Buying an EverTune Guitar and Initial Reactions

13 Jan 2026

The Itch

I have been making an effort to play guitar more and with that working on writing and eventually recording more music. My current guitar is a Comsic Blue Ibanez RG1527. It is a fantastic guitar and really more than enough guitar for me. But... the floating Floyd Rose style bridge is tiresome. I have never really used the tremolo bar; maybe every once in a while I put it on and mess around a bit and then take it off for another year or so. That means every time I tune the guitar, change strings, fix intonation issues, or even strike the strings too hard pulling things momentarily out of tune I am paying a heavy floating bridge tax with little benefit.

I had the EverTune seed planted in my brain years ago from watching Ola Englund and seeing them in his Solar Guitars. With increased playing and the desire to record some tracks, that seed began to sprout and one evening I began to start looking at what was available with an EverTune.

Shopping

Buying new guitars is not something I do often; it turns out I do it about once a decade. My first seven string, an RG7420, was purchased in 2001. The RG1527 was bought used in 2013. It is now 2026. I am also quite cautious with what I spend so I was really looking to get into EverTune as cheaply as possible while still getting a decent quality guitar. Somewhere around $1000 for a used model felt right.

I did not find too many used models that were compelling. I also looked at new and realized there really are not that many options for seven strings with EverTune, especially in the $1000-1500 range. At the time I was searching, Solar had a high shipping/tariff/customs fee that ruled them out (that seems to be gone now, leaving me to wonder if I hallucinated the whole thing). While searching, I started to notice that many of the models available are 26.5" or 27" scale length. I am used to the 25.5" scale length that Ibanez uses on most of their sevens and I was nervous about switching without some hands on experience and pickings were slim at my local Guitar Center. That further limited my options, although maybe unnecessarily so.

Eventually, I stumbled upon a new B-Stock LTD MH-1007 EverTune on Reverb. ESP calls B-Stock "Player Grade", i.e. guitars with some small cosmetic imperfection. Besides the MH, there were also B-Stock Eclipse and Arrow models available. I had originally counted LTD out because the current models with EverTune are all baritone 27" scale length but the B-Stock models I was seeing were older iterations that still had 25.5". Part of me really wanted to pull the trigger on an Arrow as I have always desired a Randy Rhoads style asymmetric V. At the end of the day, the MH was less expensive and more practical for tracking and playing while sat at the computer.

Impressions

The guitar looks great to me even though there must be some imperfection somewhere. Playing-wise, I felt immediately at home with it. The neck has a similar profile to the Ibanez but is has a gloss finish which is a divergence from the satin finish on the Ibanez. I do not mind too much; maybe I would care more if I was spending time being sweaty on a stage. The balance of the guitar is great and it sits nicely on my lap without wanting to dive. Under my palm, the EverTune bridge does not feel too dissimilar to the low profile bridge on my Ibanez. The action out of the box was good and I did not feel the need to change it.

The initial EverTune setup had the tension in the middle of zone 2 which meant that even huge bends resulted in no pitch change. It really is quite odd to be able to crank on the strings had have nearly no perceivable pitch change. In that regard, EverTune works really great. I immediately appreciated that I could strike chords naturally and not pull things momentarily out of tune. There were certain passages in songs I was working on where I was consciously striking chords gently on my Ibanez because I could hear them flutter out of tune; no longer a problem. The guitar also has much less ringing from springs. I have foam dampening the tremolo springs on my Ibanez but they still ring.

I need to be able to bend which meant I needed to add tension until I could do so. This primarily means cranking on the tuning pegs until you hear the pitch go up and then backing off about 1/8 to 1/4 turn. It is easy to get to that point and bending then feels pretty natural. However, this is also where some of the EverTune magic starts to wear off. When you adjust tension with the tuners, the bridge compensates and you can see the saddle moving as you make changes (or even as you bend). If you have ever set the intonation on a guitar before, you know that it is done by moving the saddles forward or back to change the length of the string. Thus on an EverTune guitar, the bridge's tension compensation changes the intonation. While the strings are still in tune, the intonation is now wrong, which means pulling out the tool kit and getting to work.

Setting the intonation on the string is still tedious, just as it is on most guitars. Every time you adjust the intonation screw at the bridge you have to then adjust the tension with the tuning peg to get back to the back to your desired point in zone 2. At least the string can remain in tension while you are adjusting the bridge; that is a lot better than the situation with a floating tremolo.

Once you have everything all set up and put away your guitar and come back a few days later, the strings are still in tune, but it is likely that the intonation is now off (e.g. due to environmental changes). The tension also will not be in the same place, adjusting with the tuning pegs will usually bring you back to the same tension and intonation. All this make sense when you think about it: with EverTune you are making a trade-off between static tuning and dynamic intonation while most guitars more dynamic tuning but intonation is largely static. It is not a bad trade-off as tuning issues are often more noticeable. But, if you were expecting "set and forget" perfection across the board, you may be a bit disappointed.

For me, I have chosen to ignore intonation when I am just practicing and it is certainly nice to pull out my guitar when I have a few minutes and not need to worry about tuning. When I prepare for recording, I will make sure to set the intonation and periodically check it.

To sum it all up: