I bought one of these and went to all the trouble to write a review of it for Guitar Seminars because I had asked about one over there. So I kind of closed the loop on that thread. So if anyone is interested here are my thoughts on the guitar.
First of all the reason for buying was to have a less expensive gigging guitar because I keep knocking my guitars off the stands, banging them into mic stands, etc. So I wanted something that sounds good, all solid, but not expensive.
I tried the Blueridges, some Larrivees, custom Blueridges (Eric Schoenberg has a fabulous 12 fret custom, slot head, mahogany and spruce model for 750), Epiphone Masterbuilts that looked great but did not sound so good.
All in all the Guild GAD30 was the best all around, at least for my needs, which is a combo of fingerstyle blues, some pretty instrumentals, and slide. This is exactly what it looks like:
http://www.guildguitars.com/instruments/search.php?partno=3810205821
Pluses: Beautiful solid mahogany back and sides with maple trim with a high gloss finish. Nice spruce top, nothing special but sounds great. Great neck profile and and love the open back tuners. Bone nut and saddle. It just sounds fantastic and is very light.
I had Taylors, Gibson Montana J-45s, American built Guilds, the Epiphone Masterbuilt all within feet away from the Guild. I tried them all, and damn, if the GAD didn't sound the best of them all, but not really in a Bluesy way, more of a crisp and clear way. It had some dead spots on the G string so I had it professionally set up (action raised a bit) and now it is all clean. I have a VERY heavy attack and I can't get it to bottom out now.
Cool retro looking case but not too formidable. So if you are going to fly with one you might want to put the guitar in a molded case or a Taylor Tank Case.
Negatives:
Fingerboard: Poor selection of Rosewood fingerboard and to me it is important to have a high quality, hopefully ebony, fingerboard. But the profile is great making it work great for slide as well as fingerstyle. 1 3/4 at the nut. The natural finish and the cheap rosewood fingerboard gives it a little bit of a cheap look.
Amplification. Fishman Natural 1 I think. Piezo Hell. I will probably bypass it and use my Rare Earth single Coil. I would not have purchased an amplified one but everthing else on the guitar was great. Could have probably saved a bill without the amplification. I used the onboard amplification for 1 gig and it started acting up half way through and I had to use a single coil. But I think that might have just been the battery. I have changed it and will gig it again this weekend so we'll see how it goes. Should be about 700 people there so it will get a great test.
String spacing. The string spacing is actually excellent with the exception of the high e is too close to the edge and is somewhat of a challenge to keep the thing on the board sometimes. I can replace the nut and redo the spacing but the rest of the spacing is excellent so I don't know whether I will actually do that.
So all in all I am happy with the guitar. Thought I would never go Chinese but it seems that they are really getting there act together in the case of all solid instruments. Sound wise this thing really sings. I think they try to produce them with low action and I think if you raise the action a little the guitar really comes to life.
That is my review of the GAD 30E NAT
Mark
First of all the reason for buying was to have a less expensive gigging guitar because I keep knocking my guitars off the stands, banging them into mic stands, etc. So I wanted something that sounds good, all solid, but not expensive.
I tried the Blueridges, some Larrivees, custom Blueridges (Eric Schoenberg has a fabulous 12 fret custom, slot head, mahogany and spruce model for 750), Epiphone Masterbuilts that looked great but did not sound so good.
All in all the Guild GAD30 was the best all around, at least for my needs, which is a combo of fingerstyle blues, some pretty instrumentals, and slide. This is exactly what it looks like:
http://www.guildguitars.com/instruments/search.php?partno=3810205821
Pluses: Beautiful solid mahogany back and sides with maple trim with a high gloss finish. Nice spruce top, nothing special but sounds great. Great neck profile and and love the open back tuners. Bone nut and saddle. It just sounds fantastic and is very light.
I had Taylors, Gibson Montana J-45s, American built Guilds, the Epiphone Masterbuilt all within feet away from the Guild. I tried them all, and damn, if the GAD didn't sound the best of them all, but not really in a Bluesy way, more of a crisp and clear way. It had some dead spots on the G string so I had it professionally set up (action raised a bit) and now it is all clean. I have a VERY heavy attack and I can't get it to bottom out now.
Cool retro looking case but not too formidable. So if you are going to fly with one you might want to put the guitar in a molded case or a Taylor Tank Case.
Negatives:
Fingerboard: Poor selection of Rosewood fingerboard and to me it is important to have a high quality, hopefully ebony, fingerboard. But the profile is great making it work great for slide as well as fingerstyle. 1 3/4 at the nut. The natural finish and the cheap rosewood fingerboard gives it a little bit of a cheap look.
Amplification. Fishman Natural 1 I think. Piezo Hell. I will probably bypass it and use my Rare Earth single Coil. I would not have purchased an amplified one but everthing else on the guitar was great. Could have probably saved a bill without the amplification. I used the onboard amplification for 1 gig and it started acting up half way through and I had to use a single coil. But I think that might have just been the battery. I have changed it and will gig it again this weekend so we'll see how it goes. Should be about 700 people there so it will get a great test.
String spacing. The string spacing is actually excellent with the exception of the high e is too close to the edge and is somewhat of a challenge to keep the thing on the board sometimes. I can replace the nut and redo the spacing but the rest of the spacing is excellent so I don't know whether I will actually do that.
So all in all I am happy with the guitar. Thought I would never go Chinese but it seems that they are really getting there act together in the case of all solid instruments. Sound wise this thing really sings. I think they try to produce them with low action and I think if you raise the action a little the guitar really comes to life.
That is my review of the GAD 30E NAT
Mark