Dean Playmate EVO J Electric Guitar (3/4 Size

Comments about Dean Playmate EVO J Electric Guitar (3/4 Size:

guitar is light
it is easy to play

Comments about Dean Playmate EVO J Electric Guitar (3/4 Size:

I bought this great little looking black beauty for my son who,s 9yrs.old.I got to say it is beautiful for the price and it sounds amazing after all the adjustments.We did have a problem with the 6th string it kept vibrating against the first two frets.But after few adjustments with the bridge and new strings all was fine.My son loves it more than ever and cant seem to put it down.Hes a little shredder now.Now mom -n- son shred together.Rock,Metal&Blues the playmate is awesome for your little shredder too.

Comments about Dean Playmate EVO J Electric Guitar (3/4 Size:

I am very satisfied with this guitar. I purchased for my 9 year old, and in some ways it sounds better than my own (Fender Stratocaster). Fixed bridge and humbucker pickups are definitely a plus for a kids beginner guitar. The fixed bridge because of tuning stability, and the humbuckers so they don't get too obsessed with eliminating noise and effects and other distractions at this point. Also the guitar is a beauty, shiny gloss black. Pretty much all the other choices in the short-scale category (actually, not much choice at all for short-scales) are strat copies, and so this Dean stands out nicely.

The setup from the factory was close to perfect, and easily adjusted to perfect with about 5 minutes of effort (just moving a few saddles back and forth).

Now, for the bad part. The first one I received, while still a handsome devil, wasn't setup anywhere close to playable, and even with about 2 hours of effort to adjust I still could not get the intonation right. This problem was primarily on the low E (6th string). Even with the saddle all the way back, even with the spring removed to get an extra 1/8 inch, it still was almost 50 cents sharp. The only solution would have been to remove the bridge, re-drill, and set the bridge further back. Or take it to a tech, and pay some serious bucks for them to do that.

Fortunately, I was able to send this one back for a replacement, and the second time around everything was pretty much perfect, intonation, relief, pickup height, saddle height. I put on a new set of strings (the 3 high ones from the factory were completely oxidized), made a couple of very minor adjustments, and now it looks and plays great. Too bad it has to sit under the x-mas tree for another 3 weeks until my son can get his hands on it.

I would definitely recommend this guitar for a child around 7-12 years old. But because of the variability in the quality/setup, I'd recommend to make sure you can try a few if needed until you get a good one.