Harley Benton R-457 BK Progressiv Series 5-stars Reviews

Great for the Price

Plays well and easily upgradable. Entry level 7 string at a great cost.

Could benefit from some mods

Not gonna lie, I literally bought it just to strip the paint out and replace some stuff inmediately, so I have no clue of how this one came. However after the mods it came out to be really good.

The neck is too dry and not properly treated, a shame considering this brand is basically like LEGO, you order one and they assemble them with stock pieces (ever wondered why the "Available in 2-5 days" in almost every harley benton product?) so no excuses two have already build hardware in a rough state.... Oother than that, for less than 200€? good guitar for the value, not good if you already have other guitars.

Awesome Budget 7 String

I decided to pick up this guitar for much the same reasons as many other people: I wanted to try out a 7 string electric guitar, but didn't want to spend a ton of money to get into one. This guitar absolutely scratches that itch, and is a fantastic example of the affordable quality that Harley Benton is capable of producing.

The guitar feels great; it's well balanced and feels like there was definitely attention to detail in the construction. The neck is slim and very playable, with a smooth satin finish that helps your hand glide easily up and down without getting stuck on a sticky gloss finish. So far mine has not had any fret sprout despite the changes in climate over it's long journey to the US to get to me.

As far as sound goes, it is acceptable. As other reviews have said, it's a bit muddy on the low end. It's not by any means unbearable, and doesn't make the guitar and less enjoyable to play, but it is noticable. I may end up upgrading one or both of the pickups eventually, but until then this guitar will do exactly what I bought it for: playing some heavy metal.

As with any black guitar with a gloss finish, this is a smudge-magnet. I find myself constantly cleaning it up with a microfiber to try to keep it shiny (OCD I know). I may end up sanding it back to a satin or matte finish if I ever decide to go all-in on a mod project for it.

To recap, if you want a 7 string that will do 7 string things for under $250, or if you're looking for one to buy a friend or relative, you really can't go wrong with this beast.

This is a great guitar.

I love this guitar i bought at the same time i got a 6 string floyd rose model of this same guitar. Its a great guitar i just wish it had a floyd rose but i know for a 7 string thats never really a cheap option. Still i would 100% recommend buying this guitar.

Came in perfect condition and played amazingly

Pickups are a little cheap(ish), not hard to replace down the line if I need to but they sound perfect for what I wanted it for, but it feels amazing to play, has the perfect weight, and has no issues

Came in perfect condition very quickly

Best 7 string for the money

Amazing instrument for such a great price, action is great and quality is very good.

Cheap Meal

I am impressed with my R-457. For less than the cost of a decent meal out you get a 7-string monster which is amazing value. I bought this guitar, as I suspect most will, to play around with the 7-string concept.

I found no flaws in the finish of mine.

The pickups are very decent. If not the greatest sounding they are perfectly adequate, have the right voicing for this kind of guitar and can create some decent tones. Obviously you shouldn't expect to get a great jazz tone from them but you can get some reasonable gentler tones by dialling the tone and volume down.

The neck has a very nice satin finish. Very smooth and easy to work with. The fretboard wasn't obviously dry, as others have been, although i will treat it and probably change the strings at some stage. The Kiesel-ish headstock is nicely done, too.

Every other one of my seven HBs has 10s on it. This one has 9s. Hooray! On the down side they aren't the d'Addarios you get on other models.

I have only found two minor things to mention, so far:

-one of the neck screws is installed poorly and doesn't sit flush with the neck. This kind of things is quite annoying as it's as basic as it gets and takes minimal effort to get right.

-The tuning stability of mine is quite poor, right now. Others have reported better results and I haven't played mine much, yet, so I'm hopeful that it will settle down with some more playing and string stretching. The generic tuners don't seem to work as well as those on other HBs I have, although they appear to be the same. Particularly on the lower two strings, so perhaps they don't like the heavier gauges used here. A replacement set of locking tuners might be a worthwhile investment.

Overall this is a hell of a bargain for the price, a pretty decent guitar in general and a great way to get into 7-string guitars.

Very good quality for price

I have never seen guitar for this low price have such good overall quality. Only thing i would replace are pickups but everything else should be worth at least 2x price of guitar

AMAZEBALLZ

got this in just 7 days upon payment purchase.

Looks simple and the price is amazing.

Build - 9/10

pups -7.5/10

packing - 10/10

finish - 9/10

Everything comes in proper and well packaged. Really hope they can come up with more models for the 7 string series and will defo get em.

Excellent guitar.

I would hands down recommend this guitar to anyone who is looking to cut theirteeth and try out 7 string. Not just because it is an excellent guitar, but because the price sits right in the pocket of what some people can afford. Here quality is definately not overlooked, as soon as I unpacked the guitar, it felt like i was playing a guitar kin to the sort that was made by one of the major brands. Hands down I'll be buying Harley Benton guitars again.

Wasn't expecting this...

First things first, I am not in anyway a "good" guitar player. I'm a bass player for close to 10 years so this is my first time picking up one this creatures.

I went straight to a 7 string mainly for the fact that I write alot of stuff on my 5 string bass in drop A, so obviously I need a guitar that good manage that without busting the bank. And oh boy this didn't disappointment!

The guitar arrived within 2 days (Germany to UK) well package and perfectly set up straight from the box! No need to do any changes what so ever, which is nice for obvious reasons.

Sound wise. I use this guitar through BIAS on my macbook or ipad and I can get any tone I want with it, from heavy djent through to funk and then to smooth blues without a problem.

It plays like a dream no over hanging frets no un-even frets no nothing which is amazing.

I highly recommend this guitar anyone no what their experience is, its cheap, its sounds great what more do you people need to know? Haha.

Haven't been this impressed with a guitar for a long time...

The guitar essentially feels and looks like a virgin guitar. Never been touched by other human hands with a very smooth finish and nice feel. Did I really only pay this little for this guitar?

The guitar arrived in standard tuning, almost perfectly by my surprise. The strings are great. Intonation is fine. The build and all visual aspects exceeded my expectations.

After plugging in the guitar to my Line 6 Spider IV, it became clear that my typical distortion sound needed some modifying for this guitar. After changing some EQ settings and using a combination of overdrive, distortion and reverb, I reached an acceptable sound.

I have to say, I first bought this guitar with the intention of putting high quality pickups in order to save money. At the moment, I feel ever so reluctant to do anything to this guitar, as it feels so great and the pickups really aren't that bad.

For a beginner to 7 strings or even guitar, this would have to be the perfect guitar, for its amazing design, decent sound and unbelievable price. For more experienced guitarists, I still recommend this guitar, as it has so much potential that has yet to be explored, and, if you decide to change the pickups, you can turn this guitar into anything you want it to be.

Astonishing quality for the price

I've bought a fair few Harley Benton products now and regret buying none of them. They've all been of very high quality and in this case you couldn't even build this for the price they're asking. Crazy !

I had to lower the action a TINY bit, about 1mm, but that's personal preference. It arrived totally playable and with no fret buzz or setup problems. Intonation is perfect, all the hardware functions well with no crackles or glitches and the knobs and toggle switch are smooth yet precise.

Finish on the guitar is really nice, it's simplistic but for a "black" guitar there's nothing wrong with it. Nice shine to it and easy to keep clean. Tuning heads keep their tune and don't slip out.

Pickups sound good both distorted and clean, with a nice deep tone for rhythm and a more biting sound for the treble. No crackles when switching and the delineation between the sound is clear.

If you're looking to get into playing a 7 string guitar then I would recommend this wholeheartedly. The neck may not quite be as "fast" as an Ibanez (it's a little deeper) BUT that's a really, really minor quibble considering that getting a playable 7 String Gem would cost you about £600 at LEAST. I was playing this for a long time "out the box" before I changed the action a little and it was fine, it's just a matter of preference as to your playing style but the tool is provided to change the action should you desire and the bridge being how it is means it's easy to setup.

Also, worthy of note, this guitar has a fixed bridge which makes it really helpful for beginners as the traditional tuning/intonation problems that can befall people unfamiliar with floating/tremelo setups are not part of the equation here. I purposefully bought this mainly because of this. Even though I've played guitar for 20+ years I haven't had a Floyd Rose or equivalent for a long time as I just find them irksome.

I'm now considering buying the 6 string version also, just as another "fun" guitar as, for the price, these are just crazy good value.

For a beginner to 7 string, as I've said before, I would fully recommend this there's no need to spend more and for people familiar with 7 strings I would also say that it's a great guitar. I did mention earlier that the neck is a little deeper than an Ibanez but that doesn't mean this is a "slow" guitar, I've been playing loads of crazy death metal riffs on it and it really suits that sort of play. The slight increase in neck depth almost makes playing it feel more weighty and, well, "heavy" ;-)

No quibbles here, this is a steal and represents yet more high quality/low price value from Harley Benton.

Extremely good for any enthusiast

Expecting low quality product, judging by the price, I WAS SHOCKED!

This thing is heavy as a wide load, solid as a rock and made with one purpose - to fall in love!

Nice, thick body with great contours and surprisingly - PERFECT finish. No flaws with laquer job.

Solid neck, thick enough for transfering great sound overall, thin enough to get your arm around for any chord you wish. It is one piece, but it has great lines that make me confident it won't bend over time in a bad direction.

After seeing that the woodwork and the "outside" job was done greatly I expected to find electronics bad. I was wrong, the switch is solid, doesn't make noise and the pickups are really defining their positions. Even though they are not the best, they do their job properly.

Volume and tone pot are acessible and turn without much effort, feels just right!

Pros: Cheap 7 string with excellent woodwork, great neck feel

Con: Nut is a bit weirdly made, kinda wide slots for thin strings. Makes it go off tune after some hard play or a few days sitting.

Harley Benton R-457 BK Progressiv Series

So i bought this 7-string nearly two years ago and was my first Harley Benton Guitar and to be honest i was really sceptical at first Because of the low price.However i was very wrong.

This guitar was playable right out of the box.There was no fret buzz, unnecessary high action or stuff like that, and the neck is really comfortable.

The finish is impeccable and while basswood may not be pricey or heavy as mahogany, still sounds pretty decent.

I've Been using this guitar almost 4-5 days per week and never had any problem with the knobs or pickup switch, and it holds tuning perfectly.

Sound wise this guitar isn't bad either, it has a clear and rich tone that make even single notes sound "big".I've had more expensive guitars that sound just as good.

I highly recommend this guitar to any guitar player who wants to buy his/her first 7-string.

awesome 7 stringer for the price range

As a first time 7 string user i was very worried that if i buy a 7 string guitar i might not play well to use the instrument and may be after i would not like it at all and at the end just a waste of money, so i decided and was eager to look a cheaper brand just for the sake of myself being a first timer on the 7's,I looked for brands such as ibanez and esp's... their respective price's was good though one guitar the Harley Benton R-457 caught my eye, the guitar looked very good with a cheaper price tag rather than those famous brand of guitar,so first i read some reviews and specs and so from there on i didn't hesitate to think of purchasing the item. together with my band mate we both purchased this guitar and when it arrived we immediately jammed with it with our band, we were surprised the guitar was good to handle, the action was good the tone was nice the neck was superb, it's quite shocking for this guitar for the price that it was built very nice, we agreed that we will use these on shows, but the stock pick-up's was not good but not bad also, starting to think of purchasing some dimarzio or saymour's for upgrade. would recommend these guitars for first timers on the 7th dimension.

Best £100 I have ever spent on a guitar.

You cannot find a better quality guitar for £100, let alone a 7 string. The pickups are very good. The knobs have a nice resistance so they cant accidentally turn down while your playing. There is barely any static coming off the guitar when the volumes up and it isn't being played. The fret board is very nice. The best feature I would say is how easy it is to pinch harmonic practically every note. The only thing I think would of made this guitar better is to of put in a bridge with a whammy bar in. But saying this I literally could not care any less. THIS AXE IS FROM ZEUS HIMSELF. YOU WILL NOT BE DISSAPOINTED LIKE ME :) ! ( I play metal genre... )

Cheap, yet surprisingly good sound.

I bought this guitar thinking that I would use it mainly to try out 7 string and also to have a cheap guitar always available in our rehearsal studio (that I did not really care if it got broken due to temperature changes).

I picked up the guitar and brought it home to my home studio before bringing it to the rehearsal studio, and of course I felt the need to unpack it and to at least try it out!

Instantly I fell in love with the feel of the guitar acoustics and felt that I had to try it out with an amp.

So I connected it to my computer and just listened to the clean sound from the microphones, and I thought that for the price of the guitar it actually delivered a fairly good and acceptable sound.

I then started up Guitar Rig 5 and tried out some different amp's, distortions and other effects and once again I was surprised at what I heard.

For the price of the guitar and how it delivers, it is absolutely something that I would recommend for beginners and also for professionals looking for a guitar to use in a studio or equal.

How it handles on the road I cannot express myself about, but I can imagine that it will do pretty much alright.

So, as a conclusion.

Definitely a price worthy guitar that delivers a fairly good sound for the money spent.

Good work!

Nice

I can really say for that price guitar is really good,fretboard is really nice!! maybe just to put some better humbackers and you will have perfect guitar!!! :D