John Richards
December 31, 2007

Rating: 8/10

After half an hour of taking this unit out of the box, I scurried to find the discarded packaging. Nothing wrong, you understand; I just had to check the price I\'d paid for this wonderful little unit. The build quality and presentation suggest a unit costing at least twice as much.

The quality packaging contains everything you need to get going straight away - even a decent battery, which slips easily into the rear compartment via a clip-on cover - so no need to go hunting for a screwdriver, bowie knife or whatever else you wouldn\'t want to find yourself fumbling around for in the dark.

The unit is compact (118 x 63 x 24.5 mm) and made of a rugged feeling black plastic. So it would be safe at home in either your pocket or guitar bag without taking up the space you need for spare strings, plucks etc. For such a small box, it feels reasuringly heavy (130g)in the hand - further testiment to its likely long-term durability.

The layout is simple but thoroughly functional. The power switch is safely recessed on the right hand side of the device, adjacent to 1/4\" jack input and outputs.

The front is neatly arranged with a backlit lcd screen in the centre with crisp, clear graphics. My only critism is that this display is really very small - though thats the price you have to pay for such a compact unit. All is not lost; in compensation beneath the display are three bright LED\'s which aid visibility whilst tuning if you have the unit some distance away from you.Two are yellow, respectively indicating flat (undertuned) and sharp (overtuning) conditions, with a central green LED confirming when you\'ve got it spot on. Beneath these are three control buttons marked MODE, PITCH and NOTE.

A nice touch, is that the condenser microphone is situated on the front panel. This makes it a lot easier when tuning acoustic guitars as the unit can be placed directly in front, within line of sight, thus ensuring optimum usability for the guitarist and ensuring a decent signal is picked up from the guitar, thereby elliminating the spurious noises that are often detected when the microphones are situated on the side of such devices.

The device is really easy to use and operation is almost self explanatory. However, for the novice detailed and nicely illustrated instructions are included. The unit offers both manula and auto modes of input.

In AUTO mode, switching on defaults to a standard pitch of A4 = 440HZ. This may easily be varried in 12 stages from 435 to 446 Hz by toggling the PITCH switch. In Auto mode, the unit automatically detects the string being played, so all you have to do is play one string at a time and keep an eye on the LEDs/LCD display as you make adjustments. For use with electric guitars, the unit can be left in-line whilst playing. However, Yamaha recommend that the device be turned off in order to minimise noise. In reality, this is only likely to be a problem at high volumes through powerfull PAs, or when direct injecting to a mixer in the studio.

In MANUAL mode, the device is again easy to use, and requires only that you first select the appropriate note by toggling the note button. Job done - pop it in your pocket, safely away from the lumbering feet of your front-man.

In conclusion, this is a neat little unit for use by the novice or semi-pro. It\'s compact, durable and nicely priced. It was consistently easy to use, giving accurate results. The device covers eight octaves and, useful for beginners, notes are displayed in the order as your gear. The only foible was the slightly small LCD display but, in practice this will not be an issue. Snap one up whilst you can.