The ESP Guitar Company

they are mounted into the wood of the guitar. If you have a guitar that has rings on it, you will not be able to remove the ring and screw it down because on the ring guitars they route out the wood are where you would screw it in giving you less than a 1/4 before you go into the other side of the guitar.

hypothetically, wood mounted pups sound better because you get the wood resonance into the pickup. all the guitars that i have played that have this (like the john petrucci sig) sound brutal with dimarzio's, they are really fat but still crisp and punchy. thats why the high end caparisons, music man and ibanez guitars do this.

/\/\/\ hence why he said you get more resonance from the wood into the pup.. I guess its true eh? :D

Tou couls always fill in the route for the rings, and then re-mount the pickups.

I've always liked how guitars looked without the pickup rings. I've never played one that was set up like this though.