations.
First, there is a very noticeable drop in signal strength compared to a cable. This bothers me. It's enough to make a huge change in tone depending on my gain stage needs. It makes pedals sound very different, so that's not good. I may decide it needs a boost. If going straight into an amp with a really good gain stage, the amp can compensate, but that raises the noise floor beyond what you might expect. This issue alone makes this system only useful for practice to me, never recording. Still, that's ok for my needs.
The noise floor is strong enough I have to wonder whether it's even digital. The listing says it has 24 bit 48 kHz sampling which certainly is a claim the signal is digital. It sounds like radio hiss to my ears though, making me think perhaps it is actually an analog transmission. I could be wrong about this, maybe they're just cheap converters, but I think maybe transmitting analog is why they can claim the low 2ms latency they advertise. They really do have very low latency. Dropouts also don't sound digital to me, but again, just my suspicion.
That brings me to this - If you get your body between the transmitter and receiver, you can cause signal drops. Of course that happens with other wireless gear, so it's not a surprise. But inside, at close proximity, I did not expect this to be an issue. It can be, but so far it is not too bad. I have a preference for P90 equipped guitars though, and they tend to care more how they are oriented (usually relative to the amp) to reduce RFI and just sound better. Adding the wireless gives me a 2nd reason to have to orient the guitar in a certain direction for best sound. So far, these two things have not conflicted, but I suppose they could in the future, time will tell.
My bottom line is that I'll never record with these, but will use them for practice and writing a lot. If I'm more comfortably positioned, I'll spend more time and that makes them worth it to me. If I have to play out, I'll still take a cable and expect to use it instead. My favorite amp will probably stick with its favorite cable just because tone matters there more than convenience. If I change my mind later, I see a 30 foot cable likely replacing it, and that would cost about the same.
