Finally got my xaviere!

[Cottonwood King]

Hey everyone, after pre ordering my xaviere xv-820 over a month ago, it finally came yesterday! I am really excited about it, and will be posting pictures very soon, probably to this same thread. I also will be giving as much of a review as I can, which should just be fun for me to try out. First I need to get the neck adjusted, its got some minor fret buzz going on. But other than that, this is a sweet guitar!

[scgmhawk]

Hi Cotton,

First off, congratulations. These guitars have a lot of love at their price range. I have an XV870 (strat model) and just sent the neck back to Jay at GFS due to uneven frets -- I don't know how to correct myself. The fret buzz was more than minor! While I guess you need to expect some issues with guitars in this price range, you don't expect the terrific customer service provided by Jay and the folks at GFS. That goes a long way in my book!

I look forward to your review.

[Cottonwood King]

Well, I'll tell you what, I'm going to post a video here of me just playing it, with the fret buzz, and you guys can tell me how major it is, I don't know anything at the moment about taking care of guitars, or setting them up. If it's something major, I can always send it back, but I'm not sure. Thanks!

[hagarfreak33]

Congrats i hear good things about Xaviers

[Rocket]

These guitars have a lot of love at their price range. I have an XV870 (strat model) and just sent the neck back to Jay at GFS due to uneven frets -- I don't know how to correct myself. The fret buzz was more than minor! While I guess you need to expect some issues with guitars in this price range...
I bought & tried out two of the "budget brands" that were highly touted on this forum and was disappointed with both. They've been relegated as "back of closet" dwellers.

Lesson is always this:
Buyer beware
Ya get what'cha pay for (generally)

[Cottonwood King]

Rocket, which brands did you try out? Did you spend some time tweaking them?

[Rocket]

Rocket, which brands did you try out? Did you spend some time tweaking them?
SX (Essex) & Douglas... both from Rondo. Junk... I refuse to throw good money after bad.
Eventually I'll exhume them and give em away.

[oldguy]

Rocket, which brands did you try out? Did you spend some time tweaking them?

I'm curious also......... perhaps for different reasons.
If they were highly touted here, maybe someone here would purchase them from you, if they're taking up closet space.
EDIT....... Rocket, I see you've answered while I was asking. Thanks.

[Rocket]

Because I'm a principled man, I wouldn't sell either to anyone I might have to look in the eye someday.

[oldguy]

Because I'm a principled man, I wouldn't sell either to anyone I might have to look in the eye someday.

Fair enough..... I have a couple like that myself. I tell myself they may get morphed into one playable guitar eventually, but realistically I doubt it ever happens. They may be good for a few spare parts, at best.

[Cottonwood King]

From what I've heard and seen from this Xaviere so far, it sounds pretty good, and the neck is pretty darn nice. To be honest, I'm a poor college student, so for now, this should do fine. But compared to some other tele knock offs that I've played, this is great. I haven't gotten to play either of those rondo ones, though.

[Brian Krashpad]

Congrats!

And... wait for it...

pics!

[Cottonwood King]

Alright, I will be posting some pictures/videos soon. We have band practice tonight, so hopefully we can get at least pictures. My wife took some pictures of me playing this morning when she saw the morning sun shining down through the window onto the guitar. She's a photography major at Columbia, so she was all over that.

Also, an update on the fret buzz: I stretched out the strings a bit and re-tuned, and messed with the tuners, and that somehow has helped a bit. But, as I've read about the xavieres prior, the tuners are pretty low quality. If it's too bad I'll get them replaced. As of now, it's not too big of an issue.

[Steffe1973]

Welcome to the Xaviere club and congrats a lot! I play my Xaviere XV-700 at least 5 hours every week and loving every minute of it! Jay at guitarfetish.com is a winner to sell these remarcable good guitars!

Keep bending thoose strings

Cheers from a fellow Xaviere buddy!

http://www.box.net/shared/98vcftv8s6


My baby!

[Bloozcat]

SX (Essex) & Douglas... both from Rondo. Junk... I refuse to throw good money after bad.
Eventually I'll exhume them and give em away.

I think the big issue with some of the bargan brands is consistency, as in consistency in quality control.

I have only one SX and it's a good one. Now, that either means that I was lucky, or Rocket was unlucky. Either way, it can be compared to a crap shoot. The one thing that Rondo has in their favor is an easy return policy.

I have three Agiles from Rondo and they're all good. There were some problems reported by several people at the Agile forum regarding the last model I bought, but mine is not only good, it's the best of the three Agiles I own. I am really happy with it. Again, was I lucky and others not, and just what is the percentage of "lucky" buyers to "unlucky" buyers of any particular model? I don't think we'll ever know, but a buyer twice burned (such as Rocket) is not likely to be a happy camper nor have anything good to say about the products he bought or the company he bought them from. In that same situation, we'd probably all react as Rocket has. It's understandable.

[duhvoodooman]

I think the big issue with some of the bargan brands is consistency, as in consistency in quality control.
Exactly. This is the biggest risk factor I've seen. And it's not just in these "bargain brands" but also in the economy lines from the big names. I picked up a couple of Squier '51's at my local GC a couple of years back that were garbage. But others here have had great luck with them--even pro's like Chuck D'Aloia! Lots of variability....

I have two of the Xaviere's now--a Strat copy and a Tele clone--and both are solid instruments. Not perfect, no--you don't expect perfection under $200--but remarkable for the price. Both have excellent necks, the most important single feature to me. The controls & pickups are very good, as well, and finishing quality is just amazing. Weaknesses? The tuners are just fair and the cavity shielding is pretty much non-existent. At some point, I'll probably replace the former and go after the latter, but both play just great. And Jay & his team at GFS are great to deal with and really stand behind their products.

[oldguy]

. And Jay & his team at GFS are great to deal with and really stand behind their products.

What's their return policy? Time limit and shipping policy?
It"s evident Rocket won't sell the crap ones, could he return them and take a chance on getting something decent? (though I doubt he'd do it at this stage in the game).
I just know it sucks buying something sight unseen, especially after glowing reviews, then having it turn out to be pond scum. Been there, done that.

[Rocket]

The one thing that Rondo has in their favor is an easy return policy.
Well, when I contacted Kurt at Rondo and let him know of my disappointment, he informed me that the best he could do is remove me from Rondo's mailing list.
Apparently that "easy return policy"... is a very selective process!


I don't think we'll ever know, but a buyer twice burned (such as Rocket) is not likely to be a happy camper nor have anything good to say about the products he bought or the company he bought them from.
Correct!
(But I still smile a little when people buy from him and write the glowing reviews.)

[duhvoodooman]

Well, when I contacted Kurt at Rondo and let him know of my disappointment, he informed me that the best he could do is remove me from Rondo's mailing list.
Really? Surprised to hear that, based on other things I'd heard about Rondo. How long after your purchase did you contact him, Rocket?

[Rocket]

Really? Surprised to hear that, based on other things I'd heard about Rondo. How long after your purchase did you contact him, Rocket?
About a week.
Doesn't matter... didn't lose much money and I'll either gift em to somebody or donate to a fundraiser or raffle eventually. (...or just throw them away.)
That's what Strum's Dot was destined for. When the raffle winner didn't collect the prize I offered it up at the Washburn forum. One thing led to another and it showed up at Strum's door.

[markb]

Part of the cost of more expensive guitars is the labour involved in final checks. Corners have to be cut to produce a guitar for $100 retail. You may have to spend extra to get that final tweak. You pays your money and sometimes you get lucky. I'd be reluctant to buy a cheap guitar sight unseen for this reason.

[street music]

I guess that I was lucky with the one SX that I got, it looks great and plays great too. I did change the pickups but that was already planned when I bought it. The only experience that I have with GFS is in the pickups that I have bought, all have been as promised. I have a case of GAS for a TELE right now and just waiting till enough extra cash is on hand to purchase one, not sure which it will be, looking the Squire Vintage series or a Xaviere.

[Duff]

I'm really surprised at your bad experience with Rondo.

Did you actually try to return the guitar and they refused to take it back?

That seems to be unlike the usual story that I read regarding Rondo's return policy.

I have three SX guitars and two are strats and one is a gibson lp special copy w set neck. They were all great right out of the box. I have no plans on getting rid of them and have been lucky.

It is unfortunate that you had that bad experience.

I always like to go to the store that does price matching and hand pick a nice guitar to my liking. There are a couple stores around here like that and I try to buy from them.

I got a great Classic Vibe '50s Squire there that was set up perfect and really felt and looked good. Also got a 199 dollar STD Squire Tele there, that now has a Fender Custom Shop Texas Special bridge pup in it. Hot at 10.5k ohms. Super improved sound over the Squire std tele bridge pup.

I have found that you can find some great inexpensive guitars that are way better values than some of the expensive name brands.

I really dislike a guitar that has a twisted neck or a buzz that you can't remove easily. I would return a guitar like that for a good replacement one.

In a lot of cases these hard to set up guitars can be fixed by pro techs that really know what they are doing. Often quite inexpensively.

Right now all of the guitars that I own are nice. Some are cheap and some are expensive. I play different ones all the time instead of staying with one and really getting into its groove. I like the differences among the guitars. All of them sound different.

I might buy from Rondo again.

I don't like the shape of headstock on the Xavier strat type guitars, that shows up on quite a few Xaviers. Otherwise I like the looks of the guitars and some of the colors are really nice. Some of those LP style ones look like good values.

There is nothing like a guitar that feels, plays, and sounds really good. It is really frustrating when you get one that looks bad or doesn't meet up to the expected standards and can't be easily tweaked into something real good.

GC by me had an item I rarely see there. Saw it just the other day but didn't try it out: an Epiphone black Explorer stop tail for a very reasonable price. Full size looking Explorer body. I've always wanted one of those and might go for one some day; new or used.

So how did the buzz problem finally turn out with the Xavier? Did it get fixed, returned, replaced with the same but quality item, or dropped by the wayside?

Personally I wouldn't ignore the buzz. I'd take it to a pro tech that knows what he is doing and get it evaluated and decide if the fix would make good sense or just be a means of making the guitar playable, but still significantly flawed; such as in a twisted neck, fixed by shimming, etc. I like low action with zero buzz, ideally.

All my guitars have low action. In fact I just had a knowledgeable tech set up a Peavey classic style tele of mine that had a little bit of a high action. He brought it down about
1.5mm and it now feels way better, but it was alright before, just not exactly like I would have preferred it to be. Now it is right on and it's a nice butterscotch body with a great maple neck and fretboard, set off byu a black pickguard. This Peavey tele classic type has a cool vibe. I'm going to play it now. Something about them tele style guitars that just grabs you. At one time not too long ago I never thought I'd own one and that they were only for cowboys; ignorance is no excuse.

I think if I was to check into guitar deals and do my homework I could find a better choice than an SX probably every time, but I'd likely spend fifty or so dollars more, at least; but I would have a way better playing and sounding and looking guitar, like those Peavey Generation EX telecaster style guitars uncleikes.com and others are selling for as low as 149 US. Thanks goes out to Spudman for turning me on to those gems. They originally were going for way way more money and look like they are being or have been discontinued, but possibly not. I'm not really sure if they are totally out of production. Possibly someone knows for sure.

Those are great value guitars right now. Vintage vibe items with vintage style tuners that are quite good, vintage wound single coil and humbucker pickups, and really classy looks. Really excellent build quality and quality body and neck woods. I really like the headstock, although I have heard some say they don't. It is sort of pointy in a really classy way. Peavey makes some really nice things and my teles are really nice in every way. Not in the same category at all, as the SX guitars. The Peavey Gen EX'es have class. A special type of class. Not to put down SX'es, they are nice in their own way and really inexpensive for what you get.

Duffy

[Cottonwood King]

Hey, i've got a buddy who works as fat cat guitars down here, and he's going to tweak the neck for me to look at the buzz factor. Sorry about not getting any pictures up at all, here's one that my wife took while I was messing around a bit:

http://i285.photobucket.com/albums/ll80/adnascentia/BenFinal.jpg

I really like this guitar, at least so far. I've been getting some great sounds out of it in combination with my yamaha DG 60. And, I bought both on recommendations from you guys here at the fret. So thanks for the good advice, I'm looking forward to getting more up on this thing, right now, school is crazy. I'm in a 3D design class that's owning my life, and I'm currently working on constructing a nested truncated octahedron piece that was actually due on Monday.

But band practice is tomorrow night, we'll see what we can do.

[Cottonwood King]

So how did the buzz problem finally turn out with the Xavier? Did it get fixed, returned, replaced with the same but quality item, or dropped by the wayside?

Personally I wouldn't ignore the buzz. I'd take it to a pro tech that knows what he is doing and get it evaluated and decide if the fix would make good sense or just be a means of making the guitar playable, but still significantly flawed; such as in a twisted neck, fixed by shimming, etc. I like low action with zero buzz, ideally.

Duffy

I hear you on that one, I also like a low action. Right now the xaviere has a low action, but its got a little buzz on the low E string, but like I said, I'm going to take it over to fat cat and see what's what.

[sunvalleylaw]

Hey, I sure like the looks of that thing. Congrats! I just love that classic look in a tele!

[duhvoodooman]

Hey, that guitar looks v-e-e-e-r-r-r-y familiar to me! :AOK: :dude:

[Cottonwood King]

Hey, that guitar looks v-e-e-e-r-r-r-y familiar to me! :AOK: :dude:

hmmm, wonder why? haha

[Brian Krashpad]

Cool pic, thanks for posting it.

[bigoldron]

Nice looking Tele copy, CK! I'm seriously considering getting a Xaviere, but have to sell an amp first.