Help with guitar Upgrade

[Sonicalm]

Hello customsforge friends :D, hope you all are having a nice week.

 

I've been thinking about upgrading my Peavey Rockmaster (cheapest guitar ever), I've been thinking about buying a EMG pickup, but I'm not sure which one to buy...

 

I don't fully understand the difference between passive or active pickups...

the guitar already has a bridge pickup which is not bad, but I'd like a better sound...

 

I've been trying to pick from these two, the H4 and the H4a

 

http://www.emgpickups.com/guitar/humbucking/passive-humbucking/h4.html

 

http://www.emgpickups.com/guitar/humbucking/passive-humbucking/h4a.html

 

any advice would be appreciated

[firekorn]

Active needs a battery to work while passive don't need a battery but that would also change the power output (aka volume).

 

But there's many passive that can sound as an active and vice-versa, the best way is to be able to hear both pickups and make your choice based on the sound you're looking for.

[Sonicalm]

well I've been watching a lot of videos on youtube and both sound great, and I think that I'm going to buy the H4...

[mjmiller1824]

Honestly I know you've made your decision but something FireKorn left out is the easiest way to do it is pick the version your guitar is already wired for. If you don't have a battery and preamp already get a passive. Otherwise get a clean sounding active with an even frequency response curve. But both the pickups you posted are passive.