Just got a Variax!

[Ed Dixon]

I have a 500 and had no trouble with the same strap locks. If you can get inside, use a nut and bolt to hold it on./

Ed

 

[slidey]

Hi all,

The bad:

#1 I tried to put Jim Dunlop strap locks on my Variax and found that the strap button on the butt of the guitar is VERY thin where the routing for the electronics takes place. I drilled the screw in, noticed it went as far as it could go and was still loose. Out of curiosity, I opened the plate up on the back and saw to my utter horror that the screw was protruding into the body where a circuit board was sitting! Even if you could get a shorter screw in, there isn't much wood there to support it.I put the original strap holders back on and called it a day.

#2 I paid close to $1000 for mine and it didn't come with a hardshell case.One would think that with electronics and all, it would have been standard.

I'm running mine usually through a Fender Cyber Twin and find that on some presets, the high E sounds louder than the other strings...there is a website with a forum that explains how to tweak the volume of each string individually without hooking it up to a computer. It's all in the knobs. I also wish they had a droning sitar, but you could probably do this with a delay.


When people say that the models sound the same to them...I'm betting it's because of the overdrive/distortion on the amp. Hell, if you distort the crap out of any guitar, it's going to sound like a distorted guitar...period. I actually did this myself the day I bought it...I went to an over driven sound on an amp and switched models with little difference. The sales man cleaned the amp up and said "now try it"...sure enough, BIG difference. If they can't distinguish the tones on the Variax with a clean setting, they probably are somewhat tone deaf. I can't help but wonder how many guitarists crank up and over driven amp to chech out a Variax and walk away feeling it's not all it's cracked up to be. I think it really shines on somewhat cleaner sounds.

J.P.

I play an awful lot of country/wedding style music & I'd rather have a vari tele than a tele anyday.....................I've been playing variaxe for ages & I'd hate to be without it. From the twangiest to the nastiest to the jazziest tones I can think of the variaxe delivers 90% of the time. I need 10% of a reason to use the other 30 guitars me & my ol' man have collectively.. I prefer playing real 12 string guitars because they have 12 strings & I prefer playing a banjo because the 5th string doesn't go all the wasy to the headstock & I think it's the weakest variaxe sound. But on the whole the variaxe (700 for me) & the pod XT live has everything I have ever wanted to hear

 

[Fireal402]

When people say that the models sound the same to them...I'm betting it's because of the overdrive/distortion on the amp.

So true, but part of that is also related to the quality of the distortion. I have a Mesa F30, and I can hear noticable differences in the patches with it cranked. But, running it into a GT8 without tweaking it for hours (the only way to get a good sound) makes everything sound pretty much the same.

At the same time, we also have to realize many home musicians don't have a 'tuned' ear. I know when I first started, I couldn't tell the difference between a strat and a les paul, I just knew they were guitars. Now I can pretty much tell what kind of guitar is being played on most recording. Still, most people can't.
And it pisses me off to all hell when those people try to argue with me. No, just because your friend has a mexican strat with humbuckers doesn't mean that the variax sucks because it doesn't sound like a "real" strat. And those people that have a 70's strat or whatever and say the variax doesn't sound like it. Well, of course not, it's modeled after a 50's strat! Argh, today sucks.