Ibanez GRX70

I really like this guitar, it has 21 frets, 5 way seletor, only volume and tone controls. The pickups sound good, it has a couple of Humbuckers, one at the neck one at the bridge and a single coil in between, they sound amazing with distortion. I like the finish of the body, although it does kind of scratch easily. It has a nice weight to it and a strat style bridge that sometimes makes the strings go out of tune. For #169, I think it's a bargain.

I play Alt rock, so this guitar suits my style perfectly. I think I might change the pick-ups but they do sound pretty good. it sounds great with my friends Peavey Milestone III Bass.

I love the fast neck on this guitar, i think it is one of it's best features. When I got the guitar, there was absolutly nothing wrong with it. Frets are pretty good and a filed down pretty well.

This guitar is solid. I've bashed it a few times and it still remains flawless. I can depend on it and i think it'll last for a long time.

Never had to use them, but i hear they are quite helpful.

They have been many harsh reviews about this guitar, but I think it a cool guitar and it's pretty damn good for the price. If it were stolen I would track down the theif and beat to death with his own shoe.

well its all been said in the other reviews.

the neck Pup aint really worth playing unless its too your taste, but like all guitars in this price range you aint gonna get very good quality. but i think the bridge Pup is great for metal. suits my style perfect.

had mine a while now and only thing that annoys me is it goes out of tune quite fast other than that its great, the guitar is very light with a thin neck which is easy to move fast on. so all you speed metalers will enjoy the feel of it.

well i wouldn't gig with this guitar but sure as hell wouldn't put it away during practice, i think it plays great for the money and nothing goes wrong, but like i said "for the money" so if i gigged with it i wouldn't trust it. would make a good back up tho.

couldn't tel ya

overall id give this guitar a 9 i think its great for begginers up to about 2 1/2 years. if you been playing longer than this then save for a better quality guitar. but still i love this guitar i dont think many of the other reviewers gave it a chance they seem like they were looking for things to go wrong just because its a budget guitar. so if you want to buy it give it a play or if this will be your first or second guitar get someone to show you what it can do and i bet you like it.

This guitar has 22 frets, body strat style,a H/S/H pickup configuration. It appers a great guitar for his price! I still using it and a Ibanez SA160 (it's better), but i never have problems since i was a beginner of electric guitar.

I play punk-rock,punk,and sometimes rock. This guitar has in my opinion a very good blasted sound, using the bridge Humbucker, and a Marshall Amp. The punk-sound distortion sound very well.I have also a Zoom GFX-707 guitar FX processor,and this guitar works great with it.

I have no problem with this guitar, but i don't like the cheapy construction pickup with Standard Tremolo (like a Strat).

I play this guitar with a Marshall JCM 900 saeries amplifiers and it sound very well. Heavy Palm muting can perhaps detune the guitar,but it's not a very big problem.

i never deal with them.

I think this guitar was perfect for me when i was a beginner.Now i have an Ibanez SA160qm that sound muche better,but i sometimes use the GRX70 because it's a very good guitar in my opinion.

I think the GRX has limited features. It would be nice to have more than two controls. I think the neck is good as it has 22 frets and has a very cool headstock look.

I like the sound it produces. I think it has a very heavy sound and is great with Distortion. But the Bass pickup often causes trouble. I like playing with the treble pickup only.

As I said, the neck is great for me. I dont like the shape of the body of the guitar. It feels big and a bit akward. There are problems with the input socket and volume controls though. I have had mine for 3 months and the socket has come loose once and the tone control has fallen of three times.

I can only say that the strap buttons are brilliant, Mind you I have a really good strap.

I wish it had more electic features for the pickups. I am planning to take off the neck and stick it on a different guitar though.

Pretty basic beginners heavy metal guitar. Standard tremolo (strat style), 22 frets, H/S/H pickups, 5-way selector, 1x volyme, 1x tone, dark blue finish, rosewood fretboard, crappy tuners.

If everything on this guitar would have higher quality then this guitar would be perfect for any beginner! But as it is now then I pity the fool that buy this crap.

Let's just say this guitar is only for beginners... The middle and neck pickup is worth NOTHING. You can rip them off and throw them away immediately. The bridge pickup is "usable", it's not good but you can use it and not be totally embarrased about it. The sound is kind'of dead and bad.

The finish doesn't seem to be that much crap, but still I don't think it would last that long.

The neck feels like a toy guitar. Cheap and "plastic". The neck and body joint is poorly made so the neck is straight but still the action becomes crappier for every fret. Cheap crap.

The tremolo is also kind-of crap. Sometimes it can keep the tuning like a good floyd rose, and sometimes it drops an octave or two (exaggeration) after a slight touch.

The pickups adjustment is crap. They're basically just crammed in there and "let the customer do the real job" style adjusted.

This guitar could probably stand a little bit of live playing, but I would use it onstage only if it was the last guitar on earth and I had a gig in 5 min. The hardware would probably first start to brake down, because the cheap tuners with a "plastic-feel" doesn't seem to be reliable. When I think of it, the whole guitar feels "cheap" and plastic. The strap buttons won't hold crap (you'll have to buy strap locks if you don't mind some bumps and bruises on the guitar).

But if you would use this one on stage then it would probably be a backup of a backup guitar, because I don't trust this guitar. It may not be true, but when I use it it feels like a cheap poorly done "made in china" toy.

Never dealt with them.

Four words, you could get better. This guitar would be great for a beginner, but stil you could pay less and get better. A lot of people have slagged the Epiphone Les Paul Special 2 but still it cost about 100$ less and is mutch more better than this piece of crap. I really don't understand why Ibanez doesn't care about their overall quality, they make great guitars like the Jem and a lot more, but still they make cheap crap under the same name. They should do like Fender & Squier and make the cheap crap under another name so they don't drag Fender in the dirt :)

But if you're a beginner and want to impress your friends then buy this. You can always brag that Ibanez guitars are also used by Steve Vai, Paul Gilbert, John Petrucci etc. And it looks more like a heavy metal guitar than a hard rock screaming Les Paul or a rednecks best friend Telecaster. This may sound harsh that I'm saying you should only choose this guitar for it's looks, but let's face it... this guitars sound sucks so the looks is the only thing keeping it from the junk jard.

So if you want to look cool while practising then throw your money away and buy this crap. Fool.

It's a 22-freted guitar made in Indonesia. It's solid constructed, I've accidently dropped it a few times, the strings re-tuned themselves but the guitar was still intact.
You can control the volume, tone and the pickup use (5-way).
It has a H/S/H pickup confugration with standard ibanez passive pickups.
It doesn't have Lock nobs like newer ibanez but that's no big deal cause if you have good strings they won't retune (unless u use the tremolo arm too much). It is a beginner guitar in my view, cause it has just standard pickups and so on

I play METAL and METAL only. But i still need clean sounds, i find the Single Coil pickup really good if you compare with the price. The neck pickup SUCKS, it's noisy and i can't get a good sound out of it even though i use dist. pedals and decent amps. But the combination: Bridge Pickup > BOSS MT-2 Metal Zone > Laney Amp gives you a good distortion. I give it a 6. (Would be 7 or 8 if it weren't for the neck pickup)

Nothing to complain about, except maybe that my local dealer had to adjust the single coil pickup a bit, but once adjusted it sounded great.

As said, it IS a beginner guitar and nothing I'd use for big Live gigs, but you should bring it as a backup, if you just have a good amp the sound will be decent.

I'd never had to deal with Ibanez themselves but my local dealer was extremely helpful.

If it broke (or got stolen) I wouldn't buy it again since i don't consider myself as beginner anymore... But i'll always keep this guitar, it was my first, and i've learnt a lot from it, i would consider it as THE beginner guitar.

Bought the guitar new in '99 and its made in indonesia.
Controls are volume & tone.

It's suits like in any style you want.. sorry about my english but the box where the strings end up.. not the tuning part.. anyway it's pretty weak and i wouldn't count on it ... eg. in recording

Everything was just great.

I wouldn't take it on gig.. it's still too .. "amateur"

haven't tried.

Fabulous first guitar.. played with it now something four years and I still like it.

Part of an Ibanez starter kit, accompanied by an Ibanez 15W amp, cord, stompbox, gig bag, and tools. Manufactured in '98, probably in Malaysia. HB/SC/HB (all passive), 5-way switch, volume and tone knob, 22 fret bolt-on neck, dot inlays, black strat body, no pickup guard. Unsure about body and neck woods. Non-locking tuner. The strings go through the body and rest on the bridge. Bridge has tremolo arm.

This is a starter guitar, nothing more, nothing less. If you're just beginning and don't have a basis for comparison, its sound will keep you happy until you're ready to upgrade. (For me, that was about 2 years, but I'm not a serious musician, just a basement riff monster.) Even after you buy a better guitar, you'll still find yourself playing on the GRX70 from time to time.

It is well suited for the beginner who wants to play metal. For stock pickups, the humbuckers thrash. The pickup selector in the neck position obtains deep, dark tones. The bridge setting is great for lower register rhythm riffs, especially with the tone knob cranked to the right. It does pretty well with the highs, too. Once you tire of jamming on demonic riffs, you can forray into other musical terrains. It's okay for blues and has a decent (although not spectacular) clean sound. The GRX70 has fairly good sustain.

The neck has a nice feel and the guitar is light, but well balanced. If you've never played before, this guitar will feel "right" in your hands from the start.

See my notes in the reliability section below for the downside to this guitar.

This was may first guitar. When I got it, I didn't have a clue what action and intonation were. Hell, I didn't even know how to tune it.

3 years later, it has fairly low action. Heavy palm muting pushes the string blocks down their cheaply constructed support pegs, so even if you set your E and A strings high, they'll drop over time. The frets are small, and there's no buzz. The intonation is shot and would be difficult to fix since the bridge is so cheaply constructed. The truss rod needs to be adjusted. After about a year of playing, I developed a "dead spot" on the A string 8th fret. Raising the action helped, but now the 17th fret sounds weak.

Instead of paying a professional to fix these issues, I decided to parlay my hard earned cash into a new guitar.

You get what you pay for. The GRX70 is inexpensive and unreliable. Within 2 months, the input jack had to be re-soldered. Within 4 months, the volume knob caused the unit to cut out. Turning it created a sound reminicent of the one produced by a cheap transitor radio that's on the fritz. Intonation and other problems kicked in within a year (see above) that are probably unsolvable without modifying the truss rod or replacing the bridge. The frets wore down severely after a year and a half. The soft wood of the fretboard has several dents. The Ibanez logo started to wear off the headstock. After 2 years, the lower humbucker magnets are showing signs of mild corrosion.

Worse than all of these problems combined, the GRX70 is virtually impossible to keep in tune. Whammy bar dips greater than one whole step will cause the high strings to bounce back sharp. A single dive bomb will throw every string out of tune--some as much as a quarter step sharp or flat. Forget about psycho whammy action.

Even macho bends will detune the higher strings, especially the G string. I could control the tuning gremlins by keeping my strings fairly new. Which wasn't a problem, because the cheap string supports on the bridge would consistantly cause my A string to break after about 10 hours of playing.

I'm a basement riff monster, but if I were in a band, I'd only use it for practice or to write tunes on. I wouldn't even think about using it live.

I just dealt with the problems myself. I figure Ibazez isn't going to support a low end model like the GRX70. I got it from Chuck Levin's Washington Music Center, and they fixed the input jack problem free of charge.

A low cost option that will help the beginners find out if guitar playing is for them, especially the aspiring metal shredder. The low action, good tone, and nice feel really facilitate learning how to play. If nothing else, the GRX70 will help train your ear, since you'll spend a lot of time tuning it! Not a bad place to start, but I guess you always develop a fondness for your first guitar.

If you already own an electric, buy this model only if you need something to smash onstage.

Made in Korea, 22 frets, 1 volume 1 tone/distortion control knob
Pickups h/s/h
Agathis body (what the hell is agathis? if anyone knows, e-mail ryk2500@yahoo.com, ta)
rosewood fretboard e.t.c
Mine is a jewel blue glossy finish
normal bridge
Quite solid, if a little light

I play through a zoom 505 2, into a marshall 30 watt amp, and it sounds really good. The tone can be adjusted well, and it can sound either really crunchy or bright, perfect for metal, and maybe rock/punk
The neck humbucker isnt too hot though...

Whammy arm puts it out of tune, but if you take it out, then the thing doesn't go out of tune if you leave it for months!

the finish scratches easily, but other than that, it can withhstand a good thrashing, and stay in tune perfectly well

I have been playing for about 2 years, and this guitar is a perfect beginners guitar. It looks good, it plays wel and it sounds mint, i just wish it had a floyd rose. That would be worth paying another 30 quid for, and the body could be made to feel a bit more solid

It's cool..cheapest 7-string ibanez ever made!

I play alot of styles handles metal very well.

quick response but get detuned if you use the tremolo alot..i prefer changing it with schaller locking tuners

its very durable even in very harsh live playing

ive been playing 7 years..im a guitar tech..I'm palnning to but the shecter omen7 string guitar