Steinberger Spirit GU7R Custom

As a supplement to my earlier review on this model,(and the GT-Pro) I suggest that, if you're looking to spice up the sound of this little guitar, but don't want the expense of changing pickups, then swap the regular 5-way switch for Stew-Macs "E-Megaswitch". As it comes, the middle single-coil is somewhat swamped by the humbuckers on each side, but this switch solves that problem, and what's more, the suggested tone circuit alterations recommended by Stew-Mac need not be done, as it's identical to the original Spirit setup! So all you need to do is spend 30 minutes installing the switch, utilising the red coil-tap wires on the humbuckers, and Bingo, a totally different instrument! 1st & 5th positions are original Neck & Bridge only, while 2nd & 4th give you some neat Strat-like tones. Middle(3rd) gives you a tone that they describe as "middle-position Tele", but you need to use your imagination a bit here! If you're handy with a soldering iron, then you won't spend a better $15-00!

Other reviewers have covered the cosmetic aspects well enough, so I'll just gloss over it by saying that,made in Korea or not, this little guitar has to be one of the best value-for-money packages on the market. I fact, I'll go further than that by saying I purchased it hot on the heels of a GT-Pro. These are terrific, fun instruments, and better value than some instruments I've played at 2 or 3 times the price. This model seems to have a little more sustain, and feels better balanced than the GT. Pickup-wise, they are fairly characterless, but even active EMG's have always sounded that way to me. The virtue of this is that they work exceedingly well with effects. The effect itself colors the sound, so the p/u becomes a means to an end. I quite like the p/u on this model,so I'll stick with them for a while, but I changed the GT to Seymour Duncans. Quite an improvement, but a change of character.I bought them only for fun anyway.

I mainly only dabble these days, but I like to think I can play a bit of blues. I'm more into the "Mark Knopfler"kind of claw-hammer style,(wishful thinking!) and this little guitar performs pretty well in that field. It sounds really nice through a Boss Chorus Ensemble,and is a barrel of fun with the new Korg Pandora PX-4. Amps are Fender Deluxe Reverb, Soldano Astroverb 16 and Vox Cambridge 15, but I certainly don't recommend the last one for it! Too thin sounding. It is an extremely quiet instrument, but has quite a bright sound. Variety of tone is perhaps its only failing. It depends on your effects to achieve that.
Can't say that there's anything I really dislike about it, (except the crappy gig-bag!) but I'd certainly recommend any prospective buyers to go straight to D'Addario strings. The originals(Music-Yo,I guess) break far too easily,and all of the others are inconsistent in length. In fact, I couldn't get any of the GHS strings I bought to fit. They were all too short! And no, they weren't designed specifically for the US made Trans-Trem, before anyone jumps in! Funny,because they fit the GT-Pro(?)

Here in Japan, we are fortunate to be able to buy these from a major music retailer"off the floor", so we don't have to take the chance of a hit or miss internet purchase. This definitely has its benefits, as I was able to choose between all of the colors and tops available.(16 in stock at the time!) But the first one I tried had a badly seated fret,and unfortunately, the best flamed-top! No problem. The dealer whipped off the neck,and swapped it for the best one I could find among the others! Now THAT'S service!! The transparent blue displays the lovely flame very well. It looks real nice. Intonation setup was spot-on, so all I had to do was play around with action height. Impressive.

It's only for home use, so I guess it'll probably outlast me! The string retainers are a bit flimsy,($6-00 for an elastic band!) so I'd recommend having another in reserve. The rest of it looks strong enough to withstand live playing.

Read the above. If first impressions are anything to go by........?

This is my 36th year of playing,so I've accumulated a few. A PRS Custom 22, Parker Fly Deluxe, Gibson ES335, Rickenbacker 325V63, Ovation 12 String, Larrivee Acoustic.
As I said before, I only bought this (and the GT) for fun, so I don't really have anything to complain about, especially at the price! I recently had the chance to play a 3 year old US model, and to be quite honest, I prefer these little Spirits! Maybe it's the wooden bodies & necks(?) Anyone thinking about it seriously can't go wrong, but check that fretwork when it arrives. It may be the only suspect area. I really like'em.

I won't bore you with the features. Though I would like to mention that the R-Trem on my GU-7R has no plastic, it is all metal. I know that other reviewers have mentioned plastic, so apparently Steinberger has moved to an all metal trem.

I'm about to gush, so get ready. This guitar has an amazing sound. The humbuckers have depth without muddiness, the single coil sings. As far as sound is concerned this guitar runs circles around my standard strat. There is no comparison. I've used the GU-7R on a Tech 21 Trademark 10 (great amp), a Fender Vibro Champ and a Fender Showman. It sounds amazing on all of them.

The GU-7R shines in the area. This is one of the most intelligently designed guitars I have ever seen. If you use the double ball end strings you can literally change a string in less than a minute. If you're using the adaptor it might take 90 seconds. The locking tremelo is a godsend. It makes tuning amazingly easy. The truss rod is very easy to get to, no cover to remove, no strings to get in between. The neck is beautiful, very nice finish. The rosewood is gorgeous, dark and smooth. Let me put it this way, the GU-7R makes my standard strat look like a toy. A cheap toy. To think that both cost approximately the same amount of money is ridiculous. To compare the two side by side, you'd swear that the Steinberger was worth at least twice as much. I chose the translucent red finish and it's gorgeous, the binding is very nice. The flamed maple top is very nice. There are just a couple of very very minor little spots along the binding where it could have been finished a little better, but no one would ever notice. The setup wasn't perfect and I changed the strings, but after 30 mintues it was ready to go. In general, this is just a beautiful, very functional guitar, period. One other note, juststrings.com sells the LaBella Steinberger strings. They have both nickel and stainless. They also sell D'Addario and GHS double ball strings.

This guitar is extremely well made. I am going to get another just to have as a back-up because you never know what can happen. But it is a very durable guitar. The gig bag is laughable. You should definitely order the Steinberger case that is made for the GU-7R. Don't be tempted by the cheaper TKL like I was, the guitar bangs around inside. I had to order the Steinberger case and return the TKL.

I had no problems.

I've been playing for about 5 years. I've got a standard strat and a Washburn HB35, which is also a beautiful guitar for the money. i plan on buying another GU-7R, just because it's so much fun to play and such an incredible value. After changing strings and tunings on the strat, the tremelo on the Steinberger is such a luxury. The gig bag could be better, but at least it came with something to protect it. Most guitars in this price range don't come with any type of case. I chose this guitar because of the reviews here and because of the price. Get this guitar, get it today, you will not regret it.

Made in Korea year 2000, 24 frets, laminated flame top, volume and tone knobs, 5-way selector switch between 3 EMG select pickups (passive H-S-H configuration) Maple neck with rosewood fret board, Transparent red Strat-berger body. R-trem bridge made out of metal, and by far easier and quicker to adjust than a floyd rose. In fact you can separately adjust the saddle heights for each string and all clamp together with one recesed allen screw. Gig bag includded.

All styles, works fine
boss GT3 effects strait to mackie 8 bus
Its VERY Quiet. I've never heard anything this quiet. Period.
brighter sound than that of the RG570 but still not tinny
sounds range from LP to Strat and thats good enough

I like that its quiet...

Set up was good. Junky strings though. Buy La Bellas!!!
I Like my pickups closer to the strings than most factories.
the only flaw it had was that it wasnt buffed completely and looked like it wasnt handled properly ie: little micro lines visible in certain light, but nothing a black and decker couldn't take care of r-r-r-r and the rest looks great. No fret problems, strait neck. Superb action.

It should withstand live playing, i dont smash my guitars.
Hardware seems pretty rugged. I think the finish could stand improvement. all the rest of it is very solid. Backup optional.

Music Yo has been very helpful and courteous as far as responding to and communicating by emails and Phone calls. 30 day garantee for pricing or defects basically, if you change your mind however...waranty? is that a rock band?

20 years of playing, set-up, tear-down, and experimental painting.
And I know why I dont paint Guitars for a living. So having played many kinds and brands...this little guy holds his own especially for the price. They could have let the finish properly set, and there would be a very good guitar for under 400 clams, compared to the american made GM7T which I guess is going for over 2000 if you can find one.

I only wish it had a trans-trem.
and a small hard case.
If it were stolen i probably would replace it.
Music Yo took good care of me. 2-day shipping = 2 days. Prompt and courteous responses. If you want a steinberger and still be able to eat for the next few months, its worth it, if not, well happy hunting.

2001 model, made in korea. 24 frets. Maple body and top. Volume Tone Controls, 5 way selector. H/S/H configuration. Select by emg pickups. Maple neck wiith rosewood fretboard. Blue flamed top. Semi strat style body. Steinberger locking tremolo. Steinberger headpice. Medium frets. Came with a cheap gig bag

I mainly play heavy metal, but I also play some other styles of rock music. This guitar was obviosly made with metal on mind. I play it trhu a line six spider, and it rocks. It doesbt have as much low end as my Ibanez RG3120, and wouldnt mind a bit more harmonics. It has a rally bright sound, and the clean sound is kind of thumpy.

Out of the box, not even in tune. I had to set it up all by myself. After Ther setup it was all good. The finish was not what I expected form the picture, it didnt look exactly like my ibanez, which was what I was aiming for, it was brighter, more green than blue. I would recomend the string adapter, so u can use your fav strings, to me it is DR strings, they rock!!!!!!! The string adapter came in a ziplock bag and no label or instruccions were on it, it took me a while to figure out I had recieved it, because to mee it look like the guitar allen wrenches and just that. I would say to musicyo, come on guys, I paid 26 bucks for this, would it hurt to put it in a box with instructions?

This is a guitar for the road, definately. I study at Berklee, and I use it to go to class, its really easy to carry it around. Im looking forward to tacking it on the plane when I go back home to Guatemala. It'll be nice to have a guitar to play on the airport while I wait. It looks like it can stand all kinds of gigs, specially since there is no headstock, I wont "crash" into my bandmates. The finish looks more resistant than the ibanez ones, that come of really easy. The second I got it I installed the DiMarzion straplock on it, so I dont know how good the strap buttons are, I just have strap locks on every guitar I own.

They were really helpful, except they didnt send me a teraking number for my order..

Its an awesome guitar for traveling. or just for playing at home without having to carry around a big ass guitar. Altough, my ibanez is still my number one. I might use it for the studio, but im not sure. I just think every serious guitar player should have a steinberger, its a must!!!!!

Made in Korea. 24-frets with H-S-H Configuration and 5 way selector. Master volume and tone controls. EMG "Select" Pickups, which seem a touch under powered at the neck position (probably because it's a single-coil, altough I'm considering getting another single with higher output...). Has a plastic Steinberger tremolo unit. Not sure how long it will hold up. Music Yo has replacement R-Trems for sale and I understand that Ed Roman's website has old-style all metal Steinberger tremolos. Tremolo arm can be mounted on either side of bridge for right or left hand use although I only use it in locked position. I imagine it would stay in tune well. Included rather thin gig bag. I'll probably get a full sized case soon. Made in Korea. May re-wire the guitar and add another switch so I can play with the pickups linked in parallel, although this would require drilling the body... Maybe an on/off center position switch...

Play many different styles of music through an old Music Man 65 with an older Ibanez Tube screamer or Morley distortion pedal. Guitar is EXTREMELY quiet... you'll find out how well the bypass works on your distortion pedal... Guitar sounds somewhat bright do to the maple woods used in it. Middle pickup a bit weak. Extremely good tone for <$400.

Action set up fine when I recieved it. The strings SUCK. Buzzed horribly, looked like they'd break if bent more than a half-step (never did though...) Too bad the available string adaptor (sold seperately! :P)requires a hex wrench every time you change strings...not very convenient. All the problems went away when I got some D'Addario strings on it and reset the intonation. I may lower the bridge soon, or maybe try raising the middle pickup... Always stays in tune.

Worried about the plastic r-trem (or at least there is a plastic *cover* over the tremolo...). Would not gig without a backup even though it seems very dependable.

Heard some horror storries...

Been playing for several months now. :) Have an old Yamaha acoustic (model unknown) and my dad's old Strat "parts guitar". Wish I had chosen the red one instead... ah well :)

Once again a very good guitar for $400, worth more... (although I would never pay more than $650 for it)

2001 Blue flametop made in Korea. Equipped with EMG Select (Passive) H/S/H config and a 5 way selector. All mape construction with a roswood fretboard. Steinberger R-Tremolo unit with lock with medium frets.

Ive been playing for 20+ years and mostly play Rock/Metal. The EMG Selects are certainly bright with high output and excellent harmonics/distortion. A good judge of a guitar's quality is how it sounds unplugged. The guitar absolutely rings when strummed unplugged.

Out of the box it needed a little work for my taste. The guitar shipped with .010 (Medium) double ball Musicyo strings, which I think are DOA. You must invest in the string adapter, so you can use your favorite string, there is not a big supply of double ball strings that are good/cheap. Anyway, I applied a little relief to an other wise straight neck. Installed the string adapter and restrung with D'Addario XL .009. BOOM! Awesome sound folks, though my Mesa Subway Rocket. I own a EVh Wolfie, Ibanez RG and Fender Strat, nothing and I repeat nothing comes close to the ease of play/action of this guitar. It beckons to be played.

It appears solid, although the R-Trem is not the same as the original Steinberger S/R trem, this is made of cast/plastic. Only time will tell. Big issue, alot of broken high "E" strings as the zero fret gets notched and cuts the string. I don't know the answer for this one.

Excellent, immediate response from customer support via E-MAIL. Had a couple of issue with other orders which were immediately resolved.

Again, been playing 20+ years, and would have a major s@#t fit if it were stolen/lost. There's some mojo in this axe that can rival the performance of 1000 dollar guitars, but probably couldn't match them in quality/parts. But what does one expect from a 299 dollar guitar. I got more than I bargained for here. Everyone who plays guitar knows the zone i'm talking about; The place where the guitar feels like it's playing itself and as result you step up your game; Your inspired; You improve. This guitar delivers. Peace!!!

2001 model, 24 frets, H/S/H EMG Select pickups which are passive. Transparent Red finish over a lightly flamed body. Has cream binding. Has the R-Trem which works great once you get the hang of operating it. The neck is comfortable, not too thick, and round, and not too wide. Came with a very cheap gig bag, but I ordered the hardshell case which was excellent. It has a 5 way selector switch. The construction was solid, and the neck was straight and action and intonation were off a little bit, but just a little tweaking and it was perfect.

I play classic rock and blues. It suits my playing just fine. I'm not a tone freak, but I do know what sounds good and what doesn't. This guitar will do for any style. I'm using this through a Peavey Transformer, and it has more than enough output. You can get alot of different sounds from the EMG Select pickups. It's also a very quiet guitar. Hardly any noise.

The action and intonation needed to be set a little, but the neck was straight as an arrow. The middle single coil pickup needed to be lowered. What do you expect from a $300.00 guitar. I was very pleased with it. It takes a little getting used to, since there is no headstock, but was you do, it's very comfortable.

The hardware is solid. The guitar has nice weight to it, and I wouldn't be afraid to gig with this guitar. Strap buttons are a little small, but are adequate. I wouldn't gig without a backup simply because I don't want to take a chance on something happening to the guitar.

This is where the nightmare begins. MusicYo.com is an email only business. I ordered the guitar on Friday, April 20, 2001, and I didn't receive it until May 1, 2001. They didn't process my order for a week because they forgot to print out the order and send it to the warehouse. They didn't respond to my emails for 2 days, and I finally had to threaten to dispute the charges on my credit card. When I did that, they finally emailed me and admitted their mistake. They threw in a free strap and a t-shirt, and a $50.00 gift certificate. The gift certificate did not work, and they finally refunded me $50.00 onto my credit card. Pray to God that if you order from them, that all things go smoothly!

I've been playing for 16 years. It's not the best guitar I've ever owned, but it is a very nice guitar for the money. Other than the horrible customer service, this was a nice purchase. If it were stolen, I certainly would buy another one. I'll even buy another one soon, just to have two. A very good value.

This is an extension of my previous review with info on what I have done to my GU7R since I first bought it. Ive now got a roland GK2a synth pickup installed internally into my guitar as I decided to buy the Roland VG88 instead of a modelling amp. The guitar tech has done a brilliant job, the magnetic pickup tone control is now the synth pickup volume (As I never used the tone control), Also the guitar tech told me that roland do not supply or make the two patch selector buttons which come with the internal kit anymore, so he got me two chrome sensitive pads which replace these buttons. They look really good, and all I do is lightly touch them to change presets on the VG88. All other features are the same. I decided to keep the EMG selects after the techie replaced the volume pot with a good 1000k pot and now the emg's sound more brighter, cleaner with more output, even he was impressed.

Due to the volume pot replacement, the EMG selects are really good, I plug straight into a boss distortion pedal (DS2) and then into the VG88, the sound is just killer especially mixed in with the synth pickup. Distortion through the EMG's is excellent with plenty of sustain and in the neck posititon provides real warm sounding leads.
Clean sounds are crisp & bright. I do mostly use the synth pickup for distorted sounds along with synth, acoustic, 12 string, etc

O.k, here's the bad points, when I first got the guitar out of the box, it was not setup very well and I was getting choking on the lower frets which I thought was just a trust rod adjustment. I was wrong, the neck needed a completed fret dress and frets needed reseating, this cost me #80 english pounds, about half of what the guitar cost. The guitar tech gave me the choice of getting this done or having it setup as best as he could get it, so I opted for the neck work to be done as I wanted to keep the neck and not get the graphite replacement neck from moses graphite as the wooden neck sounds alot better. Now the guitar is setup professionally I am giving it a 10 but before this work I will give it 5

This guitar is still built very well although not put together very well and will survive gigging no worries...gets a slightly lower marker due to factory setup

Not needed them

Now that I have an internal synth pickup and new volume pot, pro setup with neck adjustments, this guitar is a pro axe and is my main instrument. I plan to get another and do the same upgrade to it. Its still good value for money as in total I have spent #280 for the guitar, #240 for the synth pick which includes installation fee and a pro setup of #120 which totals #640 for a flame top steinberger with synth access, not bad at all.

My Steinberger GU-7R Custom was made in Korea, and I assume it was made in either late 2000 or early 2001 -- I don't know. Bought in March 2001.

The body is made of maple, with a flamed maple top, a hard maple neck, and a rosewood fretboard. The body is a double-cutaway, strat-style with a transparent red finish, creme-colored body binding, and a very high gloss finish. Scale length is 25.5". The flamed maple top is real and looks very nice, but it seems to not have the "depth" of the flamed maple top on my USA made Hamer Studio. However, it does look very good and it is nice to have a real flamed maple top on a guitar that only costs $350.

The neck has 24 medium-sized frets, and is headless. The width of the neck at the zero-fret is 1.625". There are dot-inlays on the fretboard and the neck has a very, very nice satin-finish. I don't know the exact radius of the fretboard or neck, but the fretboard is more flat than curved and the neck is more thick than thin.

There are two EMG Select humbuckers and one EMG Select single-coil arranged in an H/S/H configuration. These are passive pickups. There is one volume control, one tone control, and one 5-way strat-style pickup selector.

The bridge is a Steinberger R-trem. Since this is a headless guitar, the tuners are located on the bridge. The tuners work very well. I never use the tremolo arm, which, by the way, can be affixed to either side to the tremolo. There is a switch to fix the bridge when you don't want to use the tremolo arm -- I always leave the bridge in fixed position. There is a big tuning knob that allows you to adjust the spring tension on the bridge so that the strings are in tune whether you lock or unlock the bridge.

The guitar came with a very cheap gig bag that provides very little protection for your guitar. I ordered mine with the $80 hard case.

The EMG Select pickups give a very clean, clear sound that I have really come to love. You might think that because this guitar is constucted mostly of maple, that it might be overly trebly -- I was certainly apprehensive about that, too -- but, the sound is not too trebly at all. It is a little bit brighter sounding than the Steinberger Spirit GU-Deluxe models, which are made of swamp ash, but overall, the sound is still very well balanced. This guitar doesn't lack bass, either, and the bass response is nice and tight.

I play this guitar through a Fender Blues Junior, a Fender Eighty-Five, a Line 6 Pod 2.0, a Pandora PX3, a Visual Sound Jekyll and Hyde, a Visual Sound Route 66, and a Boss Cry-Baby.

The pickups are exceptionally quiet. Overall, the sound is very clean with great clarity. Many people don't like that. My guess is that most people want a really hot pickup so they can get more gain or sustain from their amps, but I prefer a cleaner, clearer pickup. This guitar sustains far better than my Ibanez RG570, and I can get as much gain as I want from my Pod.

I love the sound with the neck pickup -- no muddiness at all, just a very warm, clear tone. The single coil sounds about 100 times better than the stock single coil that came in my Ibanez RG570 -- it's clear and quacky. The bridge pickup isn't too hot, which I like. The neck/single combination doesn't quite give as nice a quack-tone as my swamp ash Steinberger GU-Deluxe, but it sounds nice anyway.

Overall, the sound could best be described as very clean, clear and very, very quiet. You can get warm, fat sounds as well as thin ones out of this guitar. I like the sound of my swamp-ash Steinberger GU-Deluxe a bit better -- it's a bit warmer and the 4th position sounds better, but this guitar still has a sound I like a lot.

This guitar arrived with a much better set-up than the GU-Deluxe I ordered about a year ago. Action was very good, intonation was almost perfect, and I didn't have to make any truss-rod adjustments at all. The guitar wasn't in tune when I got it, but that's okay.

THE STRINGS MUSICYO PUTS ON THEIR STEINBERGERS ARE PURE CRAP. On both my GU-Deluxe and my GU-7R Custom, the high E would always break if you tune it to proper pitch and try to bend it over a half step. Once I put D'Addarios on, I was able to bend without fear of the strings breaking.

The middle pickup was set too low. They set the middle pickup on my GU-Deluxe much closer to the strings and they set this one up too low for the sound to be balanced with the humbuckers.

Everything else on the guitar was great. The finish is absolutely beautiful. This is one of the most beautiful guitars I have ever seen.

This guitar is solid. After I bought my GU-Deluxe, I worried about the string saddles on the R-trem, but I don't worry about that anymore, as Musicyo now sells replacement R-trems for $90. The string saddles are all I worry about on this guitar. Everything else is durable.

I've been playing for about 12.75 years now. I also own a USA Hamer Studio, an Ibanez RG570, a swamp-ash Steinberger GU-Deluxe, and a beat-up, home-made, old strat-copy with humbuckers. This guitar blows away my Ibanez RG570, which cost me exactly twice as much back in 1991. The GU-Deluxe I own sounds a bit warmer, but this guitar has a great sound all its own. Also, this guitar is a bit lighter than my GU-Deluxe. The Hamer I have is great when I want some Les Paul type sounds, but this guitar gives me the clarity and clean tone the Hamer can't give me. The GU-7R is also more versatile than my Hamer.

Features I love about this guitar: the satin-finish neck feels absolutely marvelous to play, the exceptional quietness, clarity, and cleanness of the sound, the great balance when the guitar is strapped on, good sustain, the relatively light weight, and the beauty of the flamed top and creme body binding. I also just really love the way a headless guitar looks.

Things I didn't like about the guitar: nothing, really. Wouldn't have minded a TransTrem or jumbo frets or neck binding, but hey, this guitar only cost $350!!! And, for that price, I got a guitar that I really love.

One last thing, I ordered this guitar with the $80 hard case, and when I got it, it looked a bit beat up. Musicyo packed the guitar in the hard case with the cheap gig bag and some bubble wrap and that was it. I don't know if the hard case was damaged before shipping or if the damage was done during shipping, but next time, I'll probably order the higher-quality gig bag. And yes, there will be a next time...