Schecter C-1 Classic

You already know the features if you're looking at this, 2 humuckers, 5 way switch, grovers, volume and tone. What more do you need? Made in Korea, it could be made on Neptune and I wouldn't give a rip. 24 fret neck with abalone inlay and a really nice meaty feel to it. Frets are dressed well and have plenty of meat. Came strung with 9's, I changed to 10-52 and felt no diffence in action. Finish is outstanding, mine's the blue quilt. Neck through construction gives this guitar a great amount of sustain.

I play everything from Chris Tomlin to Helmet to Johnny Cash, and this guitar does a great job switching tones. I run it into either a new Blues Deville or a '73 Marshall Super Lead 100 and it's really responsive to pick pressure, more so with the Marshall than with the Fender (and yes, I drool every time I play the Marshall). This guitar will not sound exactly like a '57 Strat or '59 Les Paul, about 40k will get you either of those tones but it does a great job giving distinct, full, not noisy single coil and humbucking sounds. The volume knob is responsive enough to clean up the Marshall if I roll it back a little, then full up for distortion. I haven't found a dead sound in this guitar yet.

Intonation could have been better at the factory but i always set everything up myself anyway. It plays better than any Gibson I've owned in the past 20 years, my beloved '74 Les Paul Deluxe being the king but this guitar is real close in terms of playability. Only modification I'm doing is an Earvana nut because even with the intonation set properly the upper midrange is a little off.

I play this guitar live every week and unless you're throwing it across the stage it's bulletproof. I would never take just one guitar to a gig, but this Schecter is more than capable of long-term durability.

Never dealt with them.

I've been playing 38 years, have a bunch of other gear and this C1 is hands down the best purchase I've made in a while. If it were stolen I would buy another right after kicking somebody's *** for stealing it. My favorite thing about the guitar is its sustain, and the pickups - God bless Seymour Duncan. Schecter may be frowned upon by those who can spend unlimited money on their stuff, but as a working musician with four mouths to feed I can tell you that I would put this guitar up against anything Gibson has put out in the last decade. You will not regret purcasing this instrument.

??? Made in Korea - Year unknown
CONSTRUCTION: Neck-Thru Body
??? BODY: Mahogany with Quilted Maple Veneer cap with natural binding
??? NECK: Multi-Ply Maple & Walnut
??? FINGERBOARD: Rosewood
??? FRETS: 24 Jumbo
??? SCALE: 25 1/2???
??? INLAYS: Abalone Vine of Life
??? BRIDGE: TonePros TOM with Thru-Body
??? BINDING: Creme (Neck/Head) natural on body
??? TUNERS: Grover
??? PICKUPS: Seymour Duncan JB (SH-4) and Jazz (SH-2N)
??? ELECTRONICS: Volume, Tone, 5-way Mega
??? FINISH: 3 Tone Sunburst with Satin Gold Hardware

Guitar has 24 frets and sounds solid and tight - suits my music just fine. Is not a Fender replacement - it is a Les Paul replacement though.

Sounds great - the tone in all five positions the Tone is solid, in every switch setting (bridge, bridge tapped, bridge/neck, neck tapped, neck)

Using my Pevey Ultra Plus (Marshall is sitting in waiting) but all my tests are done with the Ultra Plus. Peavey Sheffield Cab. VVT Amps and Marshall 1960A Cabinet.

Noiseless

Currently no dislikes for tone!

Got the guitar in a trade so unknown about the original setup but the guy I got it from doesn't play so I suspect its Factory setup. Heck the strings fell like they are 5 years old. Action was dialed in for me - low and fast. Pups setup very well.

Quilted matched top is slightly off but only to the trained eye. The string ferrells are fine on top but have some finish chips on the back.

Ferrels and the finish chips is the only flaw I've been able ti find.

Grover Tuners, tune-o-matic adjustable bridge with string through - solid as a rock!!

The through neck is going nowhere. the only this that could happen is if I drop the thing and the headstock snaps off!!

The Finish is standard Korean depth so it may have issues but it's fine to me.

The heel strap botton was in a bag when I got the guitar and seems to work after I put it back on the guitar - I replace these with Strap locks and big screws anyways

I could gig without a backup but I like to have multiple guitars for the fun.

Been playing since 1980, Own more than 10 guitars, two amps and many pedals and other gear. This guitar trade is a win-win for both of us.

If stolen I would have to buy something else becuase I couldn't afford it.

Love the look, playability, tone. Favorite feature is the Vine inlays!!

Not fond of gold hardware - but it'll do.

Compared to Strat, Tele, RG, Les Paul and this thing is great but different.

I wish it had a FLoyd Rose Locking Trem - Otherwise it's exactly what is should be.


I don't know about the indonesian or chinese Schecters, but this guitar is very nice and has the right pickups for me. It looks great, plays great and sounds great, stays in tune and sounds tight.

Tune-O-Matic, H/H, 25 frets, Mahogany body, neck-thru, 5-way switch, etc.

The guitar is fairly versatile. It's full, although a bit muddy at times in the neck, so much tweaking is needed for a wide range of sounds but it is possible to have a diverse playing style with it. I can play metal, blues, jazz, etc. Overall, the sound is good. Do not expect to bend very much, however, it is very prone to going out of tune on bending.

The action was high. I adjusted it (the bridge is NOT durable!). The neck can get very sticky.

This is why the guitar is priced so low. Mine lasted for about 2 years. The bridge is cheap aluminum. If you do any adjustments, no matter how careful, you will strip the screws. The jack comes loose after a fair bit of play. The plastic 5-way switch has a short, causing loss of power to the humbuckers. The frets have worn down (after only 2 years!). The frets, screws, and all other metal parts, except for tuners, have quite a bit of rust.

I just didn't bother to contact them. I don't think refretting is covered and I certainly don't want to send it to them so they could replace the cheap parts with the same crappy parts.

I've been playing for nearly 10 years. I got the schecter as a cheap playtoy. It's just that. If it were lost or stolen, I'd just move on to something else. I like that it's fairly versatile but it's just too cheap to do anything worthwhile on. I used to play it a lot for practicing at home until I recently replaced it.

NEW 2009 Schecter C-1 Classic
neck thourgh mahogony with a quilted maple top 25.5" scale,vine of life inlay rosewood fingerboard ,Seymour Duncan SH-4& Sh-2n pickups, tonepros thru-body bridge GROVER TUNERS( listed as Schecter locking on the websites, but ive seen around 40 C-1 Classics and NONE of them Have the locking tuners) transparent blue.

i own 18 guitars and i beleive that this is my favorite. i just "FITS" in my hands and it plays so flawlessly. SCHECTER FTW!!!!!!!!!

The sound Quality of this thing blows me away. i expected a decent guitar for the money but i didnt expect this. i have 2 Les paul customs and this Guitar surpasses them by FAR. i play through a PODXT, & a Bogner Alchemist for recording at home, on the rare occasion i gig, i play the Bogner Head through a Line6 4x12 cab with a Keely modded Ts-808. the only thing that i would improve is it doesnt seem to pick up Pinch Harmonics as well as it should, as the "sweet spot" is hard to find. great for any style From Blues to Black Metal, a Strat is the only better player in the blues games IMO

the guitar wa great, needed to be set up for Intonation, but thats all,ive never bought a guitar that didnt need some tweaking

iv e only had it a few months , so far so good, u can never gig witout a backup guitar though

ehh they took forever to get back to me about something trivial but they were polite and answered my question

ive been playing for 22years and i own a basement full of gear. this is by far my favorite peice.

my guitar was made in 2004 in south korea. 24 frets, 2-knob sound and treble, good finish. excellent sound.

the c-1 classic is a remarkably versatile guitar. great for jazz to metal and everything in between. I used it with a marshall 15w solid state which sounds phenomenal and with a roland microcube, which sound especially good with all the effects. usually doesnt make much humming or feedback. no complaints with the sound though sometimes it doesnt have the sustain that i'd want, thats probably more of a product of the action than the guitars sound. i tried this guitar on a marshall jcm 2000 series half stack and the sound rivaled a gibson easily.

the action came a little high although it's very easy to adjust on a schecter. i lowered mine a bit which caused a very slight buzzing on the first fret, but definitely worth it for the lower action. the pickups were set up nicely. there are 5 settings, a couple of them sound much like a strat, but the neck and bridge alone sound rather smooth themselves.

easily can withstand gigging. buy this guitar and you probably will never need to buy another soild body in your life.

never need them.

buy this guitar, but make sure you play the one you're getting because sometimes the feel changes from one guitar to another, even if they're the same model.

2003 C-1 Classic -Lefty. I bouth this new and have been giggin with it since. Comes with 2 Seymour Duncans, gold hardware, quilt top, tune-o-matic bridge and grover tuners. 5 way switch adds an incredible amount of versatility.
I submitted a review when I first got this guitar, but realized over the past 6 years that it continues to be my preferred guitar for playability and sound even with an American Deluxe Strat, a Standard Tele, and an Epi Dot in my arsenal. I think it deserves a follow up review just based on how well it has held up and how it continues to be my first choice gig after gig.

I know the Schecters are touted as the preferred choice for hard and heavy groups (i.e. Slipknot), but I play only praise and worship and can't find another guitar with as rich sound, better sustain, or ease of playability as this guitar. I can't pass up on a good thing and if that means putting the preferred weapon of the unchurched rockers to use, then so be it.
I have read some reviews that bash the pots on this guitar, but I haven't found any pots on any of my guitars to be any better straight from the factory. I woudl bet that these reviewers say the same thing about all their guitars. My (15 year +)experience has been to turn up the tone on any guitar all the way and dial in the EQ at the amp. Same thing on the volume. Turn it up to 8 and regulate volume with a good quality (Ernie Ball?) volume pedal.

I play it clean through my Marshall DSL401 with a little delay and vibrato and it sounds like it was made for praise music. Add a little Fulltone OCD overdrive and think "Third Day". It covers electric praise music like no other guitar I have owned.

Guitar was set up well at the factory. However, I am a tweaker and had to make a few minor adjustments to the neck and intonation. This is my hang up and I do it with all my guitars. There were absolutely no flaws on the finish and the PU were adjusted perfectly. Great job Schecter!

I have had the usual problems with all my guitars over the years; dirty pots, jacks loosening, etc. But not with my Schecter. I have been playing it hard for over 6 years now and it has held up better than ANY of my other guitars (Fender, Ernie Ball, Epiphone, Dean, and an old DeArmond). I would leave for a gig with this as my only electric guitar and not worry about failure - not bad for a guy with OCD tendencies.

NA - no problems, no need to contact them.

I have traded gear and owned several brands, and types of guitars over the years, but have decided I will always have a Schecter of some type in my arsenal.
This thing is made for beautiful music.

Bought this a couple years ago, made in Korea, set-up in US
Heritage (brown) burst quilt maple, gold hardware.
Very solid specs for such a budget axe, bridge and Grovers are industry standard, pickups are great, but some may desire different sounds.
Neck-thru ply-neck makes this stand out against guitars in the 3 to 4 thousand $ range.
Cheap-o switchgear makes me frown, but not shocked. Worthless pots, LOUD pup selector.

Very nice for mellow blues, jazz-fusion, some country twang. Not enough bite from neck, too much twang at bridge for me. It could certainly cover a wide range, but I couldn't find "the Tone" until I swapped out pups for BurstBuckers. Great sustain, great resonance in your hands. The snap and sustain make you wonder if it's not built out of a railroad truss with steel reinforcement. Did I mention the sustain?

Phenomenal set-up for an overseas guitar; having them built abroad for cheap and ironing them out in Cali is a great way for Schecter to go. Intonation needed a tweak, but was light years ahead of anything I've bought from Gibsons to Fender to Guild. I always wondered why a $3000 hand built custom Les Paul needed a $100 set-up before it was playable... I guess it's just the manufacturer.
Finish looks ok, I'm not in love with the color. I was digging the darker fade, but its a flatter brown than I'd like. The quilt is unanimously agreed to be gorgeous, but more than one person has likened the color to, um, poop. Vine of life inlay is super cool, a really stand-out gem for any fretboard. No worries for you guys who "follow the dots", the curls and leaves seem to be put in places that make the 3rd, 5th, 7th, 9th, 12th, etc. frets unmistakable. To me at least...

Electrically, I doubt it will ever fail. The pots are cheap and useless, but at least they're built like tanks. Even the jack hasn't budged, something I have never seen before.

Gold finish on hardware sucks. What didn't polish off immediately has started to corrode in a highly ugly and damaging way. Maybe I sweat a lot, but this thing will need a new tailpiece very soon. At first I thought it would look cool and more "vintage", but now my saddles are siezed and the string ferrules have damaged the finish. Meh. At least the clearcoat has held up well, although I did wear straight into the soft wood on back with 2 years of heavy belt-buckle abuse!

Stays in tune for a whole gig.
-Odd note: I don't know how/why, but the tuning seems VERY susceptible to temperature fluctuation. I mean, I tune before I play it anyway, obviously, but even a quick walk from warm van to cold street to warm club is enough to drop this thing a whole step. Not a problem, really, but never seen it so extreme...

All in all, it really is incredibly solid. Wouldn't ever gig without a backup, but I think my back-up for this would collect a lot of dust!

No idea. Never needed or cared to call.

Overall, I really do love this thing. It's not my dream guitar, but I'm convinced this saved my musical life. It's kept me onstage through thick and thin. When times are good, she does the dirty work so the $$$ axes can rest and be babied, and when times are tight, she can still wail and scream long after the babies are sold for rent money. It doesn't quite have the fit and finish of a PRS, but that's basically what it is: a poor man's Custom 24. PRS wishes they had a neck this alive. If it got stolen, I wouldn't care, they're cheap enough to just go get another one, which I would do immediately. :)

Neck-thru const. Semour Duncan pickups. Tone Pros TOM style bridge. String-thru. Five way switching. Grover tuners.

I usually play on the clean channel and the tone (or lack of it) of the guitar I'm using really stands out. The neck-thru const. and mahogany body of this Schecter really generate resonance and sustain. You can feel the vibrations against your body without amplification. The five way switch allows you to get as thick a sound as you like, but also some nice sparkly Fender-esque sounds. The guitar has no hum and the controls work quietly and smoothly.

The nut was cut well. The frets are wonderfully finished and ready to play. The action is low with no fret-buzz. I did have to adjust the intonation, but it was easily accomplished.

I giged with this guitar the day I bought it and it has never let me down in a live setting. The finish is durable. The const. of the guitar is extremely solid. This guitar will last a lifetime.

I haven't needed them.

I've been playing for 20 years. I have experience playing in church, garage bands, and jazz ensembles at the high school and college level. I own or have owned American Gibsons and Fenders and an Ibanez Prestige. I'm not exaggerating when I say that this Schecter makes all of the other electric guitars I've owned seem like toys. This guitar looks and sounds so beautiful that I will never be able to accurately describe it to you. Go to a store and play one. Just be prepared to spend some money, becasue if you pick this baby up you won't be able to let it go.

Without doubt the best guitar purchase I've ever made.

This is a Follow up!


The guitar is perfect, you only have to upgrade some electronics.

It sounds great, easy to play, very versatile.

Judge yourself: you can listen to my C1 played on a Mesa F30 here:

http://www.myspace.com/lastazionedeipensieri

I replaced the strap buttons with the Schaller Strap Locks, the 5-way selector with a Shaller megaswitch, the tone and volume knobs and the jack.

This is all you have to do to have an almost perfect guitar!

A back up is always a good idea on a gig, but yes, you could depend on this guitar. I never broke a string, it stays in tune...always on top!

N.O.

A 10 of course!

For a perfect guitar you have to spend a lot of money: I would choose a PRS Custom 22 10Top...at least ??? 3.000 here in Italy.

But for an almost perfect guotar choose the C1!!! ??? 700 + ??? 130 to replace electronics and you are done! I spent a lot more on my American std Strato, for example.

This little wonder have the right pick ups, is well manifactured, properly set-up and looks beautiful!

Review is for a 2007 Schecter C-1 Classic.

Here are the features, from the manufacturer's catalog:
CONSTRUCTION/SCALE: Neck-Thru /25.5???
BODY: Mahogany w/ Quilted Maple
NECK/FINGERBOARD: Multi-Ply Maple & Walnut/Rosewood
FRETS: 24 Jumbo
INLAYS: ???Vine of Life???
PICKUPS: Seymour Duncan JB (SH-4)
& Jazz (SH-2n)
ELECTRONICS: Vol/Tone/5-Way Mega
BRIDGE: TonePros TOM w/ thru-body
BINDING: Creme (neck/headstock)
TUNERS: Grover
HARDWARE: Satin Gold
COLOR: Antique Amber (ANTQ)

Pickup selector, as others have mentioned, is wired so as to allow for a wide range of tonal options from the two humbuckers. The guitar is beautiful, with excellent workmanship evident at all points. After reading some of the reviews mentioning problem solder joints I opened it up, pleasantly surprised to see good joints all around, and very tight workmanship even in the cavities. Machine cut, I'm sure, but I've seen Fenders that look like a dull router was used inside the body.

The hardware, electronics, and woods used to make this guitar are all of excellent quality. It stays in tune better than my strat, and my strat has Schaller locking tuners! Of course, this guitar has a fixed bridge and a well-cut graphite nut, so there's less tuning issues to begin with.

Easy 10/10 on features, for what I need. If you need phase switches and individual pickup switches and push-pull coil taps, this might not get you where you want to be, but I don't know of many factory instruments that would...

I play blues/jazz fusion and metal.

I use this with both tube and SS amps, from a little THD Univalve 15W'er to a Peavey all-tube half stack. I do use a pedal chain for each of my amps, but nothing extreme - distortion, delay, reverb, EQ, that kind of thing. Not even any modulation, right now.

No noise from this guitar. Very quiet in all switch positions, though the ones which aren't using the coils like a humbucker obviously aren't going to cancel 60-cycle hum.

Very, very warm sounding guitar, but with good treble presence as well. The stock pickup set is a real classic, nearly everyone has an opinion on them because nearly everyone has tried them. Personally, I love them, and the switching setup makes an old favorite into a newly-capable, very versatile combination that sacrifices nothing of the individual humbucker sound you go for!

In positions 1 and 5, it's a Jazz or a JB humbucker in the neck/bridge. You know what to expect. The neat stuff is 2, 3, and 4, which give very cool sounds. 2 is almost like an acoustic-electric, 3 is very fat sounding and combines the best of the JB with the best of the Jazz, and 3 is similar to an overwound single coil in a Strat's bridge position.

10/10 for what I play. This is quickly becoming my favorite guitar.

Great. Just great. No complaints at all. The Schecter USA setup crew did a fine job. I do my own setup, and I did tweak it a bit to be exactly how I like it, but I was building on an already excellent setup and didn't have to do much at all to dial it in perfectly.

Well-intonated with relatively low action from the factory and minimal fret buzz, pickup height was just right for the best tone without hurting sustain and well-balanced neck to bridge. Hard to ask for more than that.

The top is gorgeous, and yes, it's properly bookmatched.

No flaws at all. I wish there were, I hate giving 10/10 reviews, but it deserves it.

I replaced the strap buttons with Dillion straplocks (the push-button kind, I use them on all my guitars and they work very well, no accidents). The gold-colored hardware will likely tarnish over time, but that's to be expected, and just adds character. The bridge and tuners are very high quality (Tone Pros is a very good company for guitar hardware, and so is Grover), no worries there.

I expect it to hold up quite well. I will be taking good care of it - it's too pretty to do otherwise - but I am sure that if I take care of it, it'll take care of me.

I'm not going to submit a rating, because this is the kind of thing that can only be assessed after owning it for years. If I remember or care, I might come back and rate it five years down the line ;)

Couldn't say.

Just a phenomenal guitar.

Hurry and get one while you can still get one Made in Korea! They're going to move a lot of the production of the Diamond series guitars over to Indonesia, and I worry that the quality will suffer. I have several Made in Korea guitars from various companies, and I am firmly convinced they're the new Japan as far as the price:quality ratio is concerned. Excellent workmanship on all of them, this is no exception.