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It's only natural that guitar systems join the majority of other wireless technology and go digital. Only now that they have been out of a good few years can we properly evaluate them. But how do they work? For analogue systems the transmitter converts the guitar sound into VHF or UHF radio waves. But in the process of being converted to VHF or UHF something called a compander is used to squash the signal so it fits into the range of VHF or UHF and then when it reaches the receiver, it is expanded out again into the original guitar sound. But inevitably when you squash the signal down like this some quality is lost. With a digital system there isn't a compander, so there isn't any squashing of the signal and therefore it sounds much better; the signal should arrive in exactly the same form as it left the guitar pickups. Another problem with VHF or UHF systems is to do with the bandwidth, and in particular dealing with the bass noise. Bottom E on a bass is 44Hz and some VHF or UHF systems simply don't get this quality range, a similar thing can be said for higher sounds as well; some quality will be lost. A digital system will have the full range however, and minimal sound quality will be lost. With a digital system you should get no interference at all, certainly not from anything on the VHF or UHF frequencies such as radio waves and TV signals. Other digital signals such as phones, Bluetooth and wireless Internet should not be picked up by a wireless guitar system because the receiver is only searching for a digital transmission from the transmitter, which is encoded in a certain way. All other digital transmissions are ignored, so that's why the chance of interference is virtually impossible. The weak point of digital transmission used to be range, but thanks to advances in technology this is no longer the case. You can see from the digital Line6 Relay product range they have increased the range substantially with each new model, the G30 has a 30m range, the G50 has a 60m range and the G90 has a 90m range. So overall you have to say that digital systems seem to be superior to VHF or UHF systems, before it was hard to justify the massive amounts of money you would have to spend on a digital system but now they have come down a lot in price; you can even pick up the Joyo digital system for £87.99 (about $145)! The better quality, reliability, and now equal range therefore make digital systems a great purchase. But a lot still depends on build quality. A high priced UHF system is almost certainly going to be better than a low priced digital system. But the best overall systems will be the digital ones. Digital wireless guitar systems & reviews
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