Quality of Indonesian Jacksons vs. old school MIJ?

[wrldeatr7]

No consensus as you can imagine. Some guys will say there's nothing like a MIJ, other guys have had good experiences with MII. Since there are no new MIJ not sure what sort of price comparison once can make. X-Series Jacksons are a great deal. I have no experience with Jacksons made by Cort but Jackson seems to trust them, they've been working with them for a while and are contracting them for more and more of their guitars. The fretwire is going to be different so it's going to feel different to play. And the Japanese paid more attention to finishing the fret ends, that you don't find with imports these days. Buy from a place with a good return policy just in case you don't like it.

[Gotcha97]

Well, I ended up buying an immaculate MIJ KV5 and answered my own question. My local guitar store has a KVXMG in and I had a look. It's a great guitar for the price actually, not sure what can compare at that price point.

I'd be very happy with one. But yeah, somewhat I wanted a Japanese one and was lucky to land exactly the spec I was after.

[Buckman]

I had a MIJ SL3 back in the 90s tgat was a beautiful guitar. The FR was ok but needed regular tuning. That guitar is long gone. About a year ago I bought a MII Samick SL2 MAH pro. It is a tremendous guitar. Neck is perfect, sounds awesome, and never goes out of tune. I just got a MIM Dk2mq pro last week. The fret ends are not as good as the soloist, but it atill plays great, sounds incredible, and alao holds tuning. My biggest beef with both us the locking nut is really sharp on the corners. At the end of the day, the MII Soloist is a better guitar. And I got bother of them for about 30% less than the street.

[elrrek]

I have 8 Japanese built Jackson and Charvels and 1 Indian made Jackson. It's not fair I guess to judge all the Indian made guitars on my single example but all of the Japanese guitars ate basicalky perfect and the Indian guitar is significantly inferior.

[Buckman]

My Indo Soloist is pretty much perfect. It very quickly became my number one, overtaking my Les Paul, my PRS, and my Fender. It plays better than all of them. The action is lower with no buzz. It has a dark sound due to the mahogany, but it is not dull. Just takes some dialing in on my amp. The Dinky pro with an alder body and maple cap is much brighter. I didn't have it dialed in on my first gig with it last Friday. I haven't had any five hour rehearsals with it at home on my rig yet. And as soon as summer comes and we have some heat and humidity, the frets will be smooth as silk.

I was reluctant to buy a MiM because of the fret issue. It feels like most MiM Fender necks, fret-end-wise. I guess you can chalk that up to Mexico being pretty much warm and humid year round. I live in the Northeast, and it is mega dry and cold in the winter. Relative humidity hovers are 20=30% in the winter months. Sometimes it is as low as 12-15%. In the spring, summer and falll, we are more in the 40-70% range. I only sell off MiM guitars in the summer months when the neck is smooth. Indonesia has a more varied climate. Not as extreme as the Northeast, but they have a very dry season close to ours, and a very humid season as well. That said, the Dinky is still a very nice guitar. The action is better than my others. I actually have it a little lower than the MII right now, though I am starting to get a bit of acoustic buzz on the high side of the neck after a week. But I have it the action extremely low. Amplified it is fine. My current rig is a Marshall DSL40c, and I use the classic channel with the gain maxed, which give me a little over the edge of distortion maxed out, but cleans up completely with a bit of volume roll off. Then I use pedals (Soul Food and OCD on clean boost) to push the amp into singing harmonics.

At the end of the day, my Indo Jackson pro is great. It is better than my Les Paul. I can't afford a USA Jackson these days. And I can't afford a custom shop LP either. But I can tell you that it is on par with most of the Gibson's I've had over the past 20 years. And plays better than them, though I loved them all.