Glad to see some discussion on the hybrid guitars. Like JQ, I've been on the search for the best hybrid. I also totally agree with his assessment of the Taylor T-5. It would be the perfect guitar if only it sounded better, but no cigar IMO. I really wanted a Gibson Chet Atkins SST, but found it too hard and expensive to obtain, so I've all but ruled it out.
Although I haven't seen them mentioned and have yet to see one in the stores, I would like to try one of the Fender Stratacoustic/Teleacoustic deluxe's. I tried one of the new 2009 Standard Stracoustic's the other day and they're as Fender claims "much improved". As a matter of fact, I'll probably pick one up just because they offer so much bang for the buck. I was able to dial in a nice acoustic tone with little effort and even unplugged it sounded decent with an ovation type of sound. Played like a Strat.
The best I've tried so far was easily the Godin Multiac Spectrum. I really want one of these. They're out of my price range at the moment, but are currently my holy grail of hybrids. Next best thing was the Godin A6 Ultra, which is also much improved over the previous A6 IMO and I bought one of these. The neck is a little thin and flat for my taste, but I'm getting used to it.
I noticed the recommended strings on the various model differ substantially, i.e. some acoustic, some electric, different gages. I'm curious what strings you guys have found to work best? Godin recommends pure nickel 10's for my A6 Ultra, but I put on a set of D'Addario EXP-10 acoustics and like them better. The Piezo tends to get a bit snappy and IMO a wound 3rd seems to help. What are your thoughts?
I also agree with JQ's statement about the requirement for two outputs. I run my A6 through a Nova delay with stereo output. I run the electric output (HB) into my JC-77 (beautiful chorus) and the acoustic (Piezo) into my Yamaha Stage-pass-300 PA. I also take the stereo outputs of the JC-77 and run them into two channels of my PA as well. Full stereo delay and chorus with the ability to adjust the volume and EQ for both guitar PU's.
My little room sounds like a concert hall.
