Yamaha SLG200S CRB Steel String Silent Guitar with Hard Gig Bag, Crimson Red Burst

The instrument was ordered from Amazon and arrived in its soft case in a Yamaha cardboard box which was packed in an Amazon box with what appeared to be insufficient packing materials. Happily, all packaging was in good condition when it arrived, but my experience with UPS suggests that I was lucky this time. I have had the instrument for about two weeks. I purchased the slg200nw without having played any model of Yamaha silent guitar. Buying a guitar without playing it is usually a bad idea, but I couldn't find an slg200nw in my area to play and I can imagine that there are some readers of this review who find themselves in the same position. I did do some research on line and viewed a number of videos featuring the instrument before I made my purchase. You can see by the rating I gave it that it pleased me a great deal, so I'll outline the concerns I had before I received it and how the guitar resolved them. MY CONCERNS BEFORE BUYING, AND HOW THE SLG200NW RESOLVED THEM INTONATION AND SETUP I was concerned that the intonation might be unsatisfactory even though I heard that these guitars have a reputation for accurate intonation. The intonation on the guitar I received is five star. The slg200nw arrived set up with 12th fret string heights of 3.75mm for the sixth and 3.25 for the first (as measured by a Baroque string action ruler), very close to the setup on my other classical guitars. There is an adjustable truss rod should you prefer a different setup. The strings that came on the slg200nw were exceptionally low tension, which you may or may not prefer. BUILD QUALITY I was concerned that the build quality, fit and finish of the guitar would disappoint me. It certainly didn't. I had a big smile on my face after a few moments examining it. NECK I was concerned that the neck of the guitar, which was presented by Yamaha as thinner than conventional classical guitars, might be sufficiently different from my other classical guitars to present a significantly different playing experience. It was not and did not. In fact, I'm finding no important subjective difference. CONFIGURATION, BALANCE, WEIGHT I was concerned that the playing position would be much less than ideal given that the body of the slg200nw is shallower than that of a traditional classical guitar. I also worried that the particular weight and balance of the slg200nw would be a distraction. These concerns turned out to be non-issues, at least in my case. When played the slg200nw does not feel thin like a Fender Strat feels thin. Putting one of my other classical guitars next to the slg200nw on a bed with the heads hung over the side and flattening the bodies of the guitars against the bed, the height of the strings above the bed (where the strings are touched by the right hand of a right handed player) was about four and one half inches for the conventional classical guitar and two and three quarters inches for the slg200nw. The only issue this one and three quarters inches of depth has presented is that I find myself wondering whether or not the slg200nw isn't actually more comfortable to play than my other classical guitars. SOUND I was concerned that I would be disappointed with the sound of the guitar. First let me say that this is an electric instrument and it isn't going to sound like a Ramirez 1A. But the way it sounds is very much dependent on what you use to listen to it, and if you use high quality audio equipment it sounds very good indeed. It also comes with the added bonus of interesting variability controlled by the player. I am using Audio-Technica ATH M50 earphones with satisfying results, and I suspect that the way players respond to this guitar has everything to do with the quality of the audio equipment they use with it. If you have the opportunity to play an slg200nw make certain to bring a good set of earphones or borrow a set for the occasion. There is no other way you will be able to hear what the slg200nw can sound like. LOGO I must say that I'm not a fan of logos on the headstocks of classical guitars, and I initially solved the problem by covering the logo with my favorite tuner until discovering that the tuner built in to the slg200nw was more accurate. As happy as I am with the instrument and the price I paid for it I should be more tolerant of the logo. TUNERS The tuners on the slg200nw are excellent. Part of my impression of the tuners may have to do with the low-tension strings that came with the instrument, but the tuners certainly feel smooth. SOME SUBJECTIVE IMPRESSIONS I find it interesting that I'm paying more attention to dynamics now that I can play at a volume that won't disturb others. And there is something about the sustain, or perhaps the earphone isolation, that has me paying more attention to note values. Both of these at least potentially lead to more accurate and expressive playing. If you are unable to find an slg200nw to play be sure to do some research and check out the videos that are available. If you buy one I hope you'll be as satisfied with it as I have been.

I got the Yamaha SLG200N (nylon string) Silent Guitar primarily as a travel guitar after reading and watching several reviews of the other options out there. I only considered those travel guitars that have a full 650-654 mm scale length. I was initially put off by the slightly larger size of the SLG200N guitar relative to some really compact travel guitars but the reviews both from customers and from professional reviewers (e.g. Classical Guitar Magazine [...]) convinced me that the larger size was worth the risk considering the poor reviews of my other options and the excellent reviews of the SLG. I am very glad I went with this guitar. The feel is great and the string dimensions almost exactly match my primary nylon guitar which is a custom Juan Miguel Carmona flamenco/classical (mixta) guitar I got in Granada, Spain. Scale length is slightly shorter in the SLG (650 mm) compared to the mixta (654 mm) and the nut width of the SLG (50 mm) is off by only a mm compared to my mixta (51 mm). I know that a full traditional classical has a nut width typically around 52-53 mm but for me, the 1 mm difference is really not an issue. Frankly, it forces me to really think about proper left hand finger placement which is good for my practicing anyway. I would think a full classical player would feel the same. OK. On to the sound. The sound is amazing. However, the sound of the stock guitar as shipped was quite poor. It was WAY too strong on the bass end. I had to turn the bass knob of the guitar down to its minimum setting and max out the treble and that was barely workable. I was going to return it (thinking the piezo pickup was messed up) when I called up GearTree and they were very helpful. The key is to get the saddle piece to have uniform contact with the piezo right underneath. Also, getting high tension strings to add brightness to the sound and to get the treble strings to have a good vibration signal to transfer to the piezo completely changed the sound. Bottom line: replace the strings when you first get the guitar and make sure the piezo and the saddle make uniform contact. The real benefit comes when you are playing and you can adjust the pure piezo signal with the Yamaha advanced classical guitar modeling signal for a tone surprisingly nice for a solid body “travel” guitar. For practicing (using the headphone output), you can also feed in an input from your iPhone/MP3 player via the AUX jack. For performance (yes, performance), you can plug into an amp via the “Strat-like” jack and you also have a wickedly cool looking guitar. Add in an on-board chromatic tuner and you have one amazing and surprisingly versatile guitar for practice AND (amazingly enough) for performance as well. Note: a proper recital still demands your best classical guitar but for a gig at a club or wine bar, etc., this could work out quite nicely. And finally, as I mentioned above, BIG callout to the folks at GearTree - absolutely fantastic customer service. They emailed me directly about my shipment (in addition to the auto emails) AND added in a guitar stand and headphones even though the package I bought didn’t include them. They did that since other competitor Amazon sellers were making these fancy bundles. I just had to ask. Wow… Bottom line: 5 stars (with the right strings) and get the Tobacco Sunburst version - it's beautiful.

This absolutely works just as advertised. The workmanship is excellent. The setup, function and appearance were flawless as received. Action was 3.2mm at the 12th fret, spot on for me. The fingerboard is one of the nicest pieces of jet black ebony I have seen. The fretwork is flawless and the nut string height perfect. I have had to adjust NOTHING at all. You don't need any luthier work on this one. The strings, despite some complaints here are actually the Yamaha S10 set as used on their most expensive custom guitars. The gauges are identical to the ubiquitous D'Addario EJ45 strings except they stretch far less. I may start using these for that reason alone. The tuners are excellent but I did put a dab of petroleum jelly on them which made them less stiff. Because of the solid center body the tuning stability is remarkably good. Just a touch up to compensate for temperature changes as needed. Far better than any of my good classical guitars. The concept of a "Silent Guitar" is every bit a useful as you can imagine. The included ear buds actually sound really good but the flimsy cord is a pain. The best settings for my ear are the bass and treble centered and the blend control at about 2 o'clock. The effect controls work very well and I often use the 2 reverb settings at moderate levels. I have tried several sets of good headphones but you have to fiddle with the controls to make it sound like a guitar. In general the bass is excessive as the headphone output is equalized to make the included buds sound good, which makes good headphones sound WAY too bassy with the same settings. I have settled on some rather inexpensive AKG K52 phones with the bass set to about 9 o'clock and the SRT blend at 1 o'clock. I got these at Guitar Center on sale for $30. Other phones may require the bass to be lowered to the minimum and the blend at 12 o'clock, at least to my ear. i returned several sets as they were too bassy at any setting. The OneOdio Studio are my second choice if I want a really rich bass. The output fed into an amp (Fishman Mini) sounds really good, so the excessive bass in only on the headphone output, not the instrument output. The guitar has a lot of sustain, as might be expected with a solid body. Works well for a lot of music but don't expect a Flamenco sound with sharp attack and quick decay. Batteries last a long time (several weeks at an hour or so a day) so I would skip the power supply and just get a set of rechargeable batteries. The AUX input is great for plugging in a metronome. My wife appreciates that I can endlessly practice a few measures sitting 10 ft from her without it driving her up the wall. I appreciate the lack of guilt when doing this. So bottom line, this guitar is everything I expected and more. After 3 weeks i am totally sold.

As for looks, this guitar looks like a modern work of art. I haven't seen a picture yet that does any of the wood "body" portion justice. As for sound, playability, etc., that is the real reason for doing a review. If you have read the description it states that this Yamaha can be played either just through the pick up, through a setting that plays back a sampled acoustic, full bodied classical or a combination of both. That is completely accurate and works wonderfully. The sampled classical guitar setting was taken from an actual Yamaha classical with a regular full wooden body with sound hole. Using this setting you can actually hear what sounds like the string sound reverberating and coming out the sound hole giving the guitar a very full and rich sound. Using the electric pick up while the guitar doesn't sound like a regular electric guitar and does sound like a classical it has a slightly more metallic sound which also picks up more of the fingering sounds and sounds of your fingers moving over the fret board. Some people think you wouldn't want to hear those sounds but they are part of an actual classical guitar sound. So, I tend to play around with a knob that allows you to mix both the electric pick up and the pre-recorded note sound and can pretty much duplicate the sound of MANY different models and brands of classical guitars. To further the sound modeling, the guitar also has 2 reverb and a chorus knob to change those settings. With those settings you can make the guitar sound as if it is being played anywhere from a small room to a concert hall. If you already know how to play and have ever played along with a recording of your favorite song, this guitar also has an AUX. in. A regular mini jack (like a headphone jack...which it also has so you don't have to play it through an amplifier unless you want to) that you can plug a phone or MP3 player into and its sound will come out of either the earphone jack with the guitar sound or out an amp (also with the guitar sound). As for being a silent guitar. Obviously when you pluck a sting a sound has to be made. The promo description says you can play it in a room with the rest of the family watching TV. While I didn't believe it, it is absolutely true. Whether you have headphones plugged in or not, if they aren't in your ears, even with this guitar in you lap you will have to struggle to hear this. It is as close to actually being truly silent as possible. I am a concert level classical player and just do to practice, concerts and playing for enjoyment, have very strong hands and use proper hand placement and even I can't get more than a barely audible sound out of the un-amplified strings. If you want a silent guitar this is for you. If you want a guitar you can just pick up and play at a normal volume you WILL have to use headphones (it doesn't mention it but the pkg. does come with a set of cheap ear buds) or an external amp. If you want something you can just pick up and play or plug into an amp get yourself a standard classical with a built in pick up. You can find them hear or at just about any web site or guitar store. So the sound can be almost anything you want, it IS as close to a completely silent guitar as you are going to find, you can adjust the tone to a million combinations of settings. I haven't mentioned the action (how high the strings are above the fret board). I read many reviews before ordering this guitar and the comments about the action were all over the place; from too high to too low which produces fret buzz when the strings hit a fret other than the one you are trying to play. As for the action, my guitar came perfectly set up for me. If the string height isn't right for you, you can always take it to a luthier (someone who builds or fixes guitars) and they can make an adjustment for you. Generally, most guitar stores do this. Be sure to ask how much it will cost first. Especially since you didn't buy the guitar from them they are going to charge you for the service and some stores will try to rip you off. Call a couple stores, ask if they provide the service and how much it will cost. I guess to wrap this up I will add one final comment. It is a sort of reply to something I read in a couple reviews that needs correcting. They both stated that "this would be a good guitar for an experienced player or a beginner." I also taught classical guitar for several years. This is definitely NOT a good guitar for a beginner. With all the wonderful things I said about its sound one thing I didn't mention is how it is to hold this instrument. Including the electronics and where the neck connects to the body the maximum height of the guitar is just over 3 inches and the outer frame (the curved part) is about an inch to an inch and a quarter wide. And of course there is no back to this guitar where a regular one has an entire, formed body. This guitar would, in most cases, be enough to discourage a beginner because it is unusual to hold and due to where the wood is on this guitar it does't have a very good balance (it doesn't sit easily on either leg and there is no really convenient place to rest your forearm on the body). You literally have to hold and balance it differently from a regular classical guitar. This guitar is really designed for an intermediate to experienced player who learned on a standard bodied classical. My suggestion, start there...learning to play a standard classical is the only way you are going to learn to how to balance the guitar, how to place the left hand so that the thumb never comes over the back of the neck and how the right hand can both move freely up and down the fret board and grasp the neck properly when creating a bar chord). As you may be able to tell I love the guitar and I would hate to see a beginner stop playing because this particular instrument might be more frustrating than the usual frustrations a beginner is going to feel anyway.

I couldn't be more disappointed. I'm a professional guitarist with decades of experience. I bought the Silent Guitar a couple months ago, and at first it was just as advertised. It was great to be able to practice on the road and plug in to play for other people. Suddenly, the battery stopped working. The plastic vessel that holds the battery was not snug enough to make the connection. Because this is a "Silent" guitar, this rendered the instrument totally useless. In 2025, this design should be updated to an internal power supply that is USB rechargeable, rather than relying on 2 AAA batteries. I contacted Yamaha for warranty service, and was told that Yamaha doesn't have a location that does warranty work anywhere close to where I live. I live in New York CIty. Next, Dan from Yamaha Customer Service sent me to Guitar Center, where the man at the desk was literally sleeping when I approached him, and he told me that Guitar Center does not do warranty work. I reported this back to Dan, and he suggested I send the guitar to California for warranty work. I asked to be sent a box in order to ship the guitar to California, as the Silent Guitar is a very odd shape. Dan replied that he needed to ask his supervisor. I just heard back with this message: Stephen, After conferring with my supervisor, regrettably we are unable to provide packaging materials for the shipment. I do apologize for the inconvenience, and let me know if you have any other questions. All the best, Dan Yamaha Customer Support So now, my $750 purchase is unusable, and I don't know if I have any recourse. I'm going to send this review to Dan at Yamaha, and I'll let you know (by updating this review) if that makes any difference.

I bought the classical, nylon string version with wide nut width. Overall, this is a great product and I'm happy with it. First of all, it's a work of art. You could hang it on the wall and never play it, and it would be worth the money. But, of course it is for playing, and it's quite good for that. One issue is that it arrives completely not set up well. You'll need to get it to a guitar technician for set up, unless you can do that yourself. I was able to set it up myself, however. But, I've bought more than 20 guitars in my life and never did I find one set up to my liking. So, this is par for course. However, I've never seen a nut height so high before. The height of the strings at the nut is just way too high. I can't imaging anyone wanting it like that. A couple hours of careful work with nut files took care of that easily enough. I felt the action was a little high, considering it is an electric guitar that can work well with a lower action. Perhaps, it was in the range of an acoustic classical guitar, but even then slightly high for my taste. No biggie there though. I'd rather get it too high and adjust down. The only unsatisfactory thing I find is that it is hard to get the intonation perfect because of the position of the bridge and the saddle that tilts back away from the headstock. So, as you file the saddle down, it also moves the position forward slightly and the intonation does not improve much. Hence. the high position notes are slightly sharp. I'm able to get the trebles very close to perfect and a little finger pressure towards the bridge does the rest. The basses intonate more sharp than I would like. But, I used Hannabach strings and I'm hoping that changing the bass strings might help that. But, it is acceptable and playable if I use my ears. The sound is good but I had to get the adjustments to a certain spot to really like it. It seems to have a wide range of settable timbres., and the settings need to be adjusted depending on the amp, or headphones that are used.

So... I'm pretty sure that either this guitar was used or that it was on display for a VERY long time at a guitar shop. First of all, the strings were clearly corroded, brittle, and generally just old. Second of all, the guitar was covered in hand smudges and looked like it had been handled quite a bit. Third, the batteries were Amazon batteries. In 30+ years of buying items that came with included batteries, I've never once seen retail brand batteries. Finally, the packaging suggests that the item had been taken in and out of the box repeatedly. The guitar itself seems in reasonably good shape, I just feel that the seller misrepresented the condition and I didn't have all the facts when I was making my decision. Now with that said, the guitar itself seems pretty good overall. I'm going to have to do a string change and get the thing setup before I can make a full evaluation. But if you've ever watched any video reviews, you'll have a good idea of what this thing can do-- built in tuner, onboard effects, aux in, eq and tone shaping. All there and all of typical solid yamaha quality. The neck feels pretty good, but the compact headstock makes it feel shorter than other acoustic guitars of similar scale length. The hollow silhouette is going to take a little getting used to, but generally I think it's going to be fine. I do like that it seems completely immune to feedback - one of the reasons I bought it. So in the end - watch yourself with this seller. This guitar was what was advertised, but even if was never technically owned by anyone, it was nowhere near what I would call "new" condition. Caveat emptor.

The SLG200N TBS arrived safely from Zorro Sounds, even though it was shipped in the stock guitar box, not double boxed, and had no packing other than the little piece of hard foam that Yamaha puts in there. The box had some dents and creases and I was skeptical, not only about the instrument, but half expecting shipping damage, a kink, defect, or something. All is well. In fact, I am quite impressed with the guitar, but not with the cavalier approach to shipping it. The SLG200N TBS is lightweight, 4.3 pounds (my old classical guitar is 3.5 pounds), and comfortable to hold; first fret not too far away for my small frame and small fingers. The action out of the box is a bit higher than my old guitar, but my old guitar is probably too low; fingerboard width is about the same - 50mm, and it's flat, probably the only shortcoming to playability for those used to a non-classical, but I knew that going in, and it's fine, since my old guitar is flat. The wood and the finish is first rate, very nice looking, better than the photos. The sound: well, unlike the discontinued SLG130N, this one has "mic", which allows you to blend the piezo pickup with whatever "mic" is, not sure if it's modeling or sampling, or an actual microphone, but it provides that authentic woody sound, less defined than the "pluck" of the piezo, so blended it has resonance and air, add a touch of the built in reverb and you're in a small hall or a chapel, very pleasant, stayed there for over an hour on my first visit. Too much reverb or the chorus sounds unnaturally processed. The built in tuner works fine, but cuts the audio output when tuning. It runs a long time on 2 AAs, has line out, aux in (for playing along with mp3s or whatever), headphone out (only tried with my MEE Pro in ear monitors, and no hiss, nothing, until you touch or pluck a string). The gig bag is well-designed, thick material, but has minimal padding. All in all, I'm quite pleased, and feel good about owning it, knowing that I can't fault the guitar for my shortcomings. And, I really like that I can practice ad nauseam without inflicting it upon someone else's ears. I've acquired a cache of books, basic classical, theory, and dozens of chord-melody charts for standards, traditional, and some of the easier classical pieces, so plenty to keep me busy through the winter. So, now after 2 hours at the piano, when I can't sit up any longer, I can put on my headphones and transport to a little chapel in the English countryside and pluck on my new friend.