Squier Classic Vibe 6-String Bass VI, 3-Color Sunburst, Laurel Fingerboard

Out of the box, please get the .100 strings by Fender (if you want rounds) or the 95's from La Bella (if you want flats). I mounted the Fender set and the guitar intonates perfectly.The strings this is delivered with are .084's and the low E will wiggle too much for its own good.This guitar features much larger strings than a standard six-string guitar (as you know) but it still sports regular vintage Fender tuning machines. This is acceptable, but you'll find the tuner thumbscrews are a little small for the force needed and they're very close to each other. Fat fingered players take note.The vintage tuners are stressed with the larger strings. Mine broke a gear almost immediately when I put the new strings on. Click - slack - click - slack - broken.I contacted Fender and all they wanted was my receipt and they sent me a whole new set of tuning machines (very generous!), but I also had purchased some Gotoh tuners which I'll try soon.BTW if you have a broken gear, try what I did - get a slotted head screwdriver and put it in the groove and turn the tuning peg while turning the thumbscrew and you can get past the broken gears and continue - as long as the "in tune" position has intact gears you should be okay; it will tune to pitch and stay that way.All this for a brand new instrument? Is it worth the trouble?Oh yea.This guitar is a real pleasure. She's a stallion in a barn full of regular, boring old guitar donkeys. If you're a guitar player looking to lay down some bass lines, look no further. You now have a new hobby! What fun it is to get grooving on those low strings! When set up well, this guitar is a blast to play!

My negatives, first:Amazon sent me a damaged Bass VI, at first. It had a deep gauge at the top of the headstock, about the size of a large flat-head screwdriver. It was deep enough to penetrate the finish, gauging into the wood.Amazon sent me a replacement before I had even returned the damaged one.A second negative is again aimed at Amazon, and that is that they do not package guitars for shipment very well. They ship in the same boxes that they receive from the factories. Asian cardboard is notoriously flimsy. Both the damaged guitar, and its replacement, arrived in boxes that were damaged, and torn open, in places, during shipping.I will say that I don't believe that Amazon was at fault in shipping me the damaged guitar: although I stated that the box was damaged, the torn open portion was NOT anywhere near the headstock, but near the bottom. This tells me that the guitar was damaged at the factory, in Indonesia, and shipped out, anyhow.The replacement was undamaged, although the shipping box was also torn open, near the bottom.I have purchased guitars from other online sellers- they typically place the boxes I've described, above, inside larger, sturdier boxes for shipping. I've never received damaged guitars from other retailers (zZounds is excellent!); this is the 3rd damaged guitar I've received from Amazon.As for the guitar, I love it! And yes, I refer to it as a guitar, although it is technically a 6-string bass guitar. It's one octave lower than a standard guitar, but plays just like a standard guitar, same chord shapes, etc.. It has thicker strings, which require specific replacement, but if you've already got calluses, there's no issue there.I have to talk myself into putting it down, after playing for over an hour. It really sounds funky, thick and low, and is fun to play.I also own an ESP Baritone guitar, which is also tuned lower than a standard guitar, but not a whole octave. It's nice, but not fun: it lacks funkiness. The Bass VI is funky.I read some negative reviews, mostly regarding construction, but I was not wary enough to stay away. Glad I didn't.If you order one, inspect it immediately, and closely. But you may well end up with a cool Bass VI, and love it, too.If you get one with issues, get Amazon to replace it, immediately. They're good about that.I think they only order about 20 at a time, from Fender. They were out for awhile until just before Christmas. That being the case, they might not have a replacement for you, but issue a refund. If that happens, go over to zZounds site, order from them. Same price. Better interest-free financing, too (Amazon: 5 months, zZounds: 12 months interest-free!)

New 2022 model. I love everything about this instrument - with one exception (more later). I've never played a bass with single-coil pickups. As a result, it doesn't have the deep P-Bass tones, but it sounds so springy, defined, and precise. I've always avoided instruments with "extra" strings. This is different. This is a bass and a guitar at the same time. It's like every 6-string guitar that's ever been, but one full octave lower, making it an actual bass. It's the same 4 string bass as all the others, but adds the 2 "missing" strings on the high end of a guitar. It has 3 single-coil pickups that can be switched into any configuration you can dream up. It has a cool bass-cut option that's fun to experiment with, and a whammy bar (on a bass!). I love that you can play full guitar chords on it. If fact, almost anything you can do on a guitar you can do here too, with a lot of pressure! It would be perfect, BUT... the intonation problem is real. The bridge, in my opinion, is not aligned to the instrument properly. It was installed straight across, perpendicular to the strings, when it should have been angled slightly, providing a slightly longer scale length on the low side. This would allow for proper intonation of both the low-E and the A strings (especially with lighter, lower-gauge strings). My solution was to order a wider aftermarket bridge ($100+, but easy enough that ANYONE can do it) designed specifically to fix this issue by allowing more room for adjusting the saddles. It's a perfect fix, but it's also a significant (and expensive) modification to have to do to a new instrument. It's great now, but it should have been this good out of the box.