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Comment by taylodl | Hacker News Reader

There are two Drop D tunings listed and one is actually Drop C. There is no Drop D♭, you call it Drop C♯ which while it's technically the same set of tones, it's now how guitar players think of it. You have the same issue with E♭ Standard. Each of your notes in these tunings are listed as sharps instead of flats, which is not how guitar players think of the notes in these tunings.

Also, you might want to consider polyphonic tuning. That's what would set you apart from everybody else. I bought a TC Electronic PolyTune earlier this year and it's been a game changer. It's much faster and easier to get tuned

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Interesting you mention guitarists thinking in terms of flats. Is that rooted in music theory, preference/convention, or something else?

A sibling common mentions "c#, g#, c#, f, g#, c#" which is exactly how I would think of it. I'd guess that without a key signature to reference it doesn't really matter, but I'm a theory novice so curious about this.

I really don't know why that's the convention. I always assumed it was due to the minor scale/modes having so many flats. The only mode with a sharp is Lydian - and that's a single sharp! Even the major mode Mixolydian has a flat! Natural minor has 3 flats.

I assume it's because tuning a string up can break it, while tuning it down is harmless.

I would guess that it's to do with the fact that musicians generally use the key with fewer sharps/flats. E.g., Bb major (2 flats) instead of A# major (5 sharps). This also follows what's on the circle of fifths, where major keys clockwise from C use sharps, and vice versa.

In the case of drop Db, I would also guess that people just think of it as "slightly lower than drop D", hence just adding a flat symbol.

Nit pick: A# major would be 10 sharps, at least written following the usual convention of each note letter being used exactly once: A# B# C## D# E# F## G##.

What is 2 but 1 plus 1? The key of B flat is easier to read.

Disregarding how it'd be read, I suppose you could theoretically get into keys like G-triple-sharp or F-quadruple-flat -- but that's just overcomplicating things, isn't it?

I’m self taught, and I tend to think of flats because I tend to downtune. I think others choose the flat or sharp based on their desired key. That doesn’t help me describing a tuning if I’m playing out of the tuning’s assumed key! I have adopted one set of tunings which requires bringing the second string higher than the first, which I usually dedicate to a guitar with the strings swapped so I don’t break them all the time. (Adapted from very closely watching performances by Kelli Rudick if you’re curious.) I always describe the 2nd string tuning with sharps unless I have a good reason not to.

None of this is meant as advice, it’s just how I reason about using the instrument myself in ways it wasn’t necessarily intended.

I'm interested in the algorithm for that, but it looks like for PolyTune, they just say "patented 'MonyPoly' algorithm."

So that's out. I wonder what other research has been done into detecting multiple notes at once?

Each string has it's fundamental frequency and harmonics. Some of them coincide or are very close in frequency, but some are unique to one string so can be picked out and their frequency measured with a FFT of sufficient resolution and used to indicate the tuning of the string it must be a harmonic of.

(Polytune is more robust than just doing this and does work really well, but if the guitar is really out of tune the method falls apart and you have to use its one-string-at-a-time mode)

Fourier Transform, identify the fundamentals by loudness and/or presence of harmonics?

In general polyphonic pitch detection is a much harder problem to solve than monophonic. I guess focussing on guitar tuning only rather than trying to transcribe a whole song makes the problem a bit simpler but still is probably a lot more challenging than handling one note a time. Cool feature though, I had never thought of a polyphonic tuner!

My Snark died and I was about to order another one when I saw the TC Electronic PolyTune. I splurged and bought it. I love it!

Can one set the A to 432Hz?

Why is it good? Interested

Because you can see the tuning of all the strings at once. You strum and they all show up. Then you can see which ones are more out of tune than others and tune them together. Prevents problems where changing the tuning (tension) of one string throws another string out of tune. I call it "global tuning." It gives you precise tuning extremely fast.

Does the tuning of one string affect the others on guitars with hard tails, or is this mostly a tremolo induced issue?

Yes, for hard-tails. Neck construction doesn't matter either. I notice it on both bolt-on and neck-through instruments. My method is to tune the highest strings first and work down to the lowest since that seems to minimize this effect.

I believe the issue is due to small changes in the overall tension on the instrument caused by changing one string’s tension.

Ok. Sold!!! That is awesome.

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