Antoniotsai Beauty

2005 Ebay special from Antoniosai-solid flamed maple 'jazz' Florentine cutaway model from Tainan. Insatlled piezo electronics, gold hardware, high gloss finish, rediculaos inlays everywhere except top, knockoff schaller tuners, medium neck and nice hard case.

Had a reasonable sound WHEN IT WAS PLAYABLE! Nice plugged in BUT!!!! Everything (all 12 pieces) have SPLIT AND CRACKED AND WARPED and is now UNPLAYABLE! Many buyers have this problem as he DOES NOT DRY HIS SOLID WOODS! I have pickguards, headstocks, fretboards with georgoeus inlays a THAT ARE ONLY GOOD FOR ARTWOK on a wall-unuseable. Avoid all Antonisai's holoow products except the solid bosy rock guitars(so far) unless you need interior decor to hang on the wall.

Imprecise but playable for 3-5 weeks before the Sheet hitus the fan and it all splits apart. ANother guy contacted me and his latest count on one guitar was 38 cracks! MIne has 3 and the 3 week old classical has 3 on the back-still playable so far. Frets cut fingers, needed leveling and reintstalling. Georgeous looking items but they are noe playable as they fall apart and warp! Email for photos.

Not afraid- IT HAS self destructed! Nice finish though.

Emailed and they said to return in to Oklahoma and they's send replacement BUT most ebay neg feedbacks have said he nevr refunds $$ or replaces items so I may as well hang it on a wall or use it as a boat paddle.

Been playing for 27 years, owned 150+ guitars including super 400, ES150s, etc. These Antoniosai are great artwork but I cannot use ANY of his items, guitars or pirece (except a solidbody, so far) as they have all warped and cracked. Cheap sweat shop workmanship but great looking inlays. Non guitar people comment on them though as artwork. Email me for photos of the self destruction! Antoniosai (Tony) loves to reply to his 100s of negative feedbacks with '1000s of +s speak for themselves BUT ask those positives a few months later and see what happened to their guitars!

My Tony Tsai (antoniotsai) acoustic is a single cutaway acoustic with insane abalone and mother of pearl inlay. Decent wood and hardware was used in construction. Decent case as a standard issue and the ax arrived safe from Taiwan. Do not buy one of these and expect Martin/Guild/Gibson/Taylor type of quality construction. These guitars are masterpieces of inlay art and the bodies and necks of the guitars are the canvas. The inlay is nearly perfect and very beautiful. These are basically a $200.00 guitar with $5,000.00 worth of inlay work done on them. I will buy more of them, swapout as much cheap stuff as possible and either resell them at a huge profit or keep them as wall art.

Decent sound, some buzzing at differnt spots. Inotation is pretty dead on! Not a Martin, but unless you can afford $85k for the D-100, you'll never see this pretty of inlays on a Martin!!!

Action was okay on mine, low enough for an "ol fat f*ck like me!!!! Wood was nice on the exterior, (sloppy glue on the inside though.) If you are a real neat geek, you will not dig a peek inside of one of these. The finish is near flawless and the inlays are great!!!

Seems faily solid.

Tony is a nice guy and a terrific artist but there is a big gap between us called the Pacific Ocean and $80.00 shipping charge. Tony does respond to emails though it may take a few days. If you bought one his guitars from ebay, relax, he is honest and the inlay work is pretty much second to none. I figure I paid about $1,000.00 extra to have Cindy do her inlay thing on my custom shop "Taylor". I could buy 2 or 3 more Antoniotsai guitars for just the extra $$$ I spent on just the Cindy inlays on the neck of my Taylor.

Buy one of these if you want the most beautiful abalone and mother of pearl inlays on a guitar without too much regard to the rest of the guitar. I have thought about buying several hundred older Taylors, Martins, Guilds and Gibsons, traveling over to Tony's shop in Taiwan and have him work his magic on some killer guitars and export them back over to the USA to resell what would be "the best of both worlds"

2004 December, Taiwan, Hand made acoustic guitar, Beautiful detailed inlay work on the back, fretboard, sound hole, headstock, and binding area. Solid spruce top, Asian rosewood sides, back, and headstock overlay. Mehogany neck, gold plated sealed tuning machines, ebony fingerboard, and bridge. Bone nut, and saddle. Brown burst finish. I purchased this on Ebay, and received it in one week from Taiwan.

It suits my style well as the nut width is 1 3/4", and allows easy fingerpicking. The sound is full,resonant,and balanced.It has a very nice acoustic sound, and rings well.

The guitar was poorly assembled with noticeable defects. The fingerboard had a hair line crack in it about 1 1/4" long. I repaired this with #40 gel purchased from Stewart Mcdonald. The bridge was rough, not sanded well, and had no finish on it. the ends of the bridge had several small chips, but was glued on anyway. I carefully sanded, and finished this with tung oil. I will have to live with the small chips at the ends. Frets were rough, but level, and were not dressed well at the ends. I polished the frets with 600 grit emery paper, and dressed the ends. The action was so high it could only be played with a capo, or in the first position. The bone nut was glued on haphazardly with gaps of 1/32" between the headstock, and the bottom of the nut, and was not square to the fingerboard. I filled the gaps with more gel,let dry, and filed, scraped, and sanded after the gel dryed. Extensive nut string slot fileing was necessary. The bone saddle required extensive sanding at the bottom to bring the action down. Intonation was off at the 12th fret and required me to shape the saddle back in order to compensate. I think the bridge was glued on slightly in the wrong position. I was however able to correct this by the saddle work, and achieved near close intonation to an acceptable level. The inside bracing, and support work was sloppy, but solid. The supports were shaped at the ends. Under the bridge holes were wood splinters hanging where the holes were drilled. Wood chips, and sawdust were left inside the body of the guitar. The binding was ill fit at points around the fingerboard, and the guitar at the transition points.

The guitar seems solid,and should stand up to live playing. It has a nice gloss finish. There are no strap buttons installed on this guitar, easy to remedy. I filled all gaps, and areas that looked weak with gel glue to help add to the structural integrity of the guitar. I put two coats of tung oil finish around the soundhole to cover some bare spots.

I sent one email to the seller outlining the problems with this guitar, and received no reply. If this changes I will update this review at a later time. Hey I bought it from Taiwan, what should I expect?

I have been playing for 37 years, and have had to repair a lot of problems with guitars along the way. The guitar had a 7 day return period. The sound was very good, and the inlay work was exceptional, and I decided to keep it. Shipping is $80.00 to return it to Tiawan. This guitar now plays like a nice acoustic Jazz guitar, the action is low, and fast. Intonation is acceptable. Cords ring out like a quality acoustic guitar should.It is made of all solid quality tone woods, with a bone nut, and saddle. It sounds wonderful acousticly. I use an LR Baggs M1 pickup, and a Baggs Para Acoustic D.I. for a superb amplified sound with no unwanted hum or undesirable noise. I must say Antonio Tsai's inlay work is outstanding,he presents himself as an inlay artist. In hindsight I would not purchase this again. I would get a good Taylor 414ce, and spend my time playing istead of repairing. I am now satisfied with this guitar. The guitar is a stunning looker, and now a nice player as well.