Epiphone Hummingbird Studio Acoustic/Electric Guitar

Since I bought both the Hummingbird and the Dove guitars at the same time, I am going to do a review on both of them. There seems to have been a lot of questions about which one is "better", or which one is "easier" to play. Since I have been playing both of these guitars for a couple of weeks now, I will do a review on both of them.First of all, one is not "better" than the other. They are both quite different from each other.The Hummingbird came fully set up and ready to play right out of the box. The playing height, and intonation were spot on right out of the box. I only needed to tune the guitar and start playing. The guitar was strung with D'Addario light strings. This is what Epiphone puts on the Hummingbird, and on the Dove guitars at the factory.The Hummingbird has a smaller diameter neck than most full size guitars, so it is very easy on the hands, and easy to play most chords. It is very light weight, and this makes it very easy to hold and play - especially for smaller frame people (like women, or children) who either already play, or want to learn to play guitar.The Hummingbird has a very bright, vibrant sound when playing. It is much louder than I expected when playing without an amplifier. I was surprised at the clarity and brightness of the sound when playing. Being light weight, and small neck, it makes it very easy to pick up and start playing every time I walk by it! It has now become one of my favorite guitars to play.The on board pre-amp and pickup are very good quality too. When plugged into my Behringer acoustic amp, the sound is very clear, bright, and loud. I am very pleased with the electronics.The finish on the guitar is spotless. The Hummingbird and flowers are engraved into the pick guard, so they will not wear off from playing.The Dove guitar had a few small issues right out of the box. The strings on this guitar were completely worn out - this was either someone's return, or a demo guitar in a store somewhere. When strings are played for a while, they get wear spots on the surface - think about a keypad for an alarm system. The more times you push a key, the more it gets worn. After a long while, you can see the keys that you have been pushing are more worn than the rest of the keys. Same holds true of guitar strings. The surface areas where the most frequent chords are formed have a more worn appearance. Also, after strings have been heavily played for awhile, they become dull and "dead" sounding. That is basically the condition of the strings when I took the guitar out of the box. Also, all of the paperwork, and tags were laying in the bottom of the box. They had been removed from the guitar, and removed from their plastic bags. The Hummingbird had all of the tags attached to the guitar, and the paperwork was secure in a plastic bag.For me, this was nowhere close to a deal breaker, and did I did not even consider returning the guitar. I simply put new D'Addario light strings on this little beauty, and started playing. There was a lot of string vibration/rattle when I played it, so I checked the playing height, and the neck. I needed to make a small adjustment on the neck truss rod, and after that this little beauty plays beautifully. Might be worth your while to get a professional setup done if you decide to buy the Dove. Most music stores have a guitar tech that can do a pretty nice setup job for $30 or so.Another issue that came up was the pre-amp and pickup. This particular pre-amp is in the sound hole, and has two small thumbwheel controls (volume and tone). I really do not like these setups, but they are quite common now.When I plugged this guitar into my Behringer acoustic amp, the only string that was being picked up was the High E. All of the other strings were not being amplified at all. This would have been a deal breaker for me, but I had another pre-amp and pickup assembly on hand, so I changed them out. The guitar sounds very nice now!! If you are not able to do this yourself, then you would either have to return it and hope you get a guitar with a good pre-amp/pickup assembly, or get it replaced professionally. Replacement by a professional will cost you a good chunk of change.The Dove neck is a little larger than the Hummingbird. It is still smaller than a full size guitar, but is not as easy to play as the Hummingbird. The chords are still easy to form, and the neck is easy on the hands.The sound of the Dove is more closely related to a Gibson guitar - a deep, warm tone versus the bright, vibrant sound of the Hummingbird. Both sound incredibly good, especially for the price of these guitars. They both sound even better when plugged into an amp!Bottom line is that both guitars are well made, have great sound, and both are lightweight - especially compared to a full sized guitar. They are both a pleasure to play, and this is what keeps a guitar player coming back and picking up the instrument frequently. I have several acoustic guitars, and right now the Hummingbird is my favorite to play, followed closely by the Dove. These two guitars get more than 50% of all of my playing time right now. The remaining guitars I have get the other 50% of the playing time.The Dove is a little larger, heavier, and has a deeper tone than the Hummingbird. In my opinion, it is better suited for older players (neck size and weight factor into this). The Hummingbird is better suited for younger, or smaller players - especially if they have small hands.Both guitars are a real bargain at this price, so you really can't make a bad decision on buying either one.

The rule is that you NEVER, NEVER, NEVER buy a musical instrument that you haven't personally laid hands and eyes on and inspected and tested for yourself. It is common for instruments that are made of natural materials like wood to be inconsistent and have some flaws. Things like temperature and humidity levels cause wood to change shape a little bit and can even cause wood to warp or crack. Add to that the fact that the wood is under the tension of tightly wound steel wires (strings) and you have a reasonable probability of inconsistency.I have to say that I find the Epiphone Hummingbird PRO to be a possible exception to the hard and fast rule of: Try Before You Buy. When I received my Hummingbird PRO, I saw it has several markings on it indicating that it had been inspected multiple times prior to shipping. It has markings indicating that while it had been manufactured in Indonesia (the way Gibson/Epiphone keeps the cost down...and a good part of the world to find quality woods, I might add) it was "100% Inspected and set up in the USA" by Epiphone. If you don't know what a "set up" is, that refers to the guitar being adjusted to make it playable. The neck is straightened and all warps and twists are removed, the sting height is adjusted to be low enough to make the instrument easily playable but not so low as to cause the strings to 'buzz' against the frets, etc. When I received my Hummingbird, it was nearly in tune! Only 2 strings were out of tune and those 2 were not even a 1/2 step out of tune! It seems Epiphone tries to make this guitar set up and ready to play right out of the box and they got pretty close to that goal.The action is low and comfortable, the fit and finish of the guitar is VERY smooth, and it's polished to a glossy shine. Epiphone makes this guitar ready for playing right out of the box without the need for an expensive set up at your local guitar shop/luthier. All the surfaces of the guitar (pearloid in-lays, frets, all the wood, etc. were smooth and polished. Mine is the Faded Cherry Burst, of course (at the time of this writing, I believe that is the only finish being offered on the PRO version of this guitar). This guitar just looks gorgeous!I may want to change the strings one day but that would only be because I want a different tone from the guitar. The strings that come stock on the guitar are good, loud, clear sounding strings. The stock strings are plenty good enough to leave on there for awhile. I don't know what brand the stock strings are but I assume they are Gibson/Epiphone brand or some brand that is owned/partnered with them.UPDATE: I read today (3/12/13) on the Epiphone site that these guitars are strung with Gibson Masterbuilt .012 to .053I knew I was taking a bit of a gamble buying an acoustic guitar online and it's normally not something that I would do or recommend; however, the Hummingbird PRO is so new that I couldn't find it locally yet (which is pretty incredible considering I'm in Houston, TX of all places). I took the gamble because it's not some knock-off, no-name brand. It's an Epiphone. Epiphone goes to great lengths to offer a high quality performance worthy instrument. In this case, the risk paid off and I'm completely happy with my guitar.Hint: If you think the batteries in the pre-amp may have arrived dead, remember to turn up the Volume dial on the pre-amp when you test it. Replacing the batteries in this guitar only costs about $8 (at the time of this writing) and it doesn't hurt to have a spare set in your case either.The earlier reviews were right on! I highly recommend this guitar!UPDATE: Incidentally, this guitar did not ship with a case or gig bag. I bought the Epiphone Case Epihone Dreadnought Acoustic for it and it fits PERFECTLY.