Wondering if anyone has tried the Donner HUSH-I Guitar. I’m looking for a guitar so I can continue learning while away in my caravan without driving the rest of the campers mad. Just a beginner so like that it is silent and also easy to pack away, but is it any good?
I don’t know anything about that model of Donner… but I did get a Donner acoustic and the fret work was not good… sharp fret ends. I cleaned the frets up myself and lowered the action a little and I think it plays ok now, but I don’t have any other acoustics to compare it too. My opinion is regardless of brand… price or whatever, a guitar should never go to a consumer with sharp frets. And i’m not talking fret sprout that’s a different thing.
Dave
Thank you for that, hopefully I’ll get some other replies and can decide what to do. David
Check out the Yamaha silent guitar series. I had one for years, great option
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They are like 4 times the cost of this tho?
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Probably for a good reason!
Cheers,
Keith
True they are reputedly very good but if you dont have the extra money it really doesnt matter!
They are $1800 or so here, theres a lot of good guitars for that money
Check out the second hand market. I sold mine for about $600 AUD in great condition
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They are about ÂŁ650 here, which is roughly twice the price of the Donner.
I will note that, before I bought my Travelcaster, I tried a Traveler Guitars ultralight, which seems to be closer to the Donner than the Yamaha. I didn’t like it at all (although that’s personal opinion).
Quite a few of the musicians I knew in Singapore used the Yamaha, and I tried that and liked it, and got very close to buying one.
Of course, I’ve not tried the Donner, but I think, personally, I would be steering more towards to the Yammy if I went for something like that.
Cheers,
Keith
I have a Donner Hush-1. Here in the US there was a sale on refurbished ones, so I paid about $116 USD.
I would say it is worth the $100, but not a whole lot more, maybe $200.
What I like is that it is well made and very, very compact. It feels like an electric guitar to me, a thin neck profile and a fairly standard nut width. All this is fine, but I play thicker nuts and necks usually.
The fretwork is great, the action way too high and the saddle needs a few millimeters taken off it. The nut grooves com a little high too, but they are pretty uniformly high, so you can take a little off the bottom of the nut (like you would the saddle) and get by with that.
The detachable body support arms in mine were a little frustrating to put on and off. Hard to use the little screws they provide. I bought longer ones and can finger tighten them now.
Once the action is better, it plays quite well, very quiet without amplification. The under saddle piezo pickup is terrible. Lots of quack, although a friend who is a much better guitar player can minimize it (compared to me).
The amplified sound is not great with headphones, small amps or bigger amps and modeling. But it serves its purpose and you could use the headphones or even play with a tiny plug in speaker for fun if your expectations are not high.
Their “electric” model probably sounds a lot better, but costs a ton more. I may rout it out and put a humbucker in it someday. There is room and it wouldn’t be hard.
Anyway, if you can find it for less than $200 and are ok adjusting the action, it probably would serve your purpose.
I kind of want a nylon silent, but this was so cheap it would hardly be worth selling.
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Thanks for that, not sure of the exchange rate but probably 200 to 300$ in UK. They look brilliant but you have confirmed what I was picking up from reviews. As a beginner, I’m not going to make big adjustments, just wouldn’t know what I was doing. Shame as it looks ideal. David
Unless space is a huge problem, you may be better off with a cheap used electric guitar.
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Hey all,
I don’t own the guitar you mentioned but FWIW, I do have a Donner Electric as my one and only guitar and have nothing but good things to say about it. The frets are all smooth, no tearing my hand up and overall I couldn’t be happier with it. I know that’s probably not very helpful in this case but my Donner Strat-A-Like works for me.
Thanks,
Tony.
Hi all
the guitar I just purchased is a Donner dst-152. A Strat lookalike.
I got it for around 200 € incl. VAT.
I like it a lot while not being an expert.
I just replaced the tuners with autoblocking ones. But it’s just a personal thing and probably not that important.
It sounds great on a computer. With a few virtual amps and a sound card it’s wonderfully satisfying.
I also replaced the strings as recommended on most of the reviews I saw.
The frets are nice imho, just a little itching along the sides of the fretboard.
Just to sum up, I’m pretty happy with my precious, it’s not perfect but for a beginner I think it does the job!
regards