Martin GPC-X2E Grand Performance Acoustic-Electric Guitar - Natural Mahogany

I was searching for a guitar in range of $300-500. I tried Taylor, Yamaha, Fender, Alvarez, Mitchell, Takamine, Breedlove, many others. This guitar has a better balance and intonation than those others. In my opinion, it is better than Taylor (12e) that I bought (and returned).The guitar is not perfect though.The guitar looks good, nothing extraordinary.The tuners are good, stay in tune very nicely even with new strings. The neck is standard size. The back of the neck is very nice type of wood, both looks good and feels good, and is very smooth. With the original strings that come with the guitar (which I think are 11-52) , it is just a little more difficult to play things like barre, etc (yet, not really bad). I changed the strings to low-tension (9-47) and now it is easier to play. With these low-tension strings, the action is fine, and doesn't really need to be lowered, but I am obsessed with action so am going to buy a new saddle, sand it, and bring the action down a little to see what happens (I don't want to sand the original saddle). I measured the action with original strings, it was 3.0 mm and 3.5 mm on 1st and 6th strings, respectively.The material used for back and sides is not real wood, but it looks very much like wood and is durable and non-scratchable (correct word?!). The size of the guitar is okay. I am small and am used to smaller (classical) guitars, but can handle this.And finally the sound! The sound, I give it 4 stars. Definitely better than all other guitars I tried in $300-500 range, and better than Taylor 12e. However, does not get to 5 star to me. I would say for the price, it is very good but not excellent. The first and second strings are a bit exaggerated, but I guess that's how it is in most acoustics (at least the ones I have tried). The 3rd/G string is well balanced and nice (I hate guitars with muffled G string). 4-6th strings are fine, not boomy. Overall, strings are balanced nicely without extra boom to the bass strings. If you like extra bass, may have to get another guitar. Again, the balance of strings is definitely better than Taylor 12e and better than all other guitars I tried (maybe Takamine was as good too).Overall, I am satisfied with this guitar and decided to keep it.Price-wise, well, they send you a nice Martin case. I guess that case costs $100 (?). I personally don't need the case and don't care, it just gets some extra space in my room. If they had given the option of guitar without case for $600, I would be happier. I feel I paid $700 for the guitar, and am still fine. I think for the price range, this is the best guitar you can find. If you are thinking of something around $500, I think it's worth pushing a little up and getting this guitar. I do not think this is a beginner guitar necessarily, it can well serve you to intermediate level and higher.Overall happy. Would recommend it.UPDATE:I bought a saddle on Amazon (the one that says fits Martin), and it perfectly fitted this Martin! I sanded that down and replaced it for the original. Now the action is lower which made it even easier to play. The new saddle with lower action still sounds very good, just like original.- Also, by now I have played this guitar more than when I wrote the original review. I still like the guitar and am happy with the purchase. Again, the strings are very well balanced, the third (G) string sounds very good and the bass strings are not boomy, so, again, if you like boomy sounding bass strings, this guitar will not satisfy you, but if you like well balanced strings, this guitar will be close to full satisfaction.UPDATEI had not used the guitar's electronics before, but tried it few days ago and wanted to update my review. The pickup/preamp system is very simple. Does not have a tuner, and has two knobs, one for volume and one for tone. Does not have EQ as you see in many other acoustic/electric guitars. That however doesn't bother me because at the end you will use more advanced EQs with your DAW anyway. The sound of the guitar using the pickup system is okay but not that great, in particular, the bass strings have some sort of buzzy noise when you play with the pickup, no matter how you adjust the tone knob. Overall, the guitar's sound was not very nice to me with the pickup system. I should say this was my first experience with an acoustic/electric guitar, there may be ways to tweak the sound and make it good, but I couldn't.I still keep my overall rating at 4 stars because I rated the guitar and its real acoustic sound and not its electronic capability. For the electronics alone, I would give it 2 stars I guess.UPDATEI wanted to write an update on this. It is now Oct 2023, and I have been using this guitar for 2.5 years. I am now very well used to the sound of it. On my original review I mentioned the first and second strings sound louder than normal. I am now very much used to it, it does not really sound louder now! At the time I wrote the original review I was used to classical guitars whose first and second strings do not ring as much as metal-stringed guitars. Now I am used to this guitar, and should say in fact the first and second strings also sound very good now. The guitar has still kept its nice balance and intonation, does not go out of tune even after long time sitting, and has maintained the nice tone. Overall I am very satisfied with the purchase and do recommend this guitar. Two minor things I should repeat: 1) it cames with a bag, which I don't need and is sitting there with no use. But the bag is of excellent quality, so if you are looking for a good bag for the guitar, that would be a plus for you. 2) The preamp system, I mentioned above that the sound was not so good. I have not tried it again since then, but I would say that is the only negative of this guitar. If you don't plan to use the guitar with an amplifier and need it only for its acoustic sound, do not hesitate, this is an excellent guitar.

Really good guitar fast delivery alto! Arrived to my ship with out a scratch!