LTD elite -> E-II??
LTD elite -> E-II??
To put it quickly my question is whether there is any diffrence production wise between the Elite modals from last year and the E-II that we have now. I'm talking in particular about the Horizon III nt. I'm from Poland so it's going to be some time still before the E--II get here and I'm just wondering if they are any different and whether the price is going to be any different.
Thank you in advance for any help! I tried mailing ESP but they havn't answered me and it's been three weeks since I wrote. Maybe someone over here will be able to help me
That is extremaly dissapointing to hear. Because when I heard a year ago about LTD Elite I thought that they noticed that people wanted something to bridge the gap between LTD and ESP and listened to them. They gave us what a lot of us wanted. But now it just seems really strange and confusing.
The problems that you are having are really quite unexpected. Even my ltd guitars from china don't have these kinds of problems. I hope the you just had the worst luck and that this is not something common. Because I love ESP but I'm hearing a lot of bad things about these guitars made after the 2014 rebranding. And frankly I'm not quite willing to give up a considerable amout of money if I feel that the company is playing games with me. And it's not helping that I can't seem to get anybody from ESP to answer my questions. Well hopefully all this will change soon.
Nonetheless thanks for the help and I wish you better luck with future purchases
It's not just the LP Studio's that aren't so great, the really bad thing is the LP Standards aren't even made with high quality.
It's shocking how many LP's at retailers have issues that should make them B-stock. The bindings are off, the nuts aren't cut well, frets aren't level even though they claim to use the PLEK system. The WORST aspect of how Gibson makes LP's is the lack of finish quality where the neck meets the body. On about 75% of the LP's I personally saw and played the finish where the neck meets the body looks VERY rough, like someone brushed the finish and clear coat on with a brush. This is on the TOP of the guitar where it's easily visible. Even the much lower cost Epiphone LP's don't have this awful looking finishing problem. I've never seen this on any other manufacturers guitars except for Gibson. It's like they paint the body first then install the neck and then try to apply the clear coat and can't get it smooth and flawless. I've NEVER seen this on any ESP nor on the LTD's. The finish where the neck meets the body is flawless on any ESP or LTD. My Schecter C1-Classic has a flawless finish. Where the neck meets the body the clear coat is ultra smooth and perfect. Not so with about 75% of Gibson LP's.
I thought I wanted a Gibson LP Standard so I shopped to buy one last December. I went to one of the best musical gear retailers in the country, Sweetwater. They are a premiere retailer and take great care with the instruments they sell. Even if you buy online sight unseen Sweetwater makes sure to go over every guitar before they ship it out. You can even request that the setup be a certain way, like a low action or high and they do it. I'm only about 1.5hrs away so I decided to go there and play the LP's to make a decision. Of those 10 only 2 had a smooth finish where the neck meets the body. The other 8 had various levels of bad finish at that area. I picked the LP I wanted and it too had a rough finish on that area, but it wasn't as bad as some of the others. I picked that LP because it looked great but more importantly it sounded great. I took it home and man it had a GREAT tone. But, I couldn't get the action where I like it. When I tried to lower it I got string buzz and note choke on some of the strings. I tried adjusting the neck via the truss rod and kept tweaking and still couldn't get it right. On top of that every time I tried to tune it the B and G string would get held up in the nut and when I tried to tune those strings it would get close then there would be a "tink" sound as the string would release in the nut and the string would go flat. Even when I got it in tune it wouldn't hold for more than about 10 minutes before it needed tuning again, VERY unstable. Setting intonation with a poorly cut nut is a nightmare. It takes forever as the strings would get pinched and held in their nut slot. Gibson does a VERY poor job of cutting and smoothing the nuts on most of their LP's. The string angle from where the string leaves the nut on towards the tuning peg is pretty high and that makes for easily pincked strings and you get that famous LP "tink" when you try to tune it.
I played that LP for about 4-5 days trying to meld with it, but I kept fighting it. It never felt right. It sounded great, but I didn't like the neck or the feel of how it played. I quickly found out that I am NOT an LP player. It just doesn't feel right to me. Add to that the really poor access to the upper frets and it's just a frustrating and not easy to play guitar. It might be a classic guitar, and it does have a fantastic tone, but combine the poor build quality with a not so good playing ease added to the VERY high price, and I quickly decided the LP was going back and I did NOT want another one.
That's when I decided to try out an ESP E-II. They play MUCH better than an LP. The tone is great, though not quite as nice as the LP, but pretty darn close. I had played a number of LTD Eclipses and wanted something that I thought would be nicer for the higher price. The ESP E-II with the active pups is a great guitar but I'm not a fan of the active EMG pup tone. So when ESP announced the LTD Elite with passive Duncan pups I wanted to try it. I reall liked the LTD Elite especially with the flatter LTD neck profite. But, I couldn't find one with the finish I wanted. All Sweetwater had was tobacco burst. I bought it. It was a great guitar. The ESP announced that they would not longer make the ESP LTD Elite and that they would move the LTD Elite into the regular ESP Eclipse line for 2014. So, I orderd the new 2014 ESP Eclipse/E-II with the passive Duncan pups in vintage honey burst. I didn't know at the time that ESP would change the neck radius from the flatter LTD profile to the slightly rounder Eclipse profile. I prefer the LTD necks flatter profile as it's "faster" in feel. Still, the rounder ESP neck profile isn't bad. It's closer to a Gibson LP, it feels like it splits the difference between a Gibson LP and an LTD neck radius.
What ruined it for me was the lack of quality with the new 2014 E-II. It didn't look nor feel as good as the higher end LTD Eclipses. Plus, you can't get the cool quilted maple tops that the E-II with EMG's offers. The passive E-II has a very light flamed maple top, which is kind flat looking to me. ESP really needs better looking flamed tops along with offering quilted top E-II's with passive pups. And, the color choices are extremely limited and boring. The passive E-II is the same limited choice of tobacco burst, vintage honey burst, or cherry burst and that's it. LTD offers more colors but those are limited too if you want a blue burst quilted with passive pups, well, forget it ESP/LTD doesn't offer that. ESP/LTD really needs to step it up and offer different colors with better looking tops and offer them with passive pups.
Then, ESP decides to make the "USA" line and the "ESP Original" for ridiculously high prices. When an E-II and also an "ESP Original" Eclpse? It sure does give the impression that the E-II is the economy line of ESP guitars, and in my experience they aren't as good as the higher end LTD's. IMO, ESP needs to reasses what they've done, and more importantly they need to look at why the ESP Japan made E-II is NOT as good as an LTD yet it costs more. Given my not so great experience with the E-II's I had I decided to not even try the "ESP Original" or "USA" line. I shouldn't have to pay an even higher price to get quality. A regular Japan made ESP E-II should already be a high quality made guitar. So, I ended up selling my E-II in vintage honey burst and lost some money. I just didn't want it. My Schecter C1 Classic plays better and has a better tone to my ears even though it uses the same Duncan JB bridge pup. The neck pup in the C1 is a Duncan Jazz, and the E-II uses the Duncan '59 for the neck. Even though I prefer the LP body shape of the E-II there was nothing better about the E-II over the C1.
ESP needs to offer better tops and more colors, along with better quality electronics and better build quality on the Eclipse/E-II to get me back.
AND ON TOP OF SLL OF THAT THE HEAD STOCK SHOULD HAVE NO DOUBT HAVE BEEN STAMPED AS E S P NOW THIS WHOLE LINE IF BACK N FORTH ESP AND LTD PRODUCT COMPANY NAME CHANGE IS GETTING CONFUSING DEPENDING WHAT YEAR YOU BUY YOUR ESP/LTD GUITAR AND CAN BE A HUGE PROBLEM WHEN TRYING TO FIND SPARE PARTS NOT KNOWING IF YOUR BUYING TRUE PRODUCTS OR NOT ! I MEAN SOME DICK CAN REALLY RIPP SOME POOR ASSHOLE OFF FOR ALOT OF MONEY AND ALOT OF THAT TIMES THAT ASS HOLE IS YOU AND ME GETTING JUNK SO ESP LTD PLEASE CALM DOWN ON THE RANDOM CHANGES ON SHIT TO SHOWROOM THAT HANG SIDE BY SIDE MY ¢.02 and 20 minuet ramble
That's what I wanted to see on the E-ll Just like the E-l Elite the black body with active EMG and rose wood fingerboard I want them to mix it up ...I want the E-ll to be black STRAT with EMG humbucker (2would be better but not a big deal) with the maple neck .i think it would look alot more bolder Aswell than the current E-ll as it is just maple neck blue body Seymour Duncans Take both guitars and but all the best performing best looking parts to make it right as it should have in the first place and call it "THE ELITEST" and send me a free one since I did ESP/LTD a Solid favor
AND ON TOP OF SLL OF THAT THE HEAD STOCK SHOULD HAVE NO DOUBT HAVE BEEN STAMPED AS E S P
NOW THIS WHOLE LINE IF BACK N FORTH ESP AND LTD PRODUCT COMPANY NAME CHANGE IS GETTING CONFUSING DEPENDING WHAT YEAR YOU BUY YOUR ESP/LTD GUITAR AND CAN BE A HUGE PROBLEM WHEN TRYING TO FIND SPARE PARTS NOT KNOWING IF YOUR BUYING TRUE PRODUCTS OR NOT ! I MEAN SOME DICK CAN REALLY RIPP SOME POOR ASSHOLE OFF FOR ALOT OF MONEY AND ALOT OF THAT TIMES THAT ASS HOLE IS YOU AND ME GETTING JUNK SO ESP LTD PLEASE CALM DOWN ON THE RANDOM CHANGES ON SHIT TO SHOWROOM THAT HANG SIDE BY SIDE
MY ¢.02 and 20 minuet ramble
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I can only tell you about the Eclipse E-II as I had an LTD Elite Eclipse and now an Eclipse E-II.
The E-II is the same with respect to everything, except the neck radius is now the same radius as the "standard" models. LTD Elite 350mm, E-II 305mm. Other than that same guitar. The MSRP went up by $100 from the Elite to E-II. The price of the Eclipse Standard went DOWN to $1699 from I believe $1999.
I have to write this, though I wish it went true, I now have my second E-II, because the first one they sent me had flaws. And now this second one also has flaws.
The first one had bad pots. All 3 had rattling pot shafts. The tone pot is so bad that even a light touch was cause it to ratttle making a "tink tink" sound as you move it lighlty back and forth. The 2 volume pots were not as bad, but both rattle still. That's just NOT what ESP quality should be. That's just cheap pots. Also, the nut was poorly cut on the E-II. The low E string groove was cut too low, so much the string sat noticealby lower than the A string and it felt weird when playing it. It's like my fingers had to hunt for where the low E is. There was also a finish flaw in the cutaway/horn area. it's larger than a pencil erasure, and it looks like the stain didn't take. I've seen flaws like that go as factory B-stock, yet this guitar was sent to me as first quality. I bought it from a very reputable and large retailer here in the US.
They sent a replacment of the same guitar. Guess what? The pots on this guitar ALSO rattle. Not as bad as the first guitar, but obviously someone is installing a bad batch of pots and not caring that they are doing it. There is no excuse for rattling pots in a high quality instrument. There is also a flaw in the binding on the headstock. It's right in front of the nut on the top side where I can see it, and I can easily feel it as well. Plus, where the bridge studs go into the wood/body they are not fully seated, and I can see the drilled wood right under them. It looks CHEAP, like someone didn't now how to install the studs, and/or are using the wrong studs.
I don't know what's going on at the Japanese factory, but from the 2 2014 E-II's I just got I'm not thrilled, and the are NOT the ESP quality I expect. They are not even as high quality as most ESP LTD guitars that are much lower priced and are not made in Japan. ESP really needs to check into this.
They lowered the price on their Standards, but then come with new models with ultra high prices. I'm now wondering if the E-II's are being built by student luthiers and the higher priced models built by their expert builders. If so, that's not good expecially when the quality is not up to par.