David Ball
I had a good experience with a Donner electric guitar before and I wanted to also pick up an acoustic guitar to go along with learning a new hobby during lockdown. This guitar came decently packed, strings protected in foam, and arrived in good condition. Right out of the box and after tuning, the guitar sounded really great with sounds that are full and bright. It also stays in tune during a play session and only need small adjustments after a few days. The frets are not sharp and running my hand up and down the neck felt very smooth. The body has a nice glossy finish all around and while I don't have any other guitars to compare to, it certainly does not disappoint.
The included accessories are complete and give you everything you need to get started (clip on tuner, strap, capo, extra strings, picks, truss rod adjuster, pick guard, and tuning peg winder), no need to go out and get anything else except maybe a stand. It is nice that a tuning peg winder is included, it wasn't with my electric guitar and it really comes in handy. I didn't use the pick guard because its a sticker and I thought the guitar looked great without it. The gig bag is very high quality and it has space for all your accessories.
There are few spots around the guitar where there is some excess glue and make sure you take out the oxygen absorber packet which is inside the guitar body or it will rattle around and dampen the sound.
Combined with taking lessons on Fender Play, I have been making small but meaningful progress within a week and I look forward to spending more time with this guitar.
Overall, for the price with all the included accessories, it is an amazing deal and the guitar itself doesn’t sound or feel cheap at all.
I included a video with how it sounds, I have very little knowledge on how to play so please excuse my lack of skill.
patrick collins
I wanted to have a guitar since a long time and this is the first one I got. I would say, it's great for beginners from tuning easily with provided accessories to playing. It's all in all a great package. I recommend buying it.
Alex Evans
The strap, picks, bag, tuner, string winder, and truss rod wrench are pretty basic, but they work.
Olivia Doig
This is an awesome guitar for the price. It looks great, has a full and resonant tone, and rich lows and highs. The guitar itself came with a padded gig bag, picks, a chromatic tuner, a strap, and Allan wrench, an extra set of strings, and a couple other accessories. Out of the box there were no problems with the guitar and it played fine. There were no problems in the finish as far as I could see. The only downside is that the guitar is not acoustic electric, so you are not able to plug it in directly to an amp or audio interface. Overall, though, it’s a great guitar.
Vaughan Clark
Very impressed with this guitar! Beginner player but feel like I have a guitar any level player would be happy with. At this price point, you may not expect much but it’s very impressive. Great finish, no fret buzz, quality craftsmanship, no rough fret ends, and more. Playable (with a quick tuning) right out of the box. Showed it to an experienced player and he was equally impressed. And all the extras! I would expect to pay more for just the guitar but they go ahead and throw in a gig bag, picks, tuner, capo, extra strings, truss rod tool, string winder, strap, and cleaning cloth!
Catherine Sherry
I am a huge Donner fan and have yet to be disappointed in the slightest. This guitar is outstanding and you won’t find anything close to this quality for the price.
To start, the finish on the guitar was impeccable. I could not find any imperfections at all. The tuners are also much better than I expected. They are all very solid and smooth turning. I was very impressed with the bone nut and bridge as I would never expect that on a guitar under £200.
The accessories with the guitar were also excellent. The included gig bag is the best I have seen come with a guitar. The fabric and zippers are of amazing quality. The only way it would be better is if it were a hard case. The guitar also comes with a nice capo, picks, a tuner, a nice Allen wrench for adjusting the truss rod, an extra set of strings, and a pretty decent strap.
The guitar overall is very satisfying to play and has a wonderful sound. I attached a short video of a country riff. It’s very comfortable to go up and down the neck. You will not find a better guitar for the price.
Maria Delaney
This beautiful Donner acoustic guitar in full size was simply a perfect first acoustic guitar for my son. He is taking lessons and we wanted a nice new one but did not want to spend a fortune, make sure that he would keep it up. This is a 41" dreadnought guitar bundle. So, it comes with all the goodies, gig bag, tuner, picks strap string
This beautifully crafted guitar is solid Sitka spruce on the top with laminated mahogany back & sides. The slim neck provides a very comfortable feel for his smaller hands and excellent playability according to his instructor. The smooth satin finish maximizes resonance for optimal sound quality and it also looks great.
Has all of the perfect sounds or what our teacher tells us the right frequency, in low, full and mid-frequency both great for beginners enthusiasts. With the gloss finish my son was very happy when he pulled this acoustic guitar out and it came with so many features. No need to get any other add ons at first this is ready to go right out of the nicely packaged box.
donna Barnes
I had been toying with the idea of learning to play the guitar for quite some time and recently I finally made up my mind to do something about it.
Once that was decided, I realized I would need a guitar. Now, even though I had never played, I was familiar with the prominent guitar makers, (Fender, Gibson, Martin, Taylor, etc) and knew I couldn’t justify spending that kind of money on a first guitar. What if I decided I didn’t like it? Or even more probable, what if I was terrible?
I asked a good friend who has been playing for over 50 years, what I should look for in a first guitar and armed with that information, I went shopping. I set a price limit between $150-$175.00. I went to eBay, pawnshops, consignment shops, antique shops, a music store & Amazon. What I found was, if it was what I wanted it was over my limit and if it was in my range, it was junk. Until I came across Donner on Amazon.
The Dreadnought Acoustic had the features and construction I was looking for, an accessory package, a great price and it was new, not pre-owned.
I placed my order and told my friend. He hadn’t heard of Donner and told me he looked the guitar up on Amazon, and it “sounded” like a good deal on “paper” but he was reserving judgment until he could see what I had.
When the guitar arrived I went to his house to get his evaluation. The first thing we both commented on was how nice it looked. The construction and finish details were impressive. Then he “fine tuned” my initial tuning, and proceeded to put it through its paces with several of his favorite riffs.
All in all, he was quite impressed and compared it to one of his guitars that cost twice as much. He said that “it’s easily a great beginner/intermediate level guitar and that the accessories are gravy.”
Now, if I can just learn how to play it well.
Tracey Jones
The main question people want to know: quality or crap? My answer: surprisingly great quality!
The Donner DAD-812C is a durable acoustic that sounds and plays really great. Is it a toy? No. Is it a professional instrument? Not quite. Professionals would absolutely feel comfortable jamming on the Donner DAD-812C Acoustic Guitar, but you wouldn't use one in a recording studio to make a professional album.
About a month prior to writing this review, my 2.5 year old knocked my old Epiphone acoustic over and busted the headstock. Rather than pay a luthier to fix it for the 3rd time, I decided to buy a new acoustic for use around the campfire, etc. For that, the Donner DAD-812C does the job nicely. To use a car anology, this guitar isn't a BMW, it's a Toyota Corolla. You can drive it til the wheels fall off. It's built really well, and will last a long time.
25 years ago, buying a musical instrument from Asian countries was an entirely different experience. Back then, Asian guitar manufacturers were still learning, and industrialization and globalization hadn't taken full root in those countries. Today, some of my best instruments come from Asian and SE Asian countries. They are both competing with and collarerating with North American and European companies to make instruments.
The Donner DAD-812C Acoustic Guitar + Accessories is a great deal for the money. First, the guitar is absolutely worth a couple hundred dollars all by itself. But we really can't overlook the fact that Donner threw in all those helpful accessories too! A tuner, a gig bag, a pretty nice guitar strap, extra strings, etc. They even printed a chord chart and a string action ruler on the tag attached to the headstock by a string. Seriously? What a great deal!
David B.
Package arrived on time but box was damaged and I feared the worst. Luckily everything was intact inside. Being a 73 year old beginner I don't know about sound quality but to me it looks and sounds good apart from high e plays the same note on frets 8 and 9 but not too important at my stage of learning.
Derek Arnold
beautiful guitar. beautiful wood grains. beautiful finishs. two things i did was to file down sharp frets and replace with a lighter string set (Earthwood extra light) and now it sounds better too. best money spent
Mrs T Brewer
Great guitar for the money. The guitar came in with wood feeling a bit dry especially on the fretboard. The truss rod in the neck needed adjustment since the action felt very high due to cold weather. After adjustment using included wrench, the neck feels much better to play. Overall construction felt pretty decent and looks great. Solid top with bone nut and bridge sounded great. Laminated AAA mahogany sides and back looks great and sounds great. Glad I paid a bit extra for a solid top. I'll need to find a non obtrusive option to add pick up but for now, the guitar sounded great recorded acoustically. One thing that is knocks a point off for this guitar is that the fret corners at the end of each of them felt sharp. It is important to note that the neck has binding so there should never be any fret sprouting off the sides of the neck. However, the corners at each of fret ends are still sharp. I'll have to do some work at rounding off those sharp corners. Other than that, the guitar is essentially gig ready out of the box with few adjustments.
Don Ruttle
I like the solid sound of the guitar. The workmanship of the guitar body including the varnish glossy finish. Wood used are thick. The only negative complaint I can share is the fret metal strip ends are sharp which may harm your hands everytime you slide your hands up or down. Also, I need to tune the guitar almost every week. I'm not sure until when will I experience this. Maybe until it's new. Hope it will stabilize after frequent use of this guitar. Without those sharp fret metal ends, overall it's a nice guitar. Requested for a replacement. Hope the next one will be better.
Phillip Beacock
I love the guitar! The sound and feel is awesome
Ron Leonard
Looks just like the picture. Beautifully built great quality
Atlanta Williamson
Love the guitar, sounds wonderful
James Bentley
My boyfriend loved it!
Christine MacEachern
Nice guitar for price had to do setup plays nice now
Tony Read
Ordered it as a gift and was very happy with the quality of the product and what was included with it.
Mike Jones
The Donner DAD-812C Solid Top Acoustic Guitar is a very attractive guitar with looks and sound of a much more expensive guitar. The guitar is perfect for a beginning guitarist but is very adequate for an experienced guitarist. It comes with a nice capo, an extra set of strings, a very fancy wooden handled truss rod wrench, a very usable black fabric strap, a set of picks, a very workable small tuner, a polishing cloth and even a pickguard which can be added later if needed. I have not added the pickguard because I like the looks as delivered. It also has a cutaway that I will never take advantage of because of my playing style, but I find very attractive, nevertheless. The guitar tuner is small and light and can be left on the headstock. It is as accurate as guitar tuners costing over ￡20 dollars and is as usable as several the onboard tuners on much more expensive guitars. The guitar is easy to tune and stays tuned when played. I am a fingerstyle player, so I do not stress the strings as much as a heavy strummer would. The gig bag does not provide cushioning or the protection of a solid guitar case, but it is well built and is extremely attractive with solid zippers and a pocket for storing the capo, strings, string winder, and other miscellanea. The guitar comes with adequate string height or action, but I used the truss rod adjustment tool to lower it because I like lower action on my guitars. I also switched out the strings for lighter strings that I like better. The finish on the guitar is nice and shiny with no sloppiness or flaws that I could detect. It is at least as attractive as guitars many times the cost of this one. The reason it is a great beginner’s guitar is that it comes with all the above paraphernalia that one eventually buys and has a low price point, but it is very workable and adequate for a more experienced guitarist as well.
Roberta Papa
The media could not be loaded. I bought one of the Donner DAD-412C guitars and three days later bought another while it was on sale. The first guitar had a mismatched not bookmatched top and the bridge was lifting up(I could slide a piece of typing paper under the bottom of the bridge up to the bridge pins which is about 1/2". When the second guitar arrived, it had a flat spot milled in the side of the neck from the first fret to the 10th. It looked like when it was made, a belt sander had gotten stuck while sanding it. It also had a great many bumps on it from unfilled large wood grain, forming pits about 1mm deep all along the neck. So it was unusable. I put in a replacement request and the replacement guitar had the same lifting up bridge as the first but perhaps a bit worse as it was clearly not glued on even down to the bridge pins. On both guitars I didn't remove the bridge pins and as the paper slid under up to them, the glue line could have been even higher on the bridges making them less than half glued on. I doubt either guitar will last more than a few months with full string tension on the semi-glued bridges. They came with the strings slack. Having a guitar tech put the bridge back on properly costs more than the price of the guitar. The bracing is advertised as scalloped but it is not. It is just plain straight non-scalloped bracing. Three defective guitars out of three is really bad odds. None of the guitars had an inspectors sticker or certificate to show they had passed quality inspection. Two of the boxes they came in were damaged in shipping but the gig bag had protected the guitars. I have uploaded a video showing some of the issues. I have contacted Donner directly sent them a video showing the defects, and will amend this review when and if they resolve it. I really just want two good guitars.
Lorraine Stevens
This guitar is beautiful and sounds really good
Michelle Weston
This guitar is definitely worth the price, great full sound ,delivered in perfect shape and no set up was necessary. Highly recommend this product
Holly Armour
This is a great guitar. It isn't too heavy, the strings are nice and tight and does not loosen after tuning or playing. The sound is perfect and easy to strum. This guitar is jumbo sized and produces the sound with good bass. It is the perfect guitar. Over all I am impressed with this guitar i would recommend this for any kind of player if you are looking for a nice sounding acoustic to play for cheap. The capo with this guitar is above average quality. But the tuner that came with this guitar does not work very well, but thats not a big deal as there are many smart phone tuner apps are available.
Lindsey Grainger
This was a great quality product for a great price.
David Bowie
Great sound easy to play. The solid top really helps this project Great note separating and works well for finger style or flat picking.
Mr D Whale
As I beginner I didn’t want to spend too much on my first guitar, so I bought this one. It was ok at first, but I soon began to experience problems. I’ve just been told by an expert that the arm has warped and the guitar is unrepairable. This has happened because of the low grade of wood used. He also remarked that the frets are unfinished at the ends, making it painful to play certain chords. The tone was fine at first, but the warping of the arm causes a lot of fret buzzing and the bottom E string produces no resonating sound, just a click noise. Very disappointed.
Alain
I wanted an inexpensive guitar to get back into learning to play. Having bone nut and bridge as well as a solid top are some of the features that I wanted. This guitar does not disappoint. Perfectly finished, no sharp edges on the frets, action is perfect as far as recommendations go! Stays in tune very well after initial string stretch of a few days.
Great sound. The strings might need an upgrade but for learning they are more than fine. I"m quite impressed with this guitar. Case is nice too. Tuner works perfectly. For anyone looking at a guitar , I'd also recommend a guitar stand too. When you are learning having the guitar ready to go quickly will make it easy to grab it and play. If you have to always take it out of the case to practice, you won't do it as often!
Dutchess
I've been playing the guitar for over 30 years. I have had Gibsons, Martins and Arias. I was a bit skeptical about buying this instrument because I've never had that brand. Plus it was advertised as an "adult beginner guitar". Well, let me tell you: this is a fabulously well made, super sounding guitar. This may end up being my favorite of all! It was well packaged in box, and gig bag. Strings were wrapped in foam. The action on this guitar is perfect! (meaning, the strings are super close to the neck and it takes almost no pressure to play the strings). The sound is rich, just as rich, if not better than my other instruments. Do not hesitate to buy this guitar, whether you are a beginner or a pro, like me.
John Paul S.
Great choice!
Ruben S.
I am a huge Donner fan and have yet to be disappointed in the slightest. This guitar is outstanding and you won’t find anything close to this quality for the price.
To start, the finish on the guitar was impeccable. I could not find any imperfections at all. The tuners are also much better than I expected. They are all very solid and smooth turning. I was very impressed with the bone nut and bridge as I would never expect that on a guitar under $200.
The accessories with the guitar were also excellent. The included gig bag is the best I have seen come with a guitar. The fabric and zippers are of amazing quality. The only way it would be better is if it were a hard case. The guitar also comes with a nice capo, picks, a tuner, a nice Allen wrench for adjusting the truss rod, an extra set of strings, and a pretty decent strap.
Justin
I have been looking at a acoustic guitar to practice with. Found out about Donner from other reviews.
The guitar arrived quick, I didn’t expect the case to also be a backpack style so that was a nice bonus. Speaking of bonus all the extras they include are great to start with. The guitar came pre strung and in the accessories kit there was a second set of stings, some tools, picks, strap, and the best little guitar tuner I have owned.
You can tune a variety of guitars and when you are in tune, the screen changes from blue to green!
The guitar has a great color I really like the rich look of the back and neck. The hardware on the guitar is solid as well. Be aware of the dry pack that is in the hallowed body of the guitar and remove it before you play.
After a few sessions with the guitar it plays nice, action on the frets is easy and the neck size works great for me. I would recommend this guitar to anyone that is looking for a great gift or for themselves.
Really looking forward to seeing what else Donner has in their lineup.
Kelly
The Donner DAD-812C Solid Top Acoustic Guitar is a very attractive guitar with looks and sound of a much more expensive guitar. The guitar is perfect for a beginning guitarist but is very adequate for an experienced guitarist. It comes with a nice capo, an extra set of strings, a very fancy wooden handled truss rod wrench, a very usable black fabric strap, a set of picks, a very workable small tuner, a polishing cloth and even a pickguard which can be added later if needed. I have not added the pickguard because I like the looks as delivered. It also has a cutaway that I will never take advantage of because of my playing style, but I find very attractive, nevertheless.
The guitar tuner is small and light and can be left on the headstock. It is as accurate as guitar tuners costing over $20 dollars and is as usable as several the onboard tuners on much more expensive guitars. The guitar is easy to tune and stays tuned when played. I am a fingerstyle player, so I do not stress the strings as much as a heavy strummer would.
The gig bag does not provide cushioning or the protection of a solid guitar case, but it is well built and is extremely attractive with solid zippers and a pocket for storing the capo, strings, string winder, and other miscellanea.
The guitar comes with adequate string height or action, but I used the truss rod adjustment tool to lower it because I like lower action on my guitars. I also switched out the strings for lighter strings that I like better.
The finish on the guitar is nice and shiny with no sloppiness or flaws that I could detect. It is at least as attractive as guitars many times the cost of this one.
The reason it is a great beginner’s guitar is that it comes with all the above paraphernalia that one eventually buys and has a low price point, but it is very workable and adequate for a more experienced guitarist as well.
Damon S.
It plays well and stays in tune, it's a great guitar for a beginner. It comes with a great range of accessories.
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Dépistage prudent du bois, puis laissez-les exposer à l'air et à sec naturellement pendant trois ans. Enfin, le matériel inutile devrait être éliminé. Et faire correspondre le matériau de filtrage et les envoyer à la salle sèche et humide, pour les traiter artificiellement. Assurez-vous que le sec et l'humidité d'environ 5 degrés alors la production de guitare acoustique peut commencer. 
