Problems with tuner on my new venue

[dankypapa]

I just tried plugging in my mandolin to my new venue. All i have done is plug it in with the 1spot power cord and put in a battery, plugged in my 1/4" instrument cable and turn on the tuner. The tuner is not being consistent nor has it shown me the right note I am trying to tune. It shows that i have a signal. Any ideas? I would send it back, but i want to use it for tomorrows show....which i will probably do and use my snark to tune with. Thanks in advance for any useful help.

[Bryan McManus]

Hi Dankypapa,

What pickup is on your mandolin and how long is the cable between it and the input of the Venue DI?

Is your Snark tuner in the signal path or is it a clip-on model?

[dankypapa]

i have a fishman bridge pickup. The cable is probably 12 feet or so. Snark is a clip on. But the difference between the two are way off...when trying to tune my G string it came up with C or A# or B....which is just really weird to me.

[Bryan McManus]

Interesting. I wonder if the tuner could be detecting an exaggerated harmonic overtone from the pickup or the pickup's response to the instrument.

It would make sense that the clip-on tuner would work normally if that were the case.

I'm curious to know if you've plugged the Fishman mandolin pickup into any other in-line tuner and, if so, what the result might have been.

Are you tuning by playing pairs or do you tune each of the eight strings individually?

You mentioned the G string registered a different note from the Venue's tuner. Did you get an erroneous reading from the tuner with any of the other strings?

[dankypapa]

I have noticed overtones when tuning in the past. In both, a plugged in tuner and a vibration tuner i have noticed the letter jumping from what i assumed was from some harmonic. My mandolin has tons of tone.

I tune each string individually and then together...but not using a tuner when i play them together.

I did get erroneous readings with other strings.

I am happy to say that after plugging my Venue in with an xlr to the sound system we used on Friday night, it works. Everything about it works and I so far couldn't be happier with it. Thank you Bryan for your help. I answered the questions above for you anyhow. I am not sure if it worked because of being plugged into the sound board or if it just needed to warm up. All three times i have used the power plug and a battery for power. Only difference is location and plugging into the sound system. I have another show on Wed and I am hoping everything goes just as well then.

Thanks again for your time, Bryan. Its great to know when i get a new piece of equipment that i can find good help in figuring it out.

[Bryan McManus]

Hi Dankypapa,

Thanks for sharing that info. I would be very interested to know if you see a pattern in which the Venue tuner works better when you're connected via XLR to a sound system. Since the tuner is at the input, immediately after the gain stage, it should not happen.

[pdxfairview]

Venue tuner not working with a mandolin

I'm seeing a similar problem: my tuner readings are wildly off when playing my mandolin with a fishman bridge pickup. Confirmed that the tuner works normally when I play a guitar into it. Any ideas? Any reason why this tuner wouldn't work with a mandolin?

Thanks-

[Caleb_Elling]

The Venue does work with mandolins, usually. Is your gain level turned up to get a sufficient input? This is a very important step in using the Venue DI tuner. If the gain is set too low, the tuner cannot read the incoming signal accurately.

[Caleb_Elling]

I had the same issue when I first used my Baggs mandolin pickup. Setting the gain correctly was all I needed to do.