Ibanez AZ Prestige vs Premium. Which One Would You Pick? 

Right? I really want one of those now.

I just bought a Runt 50, but was looking at the JJ Jr too. You'll never go wrong with a Friedman anything!!

No kidding

Yep

I'm glad I wasn't here then. I mean kudos to the guy for his knowledge but he'd get a better sound out of the guitars if he used them to play baseball.

PRS and GIBSON do the same thing.

@@5urg3x 'Cause it's cheaper.

Charvel dk24 pro mod plays better than both in my experience. Without debate the prestige is still specs-wise a much better guitar but I couldn't find one in Atlanta that sounded anywhere near as good or that felt as good as the ssh pro mod.

@@zakktothefuture I own a few Prestige Ibanezes, and I used to own a Charvel DK24 Pro Mod. The Charvel was great for the price, but the quality of the Prestige definitely is noticeable over it, at least in my opinion. Again, the Charvel played really nicely for the price... but it just felt a bit like a toy next to the Prestige.

It's very easy to paint guitars bright colours. Showing of beautiful wood is more tricky. I love oil finishes on figured wood, but it 's not in your face like a bright solid colour that i 'd pick for a cheap stage guitar.

How did you mod the neck?

Hi, Do you feel any wrist pain? planning to buy this one but im afraid that it might give me wrist pain like my RG

Definitely. And an important difference.

You're joking right??? At any rate, I can fix this for you. If youre playing the prestige, turn your "high" knob down from 7 to 6.8, turn your "bass" knob down from 8 to 7.9, and turn your "mids" knob from 4 to 4.1. There. Identical sound.

FYI, the demo was with the tone full on forward. If you want more warmth just roll the tone back just a touch.

Hi, do you feel any wrist pain? RG gives me wrist pain due to small neck

@@ceelee5850 the AZ necks are a little bit thicker than what ibanez usually does

Just Google AZ2204 or Az2402 followed by koa or myrtle

Indonesians are also excellent woodworkers, it's part of the culture

@@TheEchelon yes, that's true

Have Indonesian PRS SE and it is great!

Yeah I‘ve been worried about whether Indonesian luthiers are paid properly... anyone got first hand experience?

@@mountainman8775 They ship out enough junk that it's moot. If they're getting paid at all they're not earning it. It makes no sense at all to pay a 'premium' for a premium. Get the prestige or, if you don't have the money, get a Cort G300 pro or another cheap guitar. Because you're rolling the dice to get something from Ibanez that isn't made in Japan that doesn't have a ton of QC issues. Worse of all are the youtubers / signature players with premium tier who are getting good examples cherry picked (or in the signature case made in the custom shop) and telling you they're fine. They're not. If you really want a brand guitar made in Indonesia, get a yamaha revstar standard. Worse here is the guy in the video who doesn't really play the guitar saying the premium is better because it looks prettier and because he doesn't care about the quality differences? (Kudos at least he is acknowledging the quality differences - many other youtubers do not) I mean ffs, I get you mostly hang guitars on a wall to look at Phil but if you're going to make videos talking about gear for guitarists then a guitar is a musical instrument not a nicely painted piece of wood that your non guitarist friends (you're a non guitar player too) think is the better one because it's shiny. And of course saying the faults aren't big because they're easy to fix is awful for the money these cost. They're not cheap guitars where you can say "Meh the trem is broken and creaks but it's not difficult to fix" - imagine spending all that money and then having to get it fixed. You can't look at it from the perspective from someone who can fix stuff. It's like a mechanic showing a brand new car has a big fault but him saying he can fix it. Most guitar shops are charging £60 an hour labour to fix stuff - plus any parts - or these same retailers have to take the hit off their bottom line fixing guitars they get sent from manufacturers because otherwise they'd have an unhappy customer complaining. All because you sit on this channel saying Indonesian guitars that have objective and clear faults are better than guitars that don't. That's close to shilling isn't it? Certainly you should take a step back I think and reevaluate what you accept as ok in terms of flaws - because I'd get it if it was a £150 guitar, but you're now at the stage where you seem to think it's ok for a guitar that's 10x that to be broken when it's delivered either to the retailer or the customer? Really? How long before you'll be extending this "it doesn't matter if it's broken or not" to £3k guitars or higher? Ibanez basically have one job right? And you're more or less saying it's fine if 90% of their output is broken in some way - everything made in Indonesia and China can be broken? No way. That's awful. And it's an awful experience for the millions of guitarists who can't buy japanese guitars and they're being pressured by marketing into believing spending more for an Indonesian "premium" model is getting them closer to that prestige or higher tier experience - but what they're actually getting is a nice paint job and a bunch of QC issues for twice the money they could get a guitar of equal merit - like, I say, a Cort. And how are Ibanez deluding millions that this premium tier is worth twice the money? By using people like yourself Phil - wittingly or not.

Have u seen the koa and myrtle version, those are gorgeous and way way overpriced.

@@yeesenchai myrtle was a Japanese privilege model :(

Hi, I have the 3 tone one. in the den practicing it is very bright looking BUT on stage it just rocks. It just pops out. What a star it really is.

god, yeah. ugly tobacco burst is for boomers

Dylan Lanphear hahaha well I was referring to the one that looks like Guy Fieri’s shirt as ugly, but hey, to each his own!

Ha. I’m 65, playing for 50+ yrs (and better than ever, IMHO), and I bought the very same Premium back in January. Yup that same gradient finish. Love the guitar, love the looks. LOL. Ummm... maybe there goes yer theory?! :-)

Ya, the Premium finish is awful. I call it BombPop Sunbarfed.

Hell, I liked ‘em both! I’m rather easy to please though, when it comes to quality guitars.

Yeah. Even their high end Chinese guitars (like the artcore models) are soooo good. Other brands also sell fantastic instruments from other overseas factories. Indo Squiers are awesome,same for Chinese Epis

Ilian Petit mmm, I’ve had a Korean LTD and it was crap, friend had one too and it too was crap. I’ve seen too much shite from epiphone to ever regain faith in them being good. The fender / charvel Mexican stuff is pretty good !

Chapman's Korean guitars are great. Harley Benton's Indonesian guitars (Cort Factory, so by extension Cort too) are phenomenal. Bacchus (also a Japanese brand, but mostly known for basses) make some incredible basses in the Philippines. The only country to make guitars from Asia so far that has been crap at every level has been Vietnam.

it's probably a loss leader.

"When you moved the whammy bar and it creaked my thoughts immediately turned to Eddie Van Halen" - his knees?

Yes, ive tried a few models of both and they dont sound different at all. I think You did good in just going with the premium.

Got it a couple hours ago, and it's great. A couple minor cosmetic imperfections here and there, but you really have to look for them to find them. I'm more than pleased with my purchase :D

I have a Premium HSS AZ and it is a lot of guitar for the price. Sounds great and plays really well.

The only difference between the bridges on the premium vs prestige are the prestige models have titanium saddles and bigger block. VERY easily replaceable items if you so chose. Aside that they are literally the same bridge from gotoh. Not "similar", not "kind of like", they are THE SAME BRIDGE.

a good friend of mine has an American Deluxe and it's absolutely amazing! I think the American Elite might be even better

@josue Kay exact same body

hey how is the sound dif between these two its really important for me i dont want save money one more year for prestige?

So if I'm planning to upgrade my premium to prestige, you suggest don't? I'm seriously planning an upgrade. Selling my premium right now actually

@@ThePedroDB thanks for the input! Then I better buy another AZ but Prestige, just to add to my collection. Then RG j custom as the end game.

Did you feel any wrist pain?

It's like the ESP and LTD one is awesome looking and other is super plain looking

I have the premium, and I actually appreciate it more the more I play it. It has it's own sound. My strat is not as clear as the AZ. There is a clean crispness that even the strat cannot match, and yet because of the clarity I play Jazz on it, and it works. But a lot is in the fingers isn't it?

Dude, the premium model bridges ARE gotoh. They are LITERALLY the same exact bridge as the prestige version. The difference is the one on the prestige has titanium saddles instead of stainless, and a bigger block. Like there is absolutely no difference otherwise.

@@JgHaverty "Same exact except for the differences" - hehe. That means they're not the same.

@@michael1 *surely* youre not some silly noob child here. I mean, youd be *pretty* stupid to not understand the bridge and saddles are separate. Only some uneducated ignorant child would come here and try to be pedantic about a detail they dont understand. Itd be pretty embarassing to go around "correcting" people to find out the "bridge" is the support structure for the strings, and works as a fulcrum to the body and that saddles are a way to conveniently set the radius and adjust action a small amount. See i get why youre being a pedantic idiot here, but contextually, its akin to a gold vs black bridge and someone going around saying the company that makes the gold bridge is trash but the black onw is high quality. Before you nay say, heres a scenario -> when you adjust string height do you... "lower the bridge" or do you "lower the saddles"? I mean... by what youre saying, thatd be the same thing. Clearly. And as for the "bridge" itself? They have the same exact gotoh/ibanez part number you idiot -"hehe".

@@michael1 also, he says "swap out to a TRUE gotoh". The bridge IS a "true gotoh", hence my comment. There is no real purpose to changing out the bridges on either (he forgot to mention the body is cut out *SPECIFICALLY* to float a 510 in the first place)... what you could do is ... maybe change out the saddles :)

And what did you find at the end? Just curious because you said even a Majesty Monarchy isn't good :)

@@Mr.Goldbar After returning three Arctic Dream Majesty guitars, GC accidentally sent me a Black Night Majesty Monarchy. Two of the guitars looked like they had been abused in the store and one arrived with the headstock completely snapped off! Even the Monarchy arrived with issues as the action was so low, the strings were laying on the fretboard. Fortunately, it only needed a basic set up so I decided to keep it. The Majesty is a truly amazing guitar and I plan on giving it to my son when he graduates from Columbia next year.

@@timberwolfenstein nice!

There is no functional difference between the S-tech necks and the premium roasted necks. "S-tech" is just a japanese company that producs their "STEC" (thats what its called) wood, its completely and functionally identical to any other torrefaction process done by any other company. The actual difference here is that S-tech's company wants to emulate the aesthetics of "bog wood" more, so they simply leave it in the oven a little longer so it goes a little darker. The chemical and physical processes that happen are completely identical, and this change is purely cosmetic in nature.

I think they’re after Suhr’s market

it is reverse in real life. The veneers and gradient finishes of the premiums look pretty cheesy when you have them right in front of you. I'm glad they're doing solid colors now

No no no, it is a matter of taste. They do the prestige in more CONSERVATIVE colours to give it more APPARENT value. The Premium however is the working musos tool of choice. I bought mine in Singapore, when they first came out and you could not get one in Australia. (and got it cheaper) brought it back as luggage, so cost me nothing to bring it back.

i own that one! it looks so good in person

@@ProbyWaN1337 Me, too! Agreed!

for me it would ruin its mojo

Good news, Martin Miller and Wes Hauch both got prototypes of the AZ7

@@sidusize you can still get the 6 :)

@@Mr.Goldbar I saw Wes's IG post and I almost yelled out of excitement. That'll be an axe worth buying.

@@TobyKBTY It entered my bucket list right when I saw that it exists. This and a HSS AZ, because I already have the HH

I like the metallic blue a lot, especially since one of Tim Henson's prototypes is in this exact finish, but the Tequila Sunrise fade is my absolute favorite!

Djentleman Goldbar I get why people like it, but the fact that they don’t offer the same finishes between the two versions baffles me. I always prefer solid finishes but don’t feel like paying close to 3k Canadian for the option. Hopefully next year they update the line as I played an indonesian one the other day and loved almost everything about it!

If I bought an AZ, it's gonna be a guitar to keep rather than a guitar to sell, so I don't consider resale value at all

It is the burst. They are the same size as far as I could tell

Oh wow good eye! I never noticed that lol

It's the universe telling you it's 2019 and to buy locking tuners.

You too

with identical setups i would describe the playing feel of the premium to prestige AZ's on average as dramatically different honestly. If that's no so much a big deal the premiums really do offer a pretty killer value