Shadow SH 927 NMG-4 Nanomag Bluegrass

J?ai une MM50 de 1999, avec un chevalet avec piézo intégré Fishman (d?y a 15 ans) le tout sur un ampificateur Marshall AS80r. J?ai joué comme cela pendant plus de 15 ans et ça m?allait bien.
Il y a quelques jours, j?ai vu sur une vidéo des « Rumjack » que le mandoliniste utilisait ce micro en concert alors j?ai voulu l?essayer (en fait il a la MM50 pro).
Aussitôt commandé, dés son arrivé installation rapide et simple (ma MM50 avait déjà un orifice pour le jack) Je l?ai testé en répète sur mon AS80r hier soir. En fait j?ai laissé le Fishman en place et installé le Shadow SH 927 NMG-4 Nanomag afin de passer de l?un à l?autre. Le Shadow supplante largement le Fischman ! L?égaliseur est fonctionnel.
En rythmique je n?ai jamais eu ce son.
En solo j?ai un léger déséquilibre entre les aigus et les basses mais cela est réglable facilement grâce à 4 potentiomètres, malheureusement je ne trouve plus mon tournevis ! Mais bon ça va le faire.
Seul regret : l?esthétique un peu trop plastique neutre à mon goût.
En tout cas je le conseille à tous ceux qui cherche une solution d?amplification pour leur mandoline préférée ! (enfin il faut quand même percer un peu la bête)

On guitar and mandolin I prefer magnetic pickups to any of the very many stick-on and undersaddle piezos I've tried. So, I had high hopes for the Nanomag.

The design is, in theory, quite neat and sensible. In practice it's not quite so neat.

Pros:

* Good sound. Fairly acoustic-ish in tone - more so than many piezos
* The pickup element is position-adjustable by a kind of sliding arrangement
* The pickup preamp allows balancing of the output of the separate string courses - a VERY useful feature!
* On-board volume, treble and bass controls

Cons:

* Fairly flimsy build. The cable to the jack is soldered to the preamp PCB with no strain relief and the pickup element is not very robustly mounted
* The scratchplate feels and looks a little cheap
* Preamp battery cover fits poorly
The scratchplate is too clunky to fit as easily as it should and needs a bit of filing to fit and to allow better access to the screw that secures it to the neck
* The pickup does not sit firmly in place and can flap slightly up and down if the height-adjustable foot isn't stuck to the mandolin top with a small piece of double-sided tape or similar
* The thread on the pickup foot screw is too long and, as other reviewers have said, needs to be snipped to make it shorter
* The jack requires drilling the side of the mandolin. An endpin jack would have been SO much better.

On balance, I do like the Nanomag pickup: I just wish it was better made and implemented. The sound is very good and I'm actually using this for gigs now instead of my Baggs Radius. However, I have left the Baggs pickup on the mandolin too, as a backup, because I'm not 100% confident that the slightly flimsy build of the Shadow won't let me down at some point.

I'm glad I bought it. If it broke I MIGHT buy again, but I'd hesitate. If Shadow improved the implementation and build quality I would immediately buy the improved version!