There are many different ways to go about tuning a guitar, and over time I suggest that you learn all of them, just so that you are that much more empowered with guitar knowledge. How to tune a guitar is relatively simple depending on the route you take.

Using a piano

The piano method is how I learned to tune my own guitar when I first started, but I don't recommend this. First of all, you'll need to know how to locate middle E, and second, if you're using a piano - there's a good chance that the piano itself may be out of tune. A keyboard will work best, but again you need to have some prior knowledge of the layout of the keys, and will need to know the names of the strings on your guitar in order to tune them correctly.

Using a tuning fork

You can use a tuning fork, but this takes a little patience and practice, plus the pitches may throw you off guard and lead you down the wrong path if you are just getting started.

Using harmonics

If you are a beginner then you will definitely want to skip this one. This process involves using natural harmonics, but is typically used by more experienced guitar players to double check themselves. This isn't the most accurate method, because if the strings are kind of old then the harmonics will throw off the pitch.

Using other people

That one sounds kind of like a joke, but having someone else to tune to can be quite popular. The biggest problem with this is having to rely upon the other guy. Some people are even so sure that they are in tune, but we're trying to rule out the easiest and best method here.

Using a digital tuner

This is probably the most desirable method, as its easy and takes the guess work out of. Typically a tuner will have a little needle with a set of numbers. You'll have negative and positive numbers, with a zero in the middle. With each string that you try to tune, you want to get the needle as close to that zero as possible. If its a little off - no big deal, but you just want the needle, or in some cases a green light, to show up.

You can download a tuner like this completely for free on the internet, but there have been rumors that these aren't always the most accurate. Investing a small amount of money can get you a tuner that you and your friends can both use, and in a lot of cases they usually come with certain effect pedal boards, or even amps.

About the Author

Jon loves to teach and playing guitar. He is very active in the composing and recording process, and is a movie fanatic.
If you need direction to learn and master guitar, help with strings, tuning, learning chord to learn and master guitar, then I highly recommend that you get professional instruction to a learn and master guitar

Answering this question for yourself may be all that's important, but here's some advice.

If you feel that you need to replace guitar strings, then rely on what's going on at the time and use your best judgement. Some people find that strings that are going a little dead irritate them so much that they can't handle it, where others can deal with the annoyance. Either way, to replace guitar strings all the time means that it all adds up in cost. Strings don't have to be expensive, but after obsessively switching them out they can be quite costly.

The first thing that I would recommend would be to do some research on the different types of strings that are out there and how they are made. I can't give you a specific example, because every one is playing on a different type of guitar, but some sets of strings can out last the ordinary set as much as ten to one!

This all has to do with how they are made or wound generally. These processes can be top secret within the company, but believe me when I say that they don't mind boasting about it. Switching over to replace guitar strings like this can save you a lot of money, and they may even sound better.

If you are a musician or is in a band even just for fun, you may find yourself having to change strings constantly, so the above suggestion may be perfect for you. If you are doing any kind of recording, the same can still be said, but if you are just jamming to yourself, just enjoy yourself and don't worry if your strings sound perfect all the time, unless of course it really bothers you all that much.

If you break a string, that's a whole different issue. I know players who will change just the one string that they broke, and then people like me who have to change all the strings at once. That's just the way I am though - I would rather start clean slate in that kind of a scenario, however, I always save my strings just in case.

Unless you decide to replace guitar strings that are ancient, save the old ones by rolling them up an putting them back in the string envelope for later use. If you have a guitar repair kit, this is the perfect place to store something like this for an emergency.

About the Author

Jon loves to play and teach guitar, loves to record and write music, and is a major movie buff.

To learn and master guitar means to learn all the little things about it. For beginners this can be the biggest obstacle to conquer to learn and master guitar, but there is light at the end of the guitar learning tunnel.

Needing to replace a loudspeaker, how does one make a sensible selection when it's not possible to make a side-by-side comparison between two different speakers ?

Unhappy with the performance of the loudspeaker in his small amplifier, Tal would like to replace it. He's looked up the original speaker, which the manufacturer describes as:

"Very loud, touch sensitive and responsive with nice bell-sounding top end and a little bite."

He is thinking about a speaker recommended by a friend that has this description:

"Performance optimized for lead guitar. Also suitable for bass guitar, vocal P.A., keyboards, club music systems and stage monitors."

Unimpressed by marketingspeak, and slightly troubled by the fact that the same manufacturer actually makes BOTH speakers, our man decides that a comparison between the two should be based on measurements of the two speakers under consideration. A side-by-side comparison being impossible, he makes a brief search of the products on the internet and finds two sound pressure level (SPL) curves, one for his existing speaker and one for the new speaker being considered.

Then, looking at both performance curves carefully, Tal observes that "his" Yankee has higher SPL (it's louder) but less bandwidth (total frequency response) than the Empire. He makes what he believes is a reasonable assumption: that the total power the speakers can project is actually about the same. He believes the difference is in the way that the power is distributed across the frequency range.

Tal doesn't spend money carelessly and he wants to make this speaker exchange only ONCE. He feels that the speaker decision needs to be based on how he's always made decisions about music: with his ears, but how to do this?

For the rest of this excellent article, see:
Comparing Speakers That You Don't Have - The Jazz Guitar Forum