Ibanez RG421AHM-BMT

Gebruik
Thuisopname en live

Positief
* Geweldige Hals
* Foutloze afwerking
* Sound is top
* betrouwbare tuners

Negatief
* Hij is wat zwaar?
Meer is er niet negatief eigenlijk.

Persoonlijk vindt ik dit een heerlijke gitaar. Hij is veelzijdig in gebruik als wel bespeelbaarheid door de 24 frets. Dit is mijn main gitaar. Natuurlijk heb hier geen telecaster sound, maar rock, fusion, funk, metal, metalcore, zelfs blues en bluesrock misstaan deze gitaar niet. Clean, met effecten, met distortion of overdrive. De gitaar heeft een zachte warme ronde sound. De bridge buckers klinken helder en dynamisch en uitgebalanceerd. De neck buckers zijn warm, rond, donker maar niet dof. Echt de prijs meer dan waard. Ibanez kan er trots op zijn.

My first impression when I took this guitar out of the box was ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL! Ash body with see-through marine tone lacquer, thin maple neck, ergonomic body shape with a good balance and fantastic upper frets access. It looks and feels just beautiful and can make you absolutely happy with a 'new toy' for a couple of hours :)
The fretboard is really wide, which is still, after a week spent with this guitar, not absolutely comfortable for me. Frets are well treated with no sharp ends and no buzz. Initial setup was not perfect, but it took 15 minutes to make the guitar comfortably playable. Fixed bridge looks and feels solid and has no tremolo tuning stability problems fo floyd setup headache. Tuners are basic and do their job - they are not as stable as locking machines could be, but for home practice they are fine.
In general, buid quiality is decent for a basic-level guitar. I've noticed only a couple on scratches on the neck not far from a neck joint + frets needed polishing. Pickup selector and pots work fine.
As for the sound, it is really unique. The guitar is very resonant unplugged and has a lot of highs and bass. In my view the pickups do not fit the wood (body and neck) for this guitar: ceramic magnets give a lot of sharpness but have scooped midds while ash body and maple fretboard itself give quite sharp and dense sound lacking full 'mahoganish' mids. So as a result riffs sound very articulate and sharp, but overall the sound is not full, middy and fat as you expect, especially for leads. I suggest this guitar lacks a couple of good Dimarzio or SD pickups with alnico magnets, designed especially for bright ash-maple guitars.
My verdict: decent quality beautiful guitar that requires some sound improvement investment.

This is an instrument built with great care and precision. I have owned two Made in Japan RG550's and this guitar feels like it's on the level of those. The neck and fretjob is just great. The finish is stunning, the best looking guitar I have ever owned.
It came very well set up and I only did minor adjustments to the truss rod after changing to 009 strings.

I feel like a much better guitar player with this in my hands and I can play faster than on most other guitars.

I haven't made up my mind on the pickups yet. They don't sound bad at all but I feel like they can't match real Dimarzio's. I might keep them, not sure yet.

The only average thing about this guitar are the tuners. They absolutely work and kept the guitar in tune fairly well. But some big bends you might have to tune again. They also had kinda uneven resistance even if they absolutely worked without issues.
I swapped them out for Gotoh locking tuners (SG381) because I want fast and easy string swaps, and the Gotoh tuners definitely feel better than the stock ones also seem to stay in tune better.

Overall I'm kinda amazed with what you can get for your money today guitar wise.

I have been playing this guitar for half a year now, played only at home. I apologize for my English.
Cons: the body is assembled from 3 pieces of ash, maybe I'm wrong but the photo seems to be from one piece; the paint on the bridge at the places where the palm touches slightly rubbed, in comparison with the squier bullet Stratocaster (my previous guitar) it seems a little heavier, the weight of Ibanez RG421 is 3.4 kg.
Pros: beautiful; convenient to play; It was originally well rebuilt; 1.5 mm above 6 frets, the scale is building; good splitting no backlash.
In general, I really like the guitar