Kong
Member
My new Epiphone ES-339 P90 Pro arrived this afternoon. I must say my initial impression is very good. When I unpacked the guitar I was surprised to see that the body had a gloss finish. The pics on Musicians Friend looked like the body was satin (i'll post a pic below). The finish looks very nice and I have not found any flaws other than a tiny spec on the neck binding. Speaking of the binding it looks like a dark cream color and complements the finish very well. The fret-board is a nice dark rosewood.
The neck is a bit meatier that I expected and is very comfortable in my hands. I tuned it up but have not made any setup adjustments. As is, there is almost no relief to speak of, and so far I'm not hearing any buzzing and the notes aren't fretting out during bends. The action is slightly high for my taste, but I'll make the proper adjustments when I throw new strings on. The intonation is reasonable, seems to me all the notes are just a hair sharp at the 12th fret. All in all I'd say it is pretty damn good for just out of the box and certainly playable. I didn't even give it 5 minutes to acclimate to being inside.
All the hardware seems to be properly installed and I'm not getting any rattling or buzzing from the bridge or tuners. The knobs sit a bit high out of the body and that may be an issue when I want to put pointers on. They operate properly and there is no noise from the pots/switch. I only played it for a few minutes because I wanted to snap a few pics. I played it through my Peavey Classic 20 and I really dig the tone of the P90s. In just a short time it is really easy to see this is an extremely versatile guitar. Turn down the gain and you can get some nice sparkly highs from the bridge pickup and some nice warm blues tone from the neck. I think selecting both pickups on clean with a bit of chorus will sound amazing, but I'm in the middle of moving so I just have the Peavey to test it out on.
Overall it is an extremely nice guitar with amazing fit and finish. I can't believe it was $299 shipped. Huge bang for the buck, so many Epiphones are such good values these days. I'm going to play the heck out of it for a while before I even think about mods. I would consider upgrading the harness, but it seems like such a pain in the ass and the stock wiring sounds fine to me, so far. I took the stickers off, wanna see some pics?
The first 2 pics are from MF and look satin.
Here a are a few shots of mine.
The neck is a bit meatier that I expected and is very comfortable in my hands. I tuned it up but have not made any setup adjustments. As is, there is almost no relief to speak of, and so far I'm not hearing any buzzing and the notes aren't fretting out during bends. The action is slightly high for my taste, but I'll make the proper adjustments when I throw new strings on. The intonation is reasonable, seems to me all the notes are just a hair sharp at the 12th fret. All in all I'd say it is pretty damn good for just out of the box and certainly playable. I didn't even give it 5 minutes to acclimate to being inside.
All the hardware seems to be properly installed and I'm not getting any rattling or buzzing from the bridge or tuners. The knobs sit a bit high out of the body and that may be an issue when I want to put pointers on. They operate properly and there is no noise from the pots/switch. I only played it for a few minutes because I wanted to snap a few pics. I played it through my Peavey Classic 20 and I really dig the tone of the P90s. In just a short time it is really easy to see this is an extremely versatile guitar. Turn down the gain and you can get some nice sparkly highs from the bridge pickup and some nice warm blues tone from the neck. I think selecting both pickups on clean with a bit of chorus will sound amazing, but I'm in the middle of moving so I just have the Peavey to test it out on.
Overall it is an extremely nice guitar with amazing fit and finish. I can't believe it was $299 shipped. Huge bang for the buck, so many Epiphones are such good values these days. I'm going to play the heck out of it for a while before I even think about mods. I would consider upgrading the harness, but it seems like such a pain in the ass and the stock wiring sounds fine to me, so far. I took the stickers off, wanna see some pics?
The first 2 pics are from MF and look satin.
Here a are a few shots of mine.
