I’d wanted a guitar with a Floyd Rose for a long time—especially one with a Les Paul-style body. The delivery went smoothly overall, but before it arrived, I was expecting good quality. Unfortunately, when the guitar came, it had several issues.
The main problem was with the top lock (nut) — it was way too high for me, so even with the truss rod properly adjusted, the chords were out of tune and the guitar was basically unplayable. On top of that, the second fret had popped up a bit, and even with a higher action, it still buzzed. I know that a lifted fret can happen sometimes, but I don’t think I should have to hammer it back in myself—or file down the wood under the locking nut just to get a normal string height over the first fret.
There were also problems with the Floyd Rose posts: one of them wasn’t driven in all the way, which meant the sixth string could be lowered even more than the first. As for the Floyd Rose itself, it behaved strangely out of the box. When I did a dive bomb, it returned slightly sharp (about 10 cents flat from proper pitch), and when I pulled up to raise the pitch, it would lock slightly sharp. I’ve read that Floyd Roses often need to be fine-tuned and set up properly, and many factors can affect their performance, so I guess that’s fair—but I still believe a guitar should stay in tune decently right from the factory.
On the positive side, the frets (apart from that one issue) were amazing—probably the best I’ve ever seen. The neck felt great, and overall the guitar was very pleasant to play. The electronics and pickups sounded excellent, and the guitar looked beautiful.
In conclusion, I think I just got unlucky with the quality on my particular unit, since nobody else in the reviews mentioned the same problems. I’ve sent the guitar back for a replacement because, despite its flaws, I really do like it.
