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tjon901 « The current Custom 24 »
Published on 11/10/11 at 09:58PRS is an American guitar company known for making the most up to date guitars on the market. They started in the late 70s when Paul Reed Smith would go around to big name artists begging them to play his guitar. Now they have a reputation of being some of the best production guitars for sale. This is the new PRS Custom 24 model. The 24 in the same stands for 24 frets. With the new 2011 models they have changed the name of their neck shapes. Instead of Wide-Fat and Wide-Thin the necks are called Pattern Regular and Pattern thin respectively. You have to check which one your guitar has because the model can come with either neck without any markings or changes in the model name. This lovely Black Cherry model I first tested out had the Pattern Thin neck. PRS guitars have some of the best finishes on the Market. I dont know where they get their woods but they are really nice. I am a sucker for nice bookmatched flame finishes. The guitar has a mahogany body and a mahogany neck. The neck is the Pattern Thin profile I mentioned earlier. The neck has an Indian rosewood fretboard with ivory bird inlays. Up top you get a set of the PRS winged locking tuners. The bridge is the PRS Fender style Tremolo. I wish more of the Custom 24 models came with the hardtail. I am not an expert on PRS pickups but these are the stock PRS pickups in this example. The control layout has pretty unique placement with a volume and tone with a 5 way blade switch that splits coils. The blade switch is a lot better than the 5 way rotary they use to use where you never knew what position you were in.
UTILIZATION
The PRS locking tuners are really cool. These tuners lock the string in as well as the tuner in place. With the string locked in there is no slipping while youare tuning up. I had to read the instructions on how they work but they are a really creative modern design. The Pattern Thin profile neck is nice and thin like the name says and wide as well. It is very comfortable kind of like an old Jackson neck. The 24 frets are not super big but they have plenty of meat on them. The 25 inch scale means you are right inbetween a strat and a Gibson. The upper fret access is pretty good due to the deep cutaway bevels in the body. Only thing I do not like about the palyability on this guitar is the Les Paul style heel on the neck joint. The tremolo is good but I am not much of a tremolo user.
SOUNDS
The pickups in this guitar are classy for lack of a better word. The neck pickup is exactly what you want out of a neck pickup. It is smooth and fat. It loves to play lead lines. Both pickups have a very PAF quality to them but with more beef and bite. The bridge pickup has more smoothness than you get on a lot of bridge pickups nowadays. Even with the tone rolled completely off both pickups retained their clarity and were usable. If you are playing metal you may need some more specialized pickups but for just all around music these pickups are some of the best out there in a stock guitar.
OVERALL OPINION
PRS has been making some of the best guitars around for years and years and people now know this. They have made the bigger companies step up their game when it comes to quality and modernity. The Custom 24 has been part of their line up since the beginning and it is one of their flagship production models. When you get a Custom 24 you know you are getting the best guitar you can get. If you are looking for the absolute best production guitar with the best fit and finish and most up to date modern hardware it is hard to go wrong with a PRS.
UTILIZATION
The PRS locking tuners are really cool. These tuners lock the string in as well as the tuner in place. With the string locked in there is no slipping while youare tuning up. I had to read the instructions on how they work but they are a really creative modern design. The Pattern Thin profile neck is nice and thin like the name says and wide as well. It is very comfortable kind of like an old Jackson neck. The 24 frets are not super big but they have plenty of meat on them. The 25 inch scale means you are right inbetween a strat and a Gibson. The upper fret access is pretty good due to the deep cutaway bevels in the body. Only thing I do not like about the palyability on this guitar is the Les Paul style heel on the neck joint. The tremolo is good but I am not much of a tremolo user.
SOUNDS
The pickups in this guitar are classy for lack of a better word. The neck pickup is exactly what you want out of a neck pickup. It is smooth and fat. It loves to play lead lines. Both pickups have a very PAF quality to them but with more beef and bite. The bridge pickup has more smoothness than you get on a lot of bridge pickups nowadays. Even with the tone rolled completely off both pickups retained their clarity and were usable. If you are playing metal you may need some more specialized pickups but for just all around music these pickups are some of the best out there in a stock guitar.
OVERALL OPINION
PRS has been making some of the best guitars around for years and years and people now know this. They have made the bigger companies step up their game when it comes to quality and modernity. The Custom 24 has been part of their line up since the beginning and it is one of their flagship production models. When you get a Custom 24 you know you are getting the best guitar you can get. If you are looking for the absolute best production guitar with the best fit and finish and most up to date modern hardware it is hard to go wrong with a PRS.