Korg Pitchclip PC-1 guitar tuner review

Decent tuner.

I headed out to Sam Ash today to check out a Telecaster. It was good, but not good enough to make me want to buy it. Before I left I asked what guitar tuners they had in stock, and there was one selling for about 20 bucks that I decided to buy, a Korg Pitchclip PC-1.

The PC-1 is available basically everywhere. The going price at the time I write this is about 20 bucks. And yes it does come with a battery.

Up until now I've been using what was formerly known as the Planet Waves NS Tuner (now called a D'Addario NS Tuner), and I can best call that particular tuner "okay". Not great. Not bad. Just okay. In other words, it gets the job done, but not in a way where you would say "Wow, this thing is great" about it.

After using the Pitchclip for just a few minutes, I quickly realized it's much better than the NS tuner is, and I'll tell you why.

Easier to mount

Korg got the tension for the clip just right with the Pitchclip, as this thing can be used on anything from a cheap Squier all the way to multi-thousand dollar guitars with absolutely no fear of finish damage.

Easier to use

The Pitchlip has only one button, and that button does three things. Turns the clip on, turns it off, or if you hold it for longer than one second, it flips the readout of the display.

Being this clip doesn't rotate, Korg came up with the idea of just holding the button to flip the display readout, which in all honesty is a great idea because you don't have to worry about orientation. You just clip on, and if you have to do it where the display is upside down, no problem. Hold the button for longer than a second, the readout flips and you're ready to start tuning.

Easier to read

Each LED on the Pitchlip has multiple levels of brightness, so as you tune, the LEDs gradually get brighter or dimmer depending on pitch.

My only complaint here is that the display does have an indicator for sharps but not flats, so if you wanted to tune a half-step down, that would be D#, G#, C#, F#, A#.

Easier to change the stupid battery

Most clip-on tuners make the battery difficult to get to for whatever reason. Not so with the Pitchclip. Flip open the display and it's right there in easy reach; it doesn't get any easier.

Also, yes, the unit will power itself off automatically if not used for 10 minutes.

Conclusion

This Pitchclip is definitely better than the NS micro-tuner is. The wider/brighter LEDs with green and red are much easier to read from a distance (and even if you can't read the letter because of bad eyesight, you can go by color from the red and green LEDs), the clip tension is just right, clipping on/off is really easy when going from guitar to guitar, and the one-button operation is stupidly easy to use.

Korg did this tuner right, no question. I'm glad I bought it.

Published 2013 Aug 31