Well these are replacing my stock mexican pickups, which were muddy, and very noisy. I previously bought thhe fender vintage noiseless pickups, partly because of the whole fender name, and NOISELESS part. They are noiseless, but seemed to lack character, at least for me. They did have lush harmonics on the bridge/middle selector, which i loved, and if i ever bought i twelve string strat id put the fenders in it. But heres where the fenders fell short, distortion, even really low distortion, bad monkey overdrive to be exact, so not much at all. They lacked everything from character to just plain sound quality. So i bought these area 58's and a 61 for the bridge, and couldnt be happier with them. Clear like a single coil should be, dead quiet, even with higher amounts of gain. You can get praticlly any sound out of these just by adjusting the hieght!! i have the 61 set close to the strings, seeing i mainly use it for distortion. They rock!! very edgy, just what i was looking for, i almost like it more then my gibson 57 classic pickup!! that tells ya something! the 58s are also very good in the neck and middle, and could be placed in the bridge despite what others might say, you can compansate for output by adjusting the pickup hieght.

its a pickup, you can get all kinds of neat colors if you please.

I installed them in one hour, and this was the first pair of pickups i ever installed, so i think anyone with a soldering gun could handle this.

id say top notch, the wire was pretty thin, idk if thats good or bad...

its a good deal if it what your looking for...

hopefully never have to deal with them

i must say they do look pretty good in my sage green fender, with the creme covers, i want to get a pearloid pickguard to complement it all.

hobbyist

Christian,blues, rock, country, folk

Just today, I got Dimarzio Area 58 pickups put into my Highway One strat and I am totally blown away! Just like the reviewer before me, I replaced the vintage noiseless and for the exact same reason. These babies have got tone to the bone and handle distortion like a champ. Now I can play all varieties with fuzz and the clean tones are truly like a vintage stratocaster. My head is spinning. For a true strat sound and overdrive without sacrificing tone, the Dimarzio Area 58's are the Holy Grail.

They are the best pickups I'll ever own.

Clean, I get all 5 colors from my strat. Same with distortion. It's hard to find a good single-coil pickup that will be quiet and not hum when overdriven. My search for the perfect pickups is OVER!

They fit like a glove into my strat.

The cost is not an issue, I am so happy with these, they are worth every penny! I also got them from Zzounds in less than 24 hours with Next-Day Air.

Never had to deal with support and probably never will have the need.

The vintage noiseless didn't match my pick-guard. My guitar looks so much better now.

25 years as a guitarist

Rock, as far as classic to Metal. Some blues and jazz.

decades, retired from live gigs

heavy fusion