Re: Direct mounted pickups.
I never noticed that huge of a difference in sound personally between directly screwing the shits into the body and floating them in a ring.
I did it to a couple guitars back in the day, but didn't like it enough to keep it.
Mainly, i found it much more useful soundwise, to have more control via the normal mounting means, to adjust the heights and angles of the pickup. Like, that makes a much more obvious difference in pickup sound quality to my ears.