Vox ac30 headphone amp.
Pro's: nice crunch, portability and ability to practice anywhere, anytime without bothering anyone.
Con's: This model, there are 3 variants I believe, just will not deliver clean sound. Requires high quality headphones to get nice sound.
Price: Paid $39.99 at guitar center
Bought this because I work night shifts and have been slacking on my practice time because I'm usually up late and live in an apartment. Playing without plugging in is ok but not nearly as much fun. I was initially dissipointed because of such poor sound. I decided to pick up some new headphones for my mp3 player anyway so went got some decent jvc studio monitoring headphones which made a night and day differance. This product has a mp3 input also which is cool for jamalongs but you will need to get a cabe. There are 3 settings, volume, tone and gain. I have tried to adjust the three to get a nice clean sound but find it's inpossible. The gain basically drives the volume. But if you like some crunch, it's great. At max gain, it sounds similar to classic rock, so if your looking for a more metal sound you may want to buy the metal version.
It requires 2 AAA size batteries, included.
Over all I am very pleased with the purchase but if your looking for a clean sound this product is not for you.
On a scale of 1-10, 10 being the best I would rate it a 8.5. I would give it a ten if it were a bit more versitile in tone. Great product though.
Boss tu-15 guitar tuner.
Pro's: very versitile, acurate, packed with features including popular alternate tunings and ability to drop 5 semitones or 2 1/2 steps. Back lit. Orange "glow" background behing the needle. "accu-pitch" feature, plays the correct tone to tune to. Beeps to let you know your in tune. Acurate to 1 cent. "oct adj" feature adjust tuning if you have problems with fretted notes going sharp. also has a setting to adjust from 430-449 Hz.
Cons: a little pricey for a tuner, no protective case. Built in mic is not very sensitive for acoustic tuning.
Price: $84.99 at guitar center
I have had several tuners in my lifetime and always fell back on my old korg gt-3, it's been a great tuner but can only do standard e a d g b e tuning. I've been taking private lessons and my guitar teacher uses a boss tu-15. He suggested I buy a tuner that could do alternate tunings for future lessons and after checking what was on the market I found the tu-15 to be one of the most affordable tuners in that catagory. I LOVE this thing! It looks a little complex at first but once you start messing with it you will find it's very simple. It is far more sensitive than my korg, I checked intonation on all my guitars and found one had 5 strings that needed adjustment. It is supposed to be acurate to 1 cent. The korg showed all were within range. When using unfamiliar tunings it's really cool you can push a button that will play the tone your looking for. It has 7 tuning modes regular open D, E, G, and A. Drop D and dadgad. It also allows you to tune 2 1/2 steps down, 5 semi tones.
This tuner also has a feature that allows you to compensate for fretting strings. I have not used this feature yet but it is supposed to allow for the note going sharp when fretted. I used to tune on the flat side to compensate with my korg tuner, which was not always reliable and the strings tunings would not be consistant. So this should be a nice feature.
This tuner will also remember the last settings before you turned it off, which is nice so you don't have to change it everytime you need to check your tuning.
This thing is so guitarist friendly. It has a day glow orange background behind the needle, which appears to be lit when it's not. Has a background light when the day glow just isnt bright enough, that can be turned on or off to save the batteries. It also features bright red sharp and flat arrows for making larger adjustments and a needle for fine tuning. It also features lcd displays that show the string number, the note, tuning option, ect.
I've never been excited about a tuner before. It has always just been a tool like a wrench for a mechanic, but this thing actually adds alot of fun. It's great messing with new tunings I never bothered with before because of the hassle, now it's so easy to try them out. Can't wait to break out my slide and have some fun, I haven't used it in ages because It was such a pain to change tuning with a limited tuner.
This thing just does everything you could want, it even beeps when your in tune. It's a nicer feature than you would think. I have a habbit of checking tuning everytime I pick up the guitar, it allows me to check them quickly and without looking at the tuner itself.
On a scale from 1-10 I give this product an 11!
It would have gotten a 12 if it had a nice case like the tu-12 and the casing seems like a softer type platic that may be prone to damage if dropped and had a more sensitive mic. I have to set this very close to my acoustic to get it to read.
If your looking for a top notch tuner and can deal with the sticker shock, it is a must have for electric guitars. BTW I have bought many tuners prior to this one trying to find one that I liked better than my korg. I could have actually saved money had I bought this tuner first.
I assume you could buy a mic to plug into the input for better acoustic tuning but it seems unreasonable to me, so if your an acoustic only player, you may look elsewhere.
