Donner 39-Inch Electric Guitar Starter Kit with Solid Body, HSS Pickup, Accessories, Amplifier, Lessons, and Digital Tuner - Red

I bought this kit exactly a year ago to try and teach myself to play guitar. I played drums for 40 years nothing serious just a hobby with my friends until I had a spinal cord injury and lost a lot of mobility in my feet. Since I love music guitar seemed like a good idea, I didn’t want to break the bank on something that I wasn’t sure I would be able to do so I bought this kit. Once my friends found out they helped me tune it up and started teaching me the basics, they were all impressed with the quality and sound especially for the price. The little amp while obviously not great is perfect for learning on and is still cooking along. I’m getting ready to pick up a different “higher end” guitar and that reminded me to review this package. If you’re looking for an entry level guitar to experiment with you can’t go wrong here this is a solid, quality foot in the door guitar.

I've had no trouble with this guitar. It has great tone and stays tuned for me. It comes with a small electronic tuner that you clip onto the neck.I did immediately remove the strings it shipped with and installed new Ernie Balls @ only $7.99. While I had the back plate off to change strings I also reconfigured the Fender style "tremelo springs" as this recommended in a YouTube video on new guitar setup that I watched. The springs are shipped in a triangular setup and it's recommended to just have the 3 springs arranged straight through. This was very easy and intuitive to do with some decent needle nose plyers.If I have to criticize something then it would be that the frets have sharp edges, so I know I'm going to have to take care of that. Presumably the maple has dried out some since it was built and it's natural for wood to shrink. I'll have to pay for someone to file the edges or buy some tools and do it myself, which is most likely what I'll do.Update 2 months after purchase:I like this guitar today even more than the day I bought it! I've filed the fret edges down and at the recommendation of my online teacher, installed Ernie Ball 2225 series strings. The sunburst look, in contrast to what others here have said, in my case is nearly perfect. Maybe I was just lucky to get such a good specimen!? Even though I'm just starting out and I've only learned a few chords, it sounds amazing to me on the tiny little amp! The amp is rechargeable and I charged it up when I first received it and it's still running without a recharge. I don't turn it on that often, I mostly practice without the amp but still it's probably been on for a couple of hours.

I'm by no means a professional muscian. I played an acoustic guitar for years and decided I wanted to get an electric guitar, so I looked at multiple items here on Amazon. I'm sure a lot of people are looking at these beginner packages and I can tell you that after getting two of them, I have learned a lot.First of all, the Donner package is really much better than the Lyx with the exception of the amp. The Gig bag is padded, and has backpack straps. The cable is much better, and has a velcro strap so you can pack it up. The strap is ok and the tuner is like all the others and probably all made in the same place. The guitar is very nice looking and this one has the HSS configuration which is great. The mini amp is cute but not very functional except to use at home. It definitely works and can produce some sound but not a lot and it's the kind that some people strap to their belt and play. The Lyx amp is an actual amp and is surprisingly good.From reading the other reviews, it appears it is hit or miss whether you get one that has been set up. I did not. My first pick was the Lyx and it had a few issues, which I reviewed on that product so I sent it back and got the Donner. When I opened the packaging I was impressed with the quality of all the parts, and then I tried to tune it. I tried everything, including purchasing a maintenance kit with all the measuring devices and nothing I did could get the low E string to stay in tune. It would tune as an open string and then if I tried to intonate it ( use the 12th fret, which is E an octave higher), it was sharp. I then tried the whole scale on the string and all were sharp.Ok, so these guitars need to be set up properly and so I went through the process with the help of YouTube and tried to get it to intonate, but had no luck. The B and high E worked fine, but the rest of the strings were not tunable. I even adjusted the pickups to make sure they were not interfering with the tune.Thinking maybe it was me I went to the local Guitar Center to look at a Squier, and it had the same issues. However, when I took it to the in house luthier, he was able to intonate it (using the same process I had done) in a few minutes.Having become an instant "expert" through YouTube, I decided it could be one or more of several issues: the strings, the tuning pegs, the nut or the frets. At that point, I decided it wasn't worth the effort. It's a beautiful guitar, with nice features but if it needs to have new strings ($5 to $10) and then if that didn't fix it, I'd need to take it to the luthier for a professional setup ($50) and maybe change the tuning pegs ($60 for Grovers). I'm sure it could be made to work, but at the end of the day and spending an extra $120, I think it would be better to just get a Fender Squier in the first place.You can get one for $179 on Amazon but it's just the guitar alone. If you want the Gig bag it's another $30 plus $30 for a mini amp, $10 each for tuner and strap and another $10 for capo and picks and $10 for a cable you have a much better package for $120 more than the Donner. Plus, you now have an actual Fender Squier, and I'm thinking the quality control on a Fender even one built in China like these are, has much better quality control.So, if you just want a package and don't want to bother with the other stuff, the Donner is I believe a higher quality package than Lyx, and you may get lucky and have one already set up. But, if not, you may spend an extra $120 on upgrades and a setup.

First guitar had severe fret end issues that I thought I'd take care of myself since I wasn't expecting perfection. That changed when I had an electronics failure after playing for about 30 minutes. Amazon handled the replacement quickly and easily.Second Guitar: No fretboard issues, beautiful finish work and after tuning, the guitar was playable out of the box. Highly recommended for the beginner or someone (like myself) who wants something to plunk around on. The pickups are adequate for that and easily changed out by the more discriminating player.The gig bag is slightly padded and can provide minor weather protection while toting. The included amplifier was a nice surprise. Didn't sound too bad considering the size and total amount paid for the package. All in all an exceptional value for the money. Yes, there was a hiccup, but Amazon and Donner made it right.