Gibson Plugs Digital Guitar System at Musikmesse
 March 11, 2003
With the belief that it's time for the guitar to enter the digital age, Gibson has been developing a Digital Guitar System which uses a new digital audio format, under development by the company for several years now.
The heart of Gibson's Digital Guitar System is of course, a guitar. You will still find your standard 1/4" output jack so you can use it like any other electric guitar with current gear. But in addition to the 1/4" jack, there is another connector to transmit the guitar sound digitally. The cable used for this digital connection is a standard Category 5 cables, most commonly used for Ethernet-based computer networks. You won't be plugging your guitar directly into your computer however - a different data format, dubbed MaGIC, is used. The digitizing of the signals done in the guitar, so the noise problems typically associated with standard instrument cabling are eliminated. Plus you can have extremely long cable runs without any loss of quality.
Magic allows for multiple channels of audio on a single cable, in both directions, as well as MIDI. In the Digital Guitar System, the guitar actually outputs many channels of audio - one for each of the six strings plus the output of a humbucking pickup. In addition to the guitar output, the cable also carries two channels into the guitar, intended for monitoring purposes.
A breakout box is provided at the other end of the cable, handling the conversion of the digital signals to analog and vice-versa. You can patch the outputs you want to the device you want, be it an amp or direct recording interface. You can use different amps for different strings if you like, or record each string independently.
There won't be any other equipment available to plug your digital guitar into initially, but there's the possibility of compatible effects processors or computer interfaces being developed if there's enough momentum.
Gibson is also targeting Magic for other uses, including consumer electronics and home entertainment equipment, hoping to reduce the rats nests that are so difficult to avoid. For more information on the Magic protocol, see www.gibsonmagic.com.
The first shipping products are expected in the next couple of months.
For more information, visit their web site at www.gibson.com. | 
