Cagey said:
Volume pots are always audio tapered; it's not a matter of preference, it's a matter of functionality. A linear volume pot will act almost like a switch to your ear.
I have to respectfully disagree with this. Linear pots used as guitar volume controls aren't uncommon. Lots of Gibsons ship from the factory with them, for instance. After playing one of said Gibsons, I liked the action of the linear taper so much that I started using them in all of my guitars. Smooth, consistent roll off all the way across the sweep of the pot. Audio pots on the other hand have all the action in a small sweep, then a whole lot of not-much-happening. It's how they're designed.
The audio/log taper was devised to cater to the non-linear nature of human hearing. When you turn your guitar amplifier up from zero, a linear taper pot would seem to bring the volume on very abruptly. So the audio pot stretches that initial part of the taper out. It gives you a very gradual increase from 0 to around 7, then the rest of the range is covered quite rapidly from 7 to 10. However, on guitars, we typically have the volume wide open and are then turning down from there, which means that we get the fast part of the taper from 10 to 7 first, then not much happens after that. An audio pot in a guitar volume sounds like a switch to my ear: dirty to clean in in just a nudge, then then a long span of going from clean to "off". I like to use the volume knob to control how hard I push the amp, and audio pots always drove me nuts with their all-at-once operation. But I kept using them because I was always told that linear pots would be too abrupt. Actually playing a guitar loaded with them was a real eye opener. Linear volume in a guitar is way smooth. Audio is where it's at for volume swells though, fast action in a small sweep.
On the other hand, linear taper for the tone pot makes me crazy. Very little action from 10 until 4 or so, then allofasuddeneverything. I use audio pots for tone every time.
I think the "audio vs linear" pot debate falls squarely under "matter of preference".
