“My main guitar for gigs has a Floyd Rose style locking tremolo systems. When I restring it I normally just cut the ball ends off of the strings, but a friend told me there are special strings with flat tabs that should be inserted into the tremolo for better results. Is this really important?”
In our opinion, no. The locking mechanism of the Floyd (and most other systems we’ve seen) is perfectly capable of grabbing onto the string so it will not slip. In fact many players don’t even cut the ball ends off of strings for their Floyds. Instead they string them backwards so the ball end winds up at the tuning peg. This makes it easier and faster to get the strings on, which can be a big help when you break a string at a gig.
You do need to be careful, however, when using this reverse string threading technique on guitars that do not have a locking nut. The ball can interfere with how the string winds on the tuner and in some cases can contribute to the guitar going out of tune when you use the tremolo hard. This is avoidable if you’re careful, but some players recommend against it.