The Super Distortion is one of the early high-output humbuckers that was used by enough musicians in the '70's and '80's that it pretty much defined the heavy rock sound. Basically its built to put out enough signal to push the preamp stages of a tube amp into saturation, giving lots of sustain and distortion. More recent designs mistakenly (I think) are based on the 'more is better' theory. A pickup that is too 'hot' for your amp just makes blurred chords and thin-sounding notes. I've been using a four-wire Super Distortion at the bridge of my Yamaha SBG 1000 since 1986, and I haven't yet come across anything I thought would be a real improvement. It cleans up nicely if you back off the guitar volume setting, and when you crank it up, it responds well to subtlies of pick attack, without getting out of hand.