Kramer Focus 111S

Come on, it?s a Strat copy. What could you possibly need to know? Maple neck, rosewood board, and a plywood body. That?s about it.

I bought this guitar simply as a vehicle on which to mount a Roland GK-2A synth pickup and create a dedicated synth guitar. Still, I couldn?t resist pugging it in. It?s actually very resonant, much to my surprise. Not much to say here ? the bridge pickup is very hot compared to the others. The neck and middle pickups and combinations thereof produced mostly traditional Strat-ish sounds ? except that although it was very bright and trebly, it lacked spankiness and quack like the real thing. Despite being resonant, there is no doubt that the plywood body hinders tone generation ? it sounds like a plywood guitar. BUT, very very good for the whopping $70 I paid for it. Overall, not a tone machine of course but full of very useable and nice sounds.

: I?m stupefied. I paid $70 for a guitar and got: no sharp fret ends, nicely polished and leveled frets, a perfectly straight neck with no buzzes and good action, a perfect black finish, and decent quality hardware. Nice bridge saddles. What the hell is going on here? It?s not perfect, though ? the lower-horn pickguard hole was drilled just a hair too far inward, creating a small hump in the pickguard there. Some gloss finish slop was on the nut, and the fingerboard was slightly rough under my fingers due to some kind of compound left on the board ? 5 minutes with some 000 steel wool and lemon oil took care of that and it was smooth as could be. Overall very impressive though. Like getting a Corolla for Yugo money.

Super-thick finish and decent hardware. I doubt any problems will crop up if it's properly maintained. Strat-style guitars are notoriously tough.

Haven?t needed it. No idea, although if I got zero support with a $70 guitar I wouldn?t be surprised and couldn?t hold that against them.

I've been playing for too damn long, and own gobs of high-end gear. I suppose it does a good job of holding my Roland synth pickup. It also does it with quality that is pretty much unbelievable for the price. Plays great with no issues. I?d buy one of these in place of a Squier any day. Would be an excellent low-dollar way to get into playing without suffering the headaches of a poor-quality instrument.

Korean Made - 2003
Neck: Hard Maple
Neck Profile: Slim-Taper
Construction: Bolt-On
Body: Laminated Nato / Alder
Neck Pickup: Single-Coil
Middle Pickup: Single-Coil
Bridge Pickup: Single-Coil
Controls: 5-Way Pickup Selector
One Master Volume
Two Tones
Bridge: Vintage Style Tremolo
Machine Heads: Covered
Nut: PVC
Nut Width: 1.68"
Frets: 21 - Nickel/Steel
Headstock: Straight String Pull
Flat - String Tree between "E" and "B"
Fingerboard: 21 fret, Rosewood
F/B Radius: 12"
Scale Length: 25.5"
F/B Inlay: PVC Dots
Mine is a Vintage Sunburst finish

My music style is N/A, as I am just learning to play and this is my 1st guitar.
I'm using a Vox Pathfinder 15R which has built in tremelo and reverb, also have an echo and flange pedal to fool around with at a later time.
Pickup settings #2 and #4 are extremely quiet, with #1-#3-#5 only a slight sign of a hum.
This guitar produces exception full, bright, crisp sound. It's simply amazing for the price.
I really don't have any dislikes for the guitar that they shipped me. Simply put, it's "all good".

Set-up was very good right out of the box. I did lower the action a bit, but the intonation was right on the money.
Pickups seem to be adjusted perfectly, as is the bridge.
No factory or shipping flaws whatsoever. Once again, amazing for the remarkable low price. A buddy of mine who has played for 35 yrs looked it over upon arrival, and commented that it had the straightest neck he had ever seen. Beautiful sunburst finish too, and the frets / fretboard (rosewood) are fantastic.

This guitar will never see live playing with me, nor any other for that matter. I won't be playing in a band. BUT, I do believe that it would do just fine under those conditions.
Good sturdy hardware which is all visually appealing, the finish is dynomite, and I've yet to knock it out of tune other than playing with the action. Vibrato always seems to return to perfect tune.

I've never had to deal with customer support, but I will say that it shipped across country to me and arrived fast and in great shape.
For it's price, I'm not worried about a warranty.

Playing for only 1 month so far, and loving it. A Great guitar for a beginner OR a great cheap backup for a seasoned player. It blew away the low end fender strats for cost, sound, feel, features, cost ....
If stolen, I would indeed buy another just like it for the sake of having a good solid body guitar. I am planning on ordering a second guitar shorty to have a hollow body with humbuckers (Johnson JH-100), but that is entirely different beast and more costly (about $220).

Made in China, probably 2003. Others have provided the features, so I don't have to. Finish on my guitar is a mettalic Lake Placid Blue. I think it will contrast better with a white pickguard rather than the black one that comes on the guitar.
I paid extra for a leather strap and a TKL case, all in all about $160 including shipping. Not bad eh? That amount barely covers the cost of a Squier Affinity in most guitar stores.

I really much prefer the Gibson humbucker sound than the tinny, quacky Strat single-coil sound. I like the distorted crunchy sound of humbuckers with the Crunch setting of my Peavey Triumph. Occasionally I smooth it down for nice chunky jazzy bluesy chords. However, I do have the occasional urge to play this type of guitar. This guitar's single coils are actually quite powerful, sound like boosted Fender pickups and are louder than a Squier Affinity's. Very bright, sharp edge to it, specially on the bridge. Unfortunately it only makes one sound. The tone pots are useless, instead of gradually changing the sound, the move from bright to dull at about 8. It's a cheap enough guitar that I can play with it and change the pickups without any regret. I separately purchased the booster pack from Musicyo (2 dual rails and one quadrail) and will try it on this guitar, which other folks have reviewed as having only one sound: overdriven crunch.

The neck is wiiiide and thin, while my preference is a medium width neck with a little more "C" shape to it. The back of the neck and the rosewood fretboard were dry which some lemon oil made a lot nicer to play. The neck is slightly wider at the joint than the body (about 1/10 inch), and the gap between neck and body looks slightly wider than other Strat-clones. Maybe I'll pour some wood glue down there, might it improve the resonance of the plywood body? The tuners are not the best quality (some strings frequently out of tune), and the bridge saddles need a little adjusting. Action height is good, no string buzzing at all. Using the supplied cable, the guitar "crackled and popped" which could be because of the cable ends, or maybe it is the socket itself.
The back cover plate for some reason has two long cutout "windows". I can't figure out the reason for that. The tremolo pull uses only three supplied springs. I have not used the tremolo yet.

I've owned the guitar for five days, so I don't know about its durability. It's a cheap plywood guitar, what do you expect?
Let me say though that American companies have transferred enough "guitar technology" to the Chinese manufacturers that the quality is acceptable for such low prices, in fact value for money is really high. I speculate that Gibson pays these makers about US$40 for each guitar. Shipping from China, taxes, inventory overhead, etc. make up another $20 of the cost. If I critized this guitar I would actually be rude!

No idea, never dealt with them.

I've played simple rock songs on (You Really Got Me, Wild Thing, Mustang Sally, etc)and off for the last 30 years. I can play some blues. I am strictly an amateur who plays for his own pleasure and nobody else's. I play in my basement and don't let anyone else hear me sing or play, that's how bad. I prefer to play this through either the Peavey Triumph valve amp at clean setting or a Crate 20W solid state with slight overdrive. It's a nice addition to my little collection of other cheap guitars. None cost more than $400. Perfect for when I want to play the quack/cluck thing. Do I like it? Buyer's Remorse: I actually wish I had saved up a little more to buy one of Kramer's Korean made super-Strat types. I would have been happier.

I will not bore you with the details again.

The pickups hum like a swarm of killer bees, but I've never been a fan of single coils. Positions 2 and 4 are much quiter though, so I use those.

The sound/tone is slightly better than I expected. It sounds even better when masked by up to 20 effects pedals.

Having read all of the other customer reviews, I wasn't sure whether I was going to receive a pleasant surprise or a total shambles.

I received the latter. The worst set up and finish I have ever seen in the history of the entire world.

The action was very high and the saddles were not in correct ratio to the fingerbord radius/string height. Intonation was also way out and the trem was screwed right down. Pickups were very close to the strings.

The finish on the body is not too bad (vintage white), apart from a couple of cracks near the neck pocket.

The neck finish is terrible! bits of dust in the (uneven and sagging) finish. They must have coated the neck while standing next to a sandpit on a windy day!

Some parts of the neck have no coating at all, with the bare wood showing. It's quite rough to the touch. I could excuse this as a one off, but I bought 2 other guitars form musicyo.com at the same time (Vanguard & Striker) and BOTH had the same problem - to a lesser degree.

Surprisingly, there wasn't any fret buzz, even when set quite low. However, The nut slots were poorly cut, causing the G and B srings to 'rattle' when played open. I managed to remedy this with some graphite/pencil lead shavings in the slots.

Gibson/Kramer should be ashamed of themselves. Quite simply - a disgrace.

I wouldn't want to gig this - I'd be too embarrased. I'll probably just use it for experimenting.

I received the guitar/s within 48 hours of ordering, which is pretty damn good as I'm in the UK. Having said that, it's FedEx that do the deliveries, not Musicyo, so they can have an eight because their shipping rates are excellent.

Despite the total slagging I have just given this guitar, The fact remains that it cost only #43.67 ($69.99 at the time).

If you can tolerate a poor finish and know how to correctly set up your guitar/iron out minor faults, then you will have an instrument that is playable and doesn't sound too bad.

Finally, I have to mention that I am deeply suspicious about some of the rave reviews of Kramer/musicyo guitars. There is a possibility that some of the reveiws are written by musicyo staff to increase the overall scores. (I'm not stating this as fact, so please don't edit this bit out)

I would be happy for any genuine customers who are pleased with their instrument to email me and restore my faith, as the prices are so tempting that I may consider further purchases.

Made in China 2001, 21 frets, laminated body, Maple neck with rosewood fingerboard, ceramic magnet single coil strat pickups and controls with a 5 way selector, strat style body with silver metallic paint, synchronous tremolo. Supplied with allen wrenches for the bridge saddles and truss rod.

I play a variety of styles through an Ampeg Gemini II and a Kramer K-15R when I don't feel like firing up the Ampeg. The Kramer Focus has the usual kind of single coil noise when the selector switch is in positions 1, 3 and 5 and noise cancellation in positions 2 and 4. I really like the sound of the type of strat pickups that are in this guitar. I think they sound better than the ones in a Squier Strat that I have.

I wasn't expecting this guitar to be set up very well and once I got a chance to check it out I found I was right - it wasn't set up very well right out of the box. In fact it was almost unplayable. The tremolo attachment screws were turned down far enough that the tremolo didn't pivot and the saddles were adjusted too low on a few strings. The neck is ok except it wasn't radiused properly at the heel on the treble side. It is actually a little high in that area causing the saddles for the first three strings to be raised higher than they should need to be. I found that one of neck attachment screws was broken and needed to be replaced. The paint on the body is a nice color but is rather thin in some areas around the edges, so you can kind of tell the body is made of laminated plywood. If I was a beginner and didn't know how to adjust a strat style guitar for playability, I would have been pretty disappointed with this one. The tuners seemed unreliable to me so I replaced them with Grover Rotomatics. The original string trees were the round button type and had some rather sharp edges where they came into contact with the strings. I replaced them with GraphTech string trees.

I don't think the parts used on this guitar are inferior in any way that would effect reliability with the exceptions of the tuners and string trees.

I didn't deal with Musicyo on any of the defects this guitar had.

I've been playing for close to thirty years and have owned a couple different Fender Strato's and various Gibsons. My knowledge of strato construction and setup came in very handy as far as this guitar is concerned. Since it was a inexpensive guitar and in rather sad shape when I got it, I decided rather than go through the hassle of sending it back and all, that I would try to make it playable and use it as a platform for experimentation. Once I got it setup to be playable I found I actually liked the sound of the pickups and that the guitar had good sustain characteristics! I also liked the appearance - the silver metallic paint with black high gloss plastic and the chrome dome knobs. I shielded and star grounded the electronics per the instructions found on the guitarnuts website and tried some other modifications. These improved the sound so much that I really love the quality of tone and the strato-sound I get out of this thing. I wish I had these pickups in a Squier Strat that I have! The weight of the laminated body must contribute to the really nice sustain it has. And that is the reason I've decided to sell my modified Kramer - it's too heavy and it kills my shoulder after a half hour or so! But I will miss it's sound and looks.
I wouldn't discourage anyone, beginner or experienced from trying out a Kramer Focus 111S. You may get one that plays just fine out of the box and the modifications I made to mine aren't really necessary - as I said mine sounded good to me before I made them. I would be prepared, if you are a beginner or someone on a tight budget, to exchange one that is defective if needed or to have an experienced player or tech you can rely on evaluate the thing and tell you if adjustments need to be made, etc. I think they're definitely worth the price if you get one thats good or just looking for something to experiment with.

The Kramer Focus 111S guitars that I have are near excact copies of a Fender "Squier" Strat and are much better. The Bodies are solid and heavy so you know they means business. The necks are slim and feel nice. The shape of them is exactly like a strat so they are super comfortable. I own two of these guitars. One is Sunburst with a Rosewood fingerboard and the other is White with an American Flag pickguard and a Maple fingerboard. There is nothing missing as far as features are concered, so I'll give them both a 9.

Both my Focus strats can make just about any sound that I need. I can play anything from the Smoothest Jazz to Van Halen on these bad boys. The Rosewood fingerboard gives my Sunburst Focus smooth tone(I like to play on that one when I practice at home.) While The Maple fingerboard makes my white one sound extra "crisp" which is great for playing with my band because the sound really "Cuts" through.

The factroy set-up was fine but like everybody I adjusted the action to suit my stlye. The strings that came on these guitars were not as good as the Dean Markley 10's I always use. Change those strings!!! The Pickups were set just right for me and I really like the nice frets on these guitars compared to the wimpy frets on the Squier strats which are really bad. Of course I cant say that my Kramers play as well as a $1000 U.S.A. made Fender Stratocaster but they still rock the house every night!

Every part of my two Focus Kramers have been totaly strong and reliable. I really play alot on these two (especially the Sunburst one) and I have had no problems yet.

They both work fine so I've never had to deal with customer support, and that's the way I like it!

These are realy cool guitars. The best part about them is that they sound good compared to other Strat copies and they have'nt had any electronic problems or anything like that. That's really what it's all about for me!

BASICLY, WHAT YOU EXPECT IN A STRAT CLONE: 3 SINGLE COIL PICKUPS,5 WAY SWITCH, VOLUME & TONE CONTROLS. INTERESTINGLY, THE GUITAR COMES WITH TELECASTER TYPE KNOBS, WHICH I KIND OF LIKE, EVEN THOUGH I RARELY USE THEM.
I'VE REPLACED THE BRIDGE PICKUP WITH A CARVIN AP11, AND REPLACED THE PICKGUARD WITH A BLACK PEARLOID ONE FROM WARMOUTH.
I ALSO REPLACED THE TUNERS WITH NO NAME REPLACEMENTS FROM MARS.
FOR $69. YOU DON'T GET A LOT OF BELLS & WHISTLES.
THE BODY, AS FAR AS I KNOW IS NATO LAMINATE. THE NECK IS MAPLE, AND IS THE BEST PART OF THE GUITAR. IT HAS A ROSEWOOD 21 FRET BOARD WITH DOT INLAYS. THE GUITAR CAME WITH 2 ALLEN WRENCHES...1 FIT THE TRUSS ROD, THE OTHER DIDN'T FIT ANYTHING!, AND A MOLDED PLASTIC CORD WHICH WAS NOISEY AND WAS DISPOSED OF IMEDIATLEY.

I PLAY BLUES, ROCK,, FUNK, FUSION AND FOOL AROUND WITH SOME JAZZ.
I USE A CRATE GT80 AMP WITH A DIGITECH GENESIS 1 THROUGH THE EFFECTS LOOP, OR JUST THE GENESIS 1 DIRECTLY INTO THE BOARD.
I'VE PLAYED OFF AND ON FOR 34 YEARS. AT ONE POINT I HAD TO SELL MOST OF MY GEAR. WHEN I BOUGHT THIS GUITAR, IT WAS JUST TO SEE WHAT $69. COULD POSSIBLY GET ME.I REALLY WANTED A STRAT TYPE GUITAR TO PLAY WITH.
I FOUND THE SOUND TO BE A BIT NOISEY IN THE 1, 3, &5 POSITIONS, MUCH LIKE YOU'D EXPECT FROM A VINTAGE INSTRUMENT.THE PICKUPS SEEMED TO HAVE MORE OUTPUT THAN MY '66 STRAT, THOUGH, WHICH PRETTY MUCH MADE UP FOR THE HUM.
IN THE 2 & 4 POSITIONS, THE HUM WENT AWAY AND YOU CAN GET SOME NICE CLEAN KNOPFLER TYPE SOUNDS.
THE BALLANCE WAS PRETTY NICE IN ALL 5 POSITIONS, THOUGH, AND YOU CAN GET A NICE VARIETY OF TONES FOR JUST ABOUT ANY STYLE OF MUSIC.

MINE IS CANDY APPLE RED. THE FINISH IS VERY NICE, EVEN AFTER ALMOST 3 YEARS OF PLAYING IT. I ADJUSTED THE TRUSS ROD AND BRIDGE AND INSTALLED DIADARIO 10'S AND COULDN'T BELIEVE HOW FAST THIS THING PLAYS. I HAVEN'T USED THE TREM BAR, SINCE I'M AFRAID TO USE A TREM BAR ON ANY CHEAP GUITAR.
THE FRETS WERE NICE. MUCH BETTER IN EVERY REGARD THAN MY DAUGHTER'S SQUIRE AND I EVEN LIKE THE ACTION AND SOUND BETTER THAN MY 2002 STANDARD STRAT WHICH WAS ABOUT 4 TIMES THE PRICE OF THE KRAMER.
AS STATED ABOVE, THE BRIDGE PICKUP WAS REPLACED.THIS WAS BECAUSE THE ADJUSTMENT SCREW WAS STRIPPED. THE OTHER 2 WERE FINE. THE TUNERS WERE NOT TOO BAD, BUT I GOT A GOOD DEAL ON THE NEW ONES WHEN THE LOCAL MARS CLOSED, AND THEY WERE A SLIGHT UPGRADE FOR ONLY $10. THE PICKGUARD WAS REPLACED FOR COSMETIC REASONS, AND LOOKS DAMN NICE! THE SWITCH AND POTS ARE NOT THE BEST QUALITY AND MAY ALSO NEED REPLACING DOWN THE ROAD.BUT THEY STILL WORK FINE. THEY JUST HAVE A CHEAP FEEL TO THEM.I HAVEN'T HAD ANY PROBLEMS WITH THE STRAP BUTTONS, BUT I USE THIS GUITAR SITTING DOWN MOST OF THE TIME.DON'T FORGET THIS IS A $69. GUITAR. EVEN WITH SHIPPING AND THE UPGRADES I'VE ONLY SPENT ABOUT $160.

I'VE PLAYED IT FOR ALMOST 3 YEARS AND I STILL LOVE IT.THE NECK IS BETTER AND MORE STABLE THAN MY STANDARD FENDER STRAT AND TELES WHICH ARE BOTH NEWER.EVERYTHING STILL LOOKS, SOUNDS AND PLAYS BEAUTIFULLY. I USE THIS GUITAR FOR DAILY PRACTICING, RECORDING AND SIT DOWN SESSIONS WITH MY FELLOW SENIOR CITIZENS AND MY DAUGHTER. SHE ALSO USES IT ALMOST DAILY SINCE IT'S SO MUCH NICER THAN HER SQUIRE.I'VE GOTTEN MY MONEY'S WORTH OUT OF THIS THING SEVERAL TIMES OVER.I WOULDN'T USE ANY INSTRUMENT ON A GIG WITHOUT A BACKUP. AND I HAVEN'T REALLY USED THE STRAP BUTTONS MUCH.BUT I REALLY ENJOY PLAYING THIS GUITAR AND I DON'T CARE WHO KNOWS IT!

I ORDERED IT FROM MUSICYO.COM. I GOT IT IN LESS THAN A WEEK. AND I HAVEN'T HAD TO CONTACT THEM OR KRAMER ABOUT ANY PROBLEMS.

I'VE BEEN PLAYING SINCE 1969.I PRESANTLY OWN A FENDER STANDARD STRAT, FENDER STANDARD TELE, TAKAMINE SANTE FE, IBANEZ TCY15, GUILD S300D, AND A SIGMA ACOUSTIC, A CRATE GT80 AMP, PEAVEY R15, DIGITECH GENESIS 1,DANELECTRO, DUNLAP AND BOSS PEDALS.
THIS IS THE GUITAR THAT I PLAY THE MOST OF THE LOT. IT WORKS WELL WITH ALL MY OTHER GEAR, RECORDS WELL, AND PLAYS LIKE A BITCH WHETHER I'M PLAYING BLUES, FUSION, OR METAL.FOR THE PRICE, IT'S AMAZING.

Mine are the 3 single coil configuration. Same features as everyone else has mentioned. Alder/nato laminate body, 21-frets, maple neck, rosewood fretboard, 5-way switch, etc. Basically they are Fender Strat copies, made in Korea by Samick I believe. Pretty simple in the features department, but it does what an electric guitar is designed to do.

I can't imagine a style of music you could not play on these things given a good amp setup or amp simulator. I cover everything from punk to thrash to blues and some classical (using a BOSS Acoustic Simulator) with just this one type of guitar...and the sounds are top notch. I run it through a Line 6 POD to an 60W Nady PA for electric sounds and through the BOSS pedal to the PA for acoustic sounds. The single coils give the usual single-coil noise in the 1-3-5 positions, but I only use them in the 2-4 positions, so that cancels out any hum.

Clean sounds are magnificent. I use the emulation of the Mark IIc+ clean channel for my clean sounds, and I get some of the most beautiful tones. The single coils really shine on clean settings (no surprise here), but what really made my jaw drop was that...

With the bridge and middle pickups together, you get a real thick chunky sound using the Rectified/Insane amp models. I can totally clone Petrucci, Hetfield, Hammet, Dimebag, even Dino from Fear Factory sounds with the Insane mode - with single coil pickups!!! Total shocker!

Rich/Full sound or bright...believe it or not, both! Maybe it's just the versatility of the POD. I guess it's true...the type of amp you're using is the biggest determining factor of your sound. For the sake of comparison though, if you plugged it in to a cranked Marshall stack and then plugged in a Les Paul (or similar humbucker guitar), the Kramer would be less distorted and brighter. The thing is, it's easy to make this guitar into an overdriven beast (POD, decent distortion box), but it's very hard (or impossible if you have a high gain amp) to get good clean sounds from a humbucker guitar.

As far as sound goes, I have 3 Kramer Focuses, and they all sound identical. No need to change amp settings in the middle of a gig. If you break a string on one, grab another, and you're set.

Finally, the people who are saying this guitar doesn't sound good either got a lemon, don't have decent amplification, or just can't play very well. I hate to admit it, but these guitars sound better than my Carvin (which cost about 10 times as much as one Focus)!

The setup on arrival was very playable. I just had to tune, plug in, and I was jamming in no time. I did lower the action, but that's just my personal preference. It was completely playable on arrival though. No flaws whatsoever.

These things seem built like a tank. I guess time and use will tell though. The hardware seems really sturdy, but the tuners seem kind of cheap. Easy and not to expensive to change. I'd definitely trust this instrument without a backup, but I don't trust myself to not break a string, so I'll always use a backup (another Kramer Focus of course)!

I e-mailed them and got a reply the same day. They ship hella fast. I ordered on a Thursday, got the guitars the following Monday. The warranty is either 30 or 60 days, but I know I won't need it. These guitars are built to last.

I've been playing for about 8 or 9 years, mostly just playing along to cds and figuring out tunes from rock bands that I like. I've owned and sold an Ibanez RG, Parker P-40, Epiphone Les Paul, and Line 6 Spider. Now I have the Kramers, a Carvin, a POD, a BOSS Acoustic Sim Pedal, a PA, Fender Champ, and a Mesa/Boogie Subway Rocket. I think I might sell the Carvin now (the only thing it does better than the Kramers is acoustic sounds, and that's only because of the piezo bridge - the coil splitting for single coil magnetic sounds is a joke!). I'd totally buy the Kramer(s) again if any of them were stolen. I love the sounds out of these guitars and the versatility when combined with the POD and BOSS Acoustic Simulator. The only things I wish they had were better tuners and piezo bridges, but for 80 bucks an axe, that's just pushing it.

I'm really picky when it comes to guitar tone. That's why I've tried so much gear. When I plugged in and got the settings right on the POD, I knew my search was over. Amazing that $80 guitars can outshine $1000+ guitars.

2002 model. I believe they're made in china. 5-way pickup, maple neck and fret on the old glory model and maple neck w/ resewood fret on the sunburst. closed tuners, tremelo bar. I bought a sunburst finish (the cheapest Kramer!) and an old glory model w/ flag pickguard. YOu can check out the description at musicyo.com.

When I first read these reviews, I thought the people that were submitting them must have been employees.
But let me tell you, I have been playing 2 1/2 years now. I have a MIM fender telecaster, a DeArmond set neck, a couple of washburn solid top acoustics, and a Ibanez strat. I hardly use my tele now, as I love these Kramers!!! I think I will sell my fender because I'd rather play the Kramers and there's no sense in keeping the tele around just because it's a Fender. The necks on the Kramers are so comfortable- more comfortable than any other guitar I own or have ever played.
Okay, the pickups are wired pretty hot- but I kinda like it. someday I may replace the pickups and the tuning gears- although it does stay in tuned pretty well. I play it everyday for a couple of hours and I may have to adjust the tuning maybe twice a week. Yes, it's a cheap guitar, but it's so much fun to play that I'd buy a third! But I need a third one like I need a hole in my head. But I was so impressed with the value that I will undoubtedly buy a Kramer acoustic 12 string before this christmas!! You've got to try one of the focus electrics! For 80 bucks you just can't go wrong. Even the tremelo (whammy) works relatively well and doesn't throw the guitar out of tune unless you really yank on it.

Maybe I'll sell the tele and buy the acoustic 12 string even sooner.

I like the sounds. It rocks! I thought the pots were good too. Cheap pots drop out between 0-3 and 7-10, but these you can hear gradual increase in volume even at 0-3 and 7-10.

the sunburst was ready right out of the box!- except for minor tuning. The old glory needed some slight saddle adjustment, but not too much. The nut is cheap (PVC) but the notches seemed to be cut good and the strings fit good. the finish is surprisingly good, too.

Well, I wouldn't gig without a backup, but that's just me. Although I have owned these 2 Kramers for over 7 months and haven't had a single problem. Someday I will probably change tuners and then maybe the nut and pickup, but it could be quite a while before I do that. So far they are fine.

Haven't had any problems. 1 yr warranty. the usual thing. I think musicyo is pretty good to deal with.

If it was stolen I would definately get another one. I just love them!

1999 Indonesian strat copy, 21 frets, 2 tone pots, one volume pot, 5 say selector switch, 3 single coil pickups, maple neck, rosewood fingerboard, alder solid body (I've done my research. These Indonesian ones were the only good ones Gibson made. Since then they've turned out crappier Korean and Chinese guitars), gloss black finish, black pickguard, black pickup covers, chrome hardware, strat style trem, regular no name tuners. Really it's just a strat with a different name and better looking head.

I play a punk influenced grunge/hard rock style and it fits perfectly. Under distortion (Danelectro Fab Tone) the bridge pickup is able to cut through anything, the rhythm able to chunk away, and the middle is a happy medium of the two. Clean I like the rhythm pickup and the rhythm/middle blend because it's nicely deep and rich (for a strat. I know regular Gibsons are better at the thing, but I've yet to hear a strat beat the thickness of this guitar). I've played some Fender and Squier strats and this one sonically beats them out in every way. Better sustain, chunkier, more subtle, everything. The only sonic problem is a difficulty in making artificial harmonics scream like I can with a humbucking guitar, but that's just another single vs hum difference. So in relation to the mainstream Fender strat, I'm giving it a 10.

I got this guitar as a gift from another guitarist, so I don't know what condition it was in when it was fresh from the factory. Now it's perfectly set up (really an easy job to do) as far as action and intonation are concerned. I have the action set pretty low and I still get no fret buzz, even on the higher strings. The finish is perfect, nice and black and perfectly even. And as much as people before have complained about the tuners, I have never had a problem with them. The neck is flatter and thinner than any other guitar I've played and most basses I've played (only thinner one was an old Fender Bullet Bass). The nut is the only flaw I've seen on this, but it doesn't affect performance at all. It's not level, so it holds the higher strings (like high E, B, and G) closer to the fingerboard then the lower strings. Kind of helps performance actually, I'm surprised nobody has done such a thing on purpose before. But because it wasn't on purpose I'm marking it down a point.

I'm sure this guitar would withstand live playing. The hardware is solid, the finish thick, the strap buttons unmovable. All in all, it's a dependable guitar. I still wouldn't use it to gig without a backup, but that's mostly because my strap...

I've been playing for over two years and this is the guitar that's gotten me through it all. It's a great guitar and I'm puzzled as to why Gibson/Kramer shifted ops to Korea and China and started making the crappy new ones. If it were lost or stolen then god help whoever lost or stole it from me, I'll be coming down the warpath. I'd definately get another one, but I'd have to hunt pretty hard for it. No way I'd get a crappy new one though. It's worth the effort spent looking for a 1999 Indonesian Kramer Focus 111S