DiMarzio DP 416 Area 61 WH

I have been using this for about a year and it's a wonderful pickup. First installed it in bridge position where it was great (perfect for early Blackmore tone, Hendrix, Gilmour...) but it wasn't powerful enough for heavier music so I moved it to middle position (and put Virtual Solo to bridge position).

To my ears it does sound like a single coil minus the hum. Very sensitive to height adjustments, you can dial in the tone you like. I use this for SRV tones, some hendrix etc. Some people complain that it is "noisy" but mine certainly isn't.

It is so good I have a temptation to buy 3 of these and put them in all strat positions for "vintage" guitar with little lower output compared to modern pickups.

I purchased the Dimarzio Area 61 single coil to use as a set with two Area 67 pickups in a 2006 American Standard Stratocaster (Alder body, Maple neck, Rosewood fret board, 2 post trem with callaham block and saddles). The Area 67s went in the neck and middle positions and I have come to be quite satisfied with their tone. However the Area 61 I have been less impressed with. I find this pickup to be quite bright and in my guitar I find it to sound hard and 'ice pick' like when I dig in. With overdrive I think this pickup sounds ok but as far as classic Strat bridge single coil clean tones go I find this pickup to fall quite short on what I was getting from the stock US Standard pickups. I don't find it to balance well with the Area 67s in the neck and middle in terms of brightness. I also own the Dimarzio Area T set for Telecaster and I find that set to be quite convincing, however the Strat pickups I am less happy with. I personally could only recommend this pickup to someone who wants a hot, bright voiced bridge single for higher gain settings. If you want a convincing clean tone I'd advise looking elsewhere.

I've been testing/using lots of Dimarzio's pickups during the past decade from humbuckers to singlecoils and I have to say that this one is amazing.

The sound is very close to a single coil but with the advantage of the noise less feature, bright and puncy. I use it on a solid body Basswood guitar in the neck position, and so far it is realy inspiring.

I love that "special sound" of it without extra noise.
Eq. wise, the bass are bright and sparkly, so no sin of muddiness in the neck position, the notes comes out very easy and defined.
the treble are clear and never to bright in my opinion. I've tested it on various settings from "jazzy clean to hard rock distortion style".
The Area 61 also works very well in combination of an medium output Humbucker.

Finaly, I do recommend this Pickup for any guitar player in need of that twangy/fenderish sound with no extra noise for various music style such as Clean jazzy, blues and hard rock.

Use
I got the pickup mainly for Studio use and because i was sick of hum,buzz and other crap messing with my tone.. ;)

Thoughts

I forget how normal strats buzz and hum when i got mine.. I will be completely honest they don't sound exactly like a single coil .. They miss the very high end frequencies that a single coil has.. I would say they sound 90% like a single coil.. Which for me is perfect..

I will purchase this pickups for all of my guitars with single coils...

pros

1. You get noiseless single coil pickup perfect for studio use and on stage.
2. You can wire them so that they can split..

cons

They don't sound exactly like a single coil which i think is a good thing..
If you like hum and buzz i guess you will not like this pickups.. :D