Cagey
Mythical Status
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You'll be fine. There's theory, and then there's reality when it comes to tuning. He's mostly talking about theory in the video, although he's able to back up what he says with objective fact through the use of precise test fixtures and instrumentation. In reality, many of the "problems" with tuning come from two places - our access to accurate tuners, and playing style.
A very accurate tuner, which is most of them these days, will allow you to see things that you can't hear directly. Less than $10 will get you a device that's good to within a couple cents, and they only get better from there. On the other hand, human hearing just isn't that good for a single tone. Opinions vary, as there's no objective way to be precise about perception, but it's generally accepted that very young ears (think babies) are sensitive down as fine as 5 cents variation in frequency, while a normal adult is at about 25 cents or more. You'll get some argument about that from some people, but blind testing them would return surprising (to them) results.
What even us ancient wankers can hear very easily is dissonance. It only takes a few cents for that to rear its ugly head, and that's what drives us crazy. But, in order to hear dissonance we need more than one tone, and that's where playing style comes in. If you play a lot of chords or overlapping single notes where one note is allowed to sustain as the next note is played, fine tuning takes on a great deal more importance than it does for the player who more often than not is playing serial single notes.
What you really get from the compensated tuning solutions such as the Earvana nut is not so much accurate tuning as a reduction in dissonance due to poor setup or uneven finger pressure. Where you'll notice it is when playing cowboy chords - those "open" chords down by the nut that include both fretted and open strings. As the man says in the video - a proper setup will get you the same thing. It just costs more, because now you're paying for labor and expertise instead of injection molded plastic. The advantage of a proper setup is easier playability, but people have been playing poorly set up guitars for so long that it's become the norm.
A very accurate tuner, which is most of them these days, will allow you to see things that you can't hear directly. Less than $10 will get you a device that's good to within a couple cents, and they only get better from there. On the other hand, human hearing just isn't that good for a single tone. Opinions vary, as there's no objective way to be precise about perception, but it's generally accepted that very young ears (think babies) are sensitive down as fine as 5 cents variation in frequency, while a normal adult is at about 25 cents or more. You'll get some argument about that from some people, but blind testing them would return surprising (to them) results.
What even us ancient wankers can hear very easily is dissonance. It only takes a few cents for that to rear its ugly head, and that's what drives us crazy. But, in order to hear dissonance we need more than one tone, and that's where playing style comes in. If you play a lot of chords or overlapping single notes where one note is allowed to sustain as the next note is played, fine tuning takes on a great deal more importance than it does for the player who more often than not is playing serial single notes.
What you really get from the compensated tuning solutions such as the Earvana nut is not so much accurate tuning as a reduction in dissonance due to poor setup or uneven finger pressure. Where you'll notice it is when playing cowboy chords - those "open" chords down by the nut that include both fretted and open strings. As the man says in the video - a proper setup will get you the same thing. It just costs more, because now you're paying for labor and expertise instead of injection molded plastic. The advantage of a proper setup is easier playability, but people have been playing poorly set up guitars for so long that it's become the norm.
