Harley Benton TE 20 VS Fender Player Telecaster - Worth 8x the money?
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- Опубліковано 25 сер 2024
- Let's compare the sounds of the affordable Harley Benton TE 20 vs the Fender Player series Telecaster. Is it really worth 8 times the price? Is there an advantage to playing a budget guitar?
You can find the guitar here - www.thomann.de...
#harleybenton #harleybentonte20 #fenderplayertelecaster #fenderplayertele #fender
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I’m 59 and wanted to start in home recording again after 25 yrs. I knew my wife wasn’t going to let me spend the cash I wanted to too buy new fenders, Gibsons etc. So I watched many previews on Harley Benton guitars and must say I wasn’t disappointed. They need a little adjusting but for recording and all the sounds I get from different guitars at a low price, it was worth it. I ended up buying 11 guitar’s.
Wow nice!
Haha excellent story
The only difference I am hearing between those two guitars is the intonation. The fender sounds a little higher pitch. No two guitars sound the same.
11? 😂
Recently got a Fender standard Telecaster. You can definately tell the difference in quality in sound compared to my Harley Benton DB Telecaster. That said, the HB is a great instrument.
Great demo. About 20 years ago, a friend of mine let me play his Gibson Les Paul. Incredible sound. However, I could not afford it. I searched and came across a Hamer Slammer Les Paul. It was nearly identical in sound and only cost me $250 brand new. I now own two Harley Bentons. I own two Donners (incredible instruments for the money). Two Ibanez guitars (great guitars). I do own a Taylor acoustic. I got that on sale for $700. I am primarily an acoustic guitarist. I also own a Glarry strat which is my knock around practice guitar. The Glarry strat is far better than my first electric guitar (which was a knock of strat) I bought in 1970. The cheaper guitars have gotten better since then.
Fender has more treble in the tone for sure. If anything I’m not liking the harshness in the high end on the fender. The Harley Benton is holding up well though!
Thanks J 😊
Good demo... Clearly the Fender has a more crisp and clear glassy sound when played clean, but as soon as you ad dirt, the differences dissipate. I own 2 HB's myself amongst my other high end guitars and I find myself playing the HB more these days. They are just plain fun
Thanks... cheers!!
@Pocket Ryder
ME TOO, MY FRIEND!!! I'm Blessed To Have An Fender American Standard 50th Anniversary Stratocaster That I purchased In 20O4, Which I LOVE & APPRECIATE! I Also Have 2 Harley Benton Strats That I Purchased In 2020 That I Play MORE Than My FENDER!!! 😝 Again I Was Blessed Because Whoever Put Those 2 Harleys Together (A Vintage White ST20 & A Swamp Ash DLX) Put Their Heart Into It!!!! I Almost Cried How Well Both Played, Felt, Sounded & Looked STRAIGHT OUT THE BOX!!!!! The Vintage ST I Got Setup Just To See If There Was A Better Difference ...... NOPE! The Swamp Ash DLX, I Refuse To Have ANYONE TOUCH For Fear Of Jinxing The AWESOMENESS If It!!! I Once Thought Of Having It Custom Painted, But ....... NAW, THAT'S ALRIGHT!!! Be Well, My Friend!!! 👍
OOPS!
P.S. I Have That Exact Butterscotch Player Telecaster That I Bought For My Birthday 2021 🎸🎶🎶🎶🎶
Change the pickups. You'll be surprised what these guitars are capable of.
@@EbonyPopeand the caps on the tone / volume knobs I hear that helps hem sound cleaner
One thing of note to add, the HB has cheapo ceramic pickups, about the same level as a cheap Squier.
Better comparison would've been a HB with alnico's.
Great video! I think the Harley Benton sounds a bit thin, but if you consider the low price compared to the Modern Fender, you could for les money purchase a couple of Fender pick ups, and I think you will get a great sound in the Harley Benton, maybe even better than the Modern thing! Do you agree?
I'd go for the HB primarily because of the price ,to my ears the Fender wasn't 8 times better sound wise. The Fender did sustain its notes a bit longer but other than that there wasn't a justification to spend 8 times the amount of the Fender. After a guitar has been put through effects and EQ the differences will be even harder to pin down. On the clean tones the Fender definitely had something unique but weighing it all up the Harley Benton represents so much more value for money and as you say you can have more different guitars for the same money. Good video comparison Jake just subbed.
All you have to do is to invest another 200 dollars in order to get new pickups, pots, better saddles, maybe a better nut/tuners and you will basically get the same instrument for less than half the price.
What’s more important is the playability of these cheaper guitars , the build and the most important thing the neck , pickups and controls can be upgraded rather cheaply in some cases
As a beginner I would buy 1 or more HB's. In fact.... I have ! They are both excellent
Thanks for the comment! Which ones did you buy?
@@JakeLeighGuitar I have an SC-CUSTOM II P90 and HB-35PLUS in blue
I am really not good enough yet to own 2 guitars but the HB-35PLUS in blue looked so gorgeous and I liked the idea of semi acoustic. I call the HB35+ "Blucille" in honour of the late great BB King
In some sound samples the HB sounded a LOT more mature IMO (neck pickup)...and in NONE of the comps did the Fender sound EIGHT TIMES better...Good guitar building (especially electric solid body designs) isn't a mystery anymore...nearly every aspect is automated and repeatable by robotics...Basswood vs Alder is not a provable upgrade...string through design vs top load bridge is another diff so minor as to not make or break a buying decision...that HB with some really good tuners and MAYBE a better set of brass staggered saddles could easily rival many Fenders...for under $220 USD.
love the muddier neck pu of the harley benton on clean aounds
I thought the H.B.sounded fuller,but it had new better strings.I would have liked to have heard both with new strings.Ya know that makes a big difference.
The Fender was new out of the box, so it's strings were new as well. Didn't sound like it had been hanging in a music store for 10 months.
the only difference i can tell...is the price...both sounded good...i would take a chance with a Harley Benton
I recently put used Fender American Standard pickups and compensated brass saddles in my te-20. With the U.S. Harley Benton markup ($80), and the costs of the mods, it's now about 1/4 the cost of a Player Series, and worth every penny.
I'm a guitar player and collector. I guess you could say I'm sorta a guitar snob. I own Gibsons USA fenders music Man Majesty's the list goes on but after taking a chance and ordering a Harley Benton guitar all that changed . I bought the guitar Max signature guitar and I couldn't believe $444 could buy such an amazing guitar. It's actually the one in my profile photo.
I have an HB TE62 LBT, I will change the pick ups to Bootstraps since the neck is a bit muddy and the bridge is too ice picky. However, the feel and build of the guitar is excellent.
I was able to play the TE62 recently and it blew me away. What a great guitar, different league to the TE20.
@@JakeLeighGuitar The guitar is really great for the price, I even ordered some electronics from 'Six String supplies' last night so I shall hopefully have a greater guitar soon.
In all fairness, with the fender you get lasting quality/reliability. It would be great to see the higher quality Hb te62 or the fusion compared to the fender, the fender may not look so good in those comparisons. Thanks for sharing!
Exactly my thoughts... Try the Te-62 with alnicos.... or the Fusion... not the cheapest with ceramics..
@@Onlymyselfknow Exactly, I'm also thinking more along the lines of the carmelized maple neck or roasted neck guitars to rival the fenders even if you replace some parts like pups, pots & tuners.
No.. I ordered a Strat player and had to return it already 3 times it was always something broken and the quality so pure, full of damages.. I was so happy to get a fender but this get on my nerves. Always have to send it back .. my Harley benton literally has perfect quality, no damages .. the sound may be something different, but only from the quality point of view I’m very very upset with the fender player… was so happy to be able to afford one finally.. hm
All the hardware on Fender Player series guitars is made in Taiwan and Indonesia.
Did you know that?
@@christoguichard4311 yes I know, parts are good quality, the reason the player series is cheaper is because of cheaper labour, still a very good product.
For a cheap guitar the HB sounded really good but the Fender deffo had much more sustain and that trademark glassy high end. If I had a Harley Benton I'd get some MIM pickups and Graphtec nut for it.
Great review and superb playing mate
I have an American pro 2 and all the potential problems I expected from the hb occurred with my 2 grand pro 2 It’s just went back for a second time due to electrical problems, no probs with hb . Sour taste having the hastle . I put Ernie balls on the hb and it’s great no real set up needed. So no guarantees that you spend big you get satisfaction leading to a bonding experience.. The cheap guitars are now being built so well and if inclined they are a brilliant modding platform . 400 quid you could have a fantastic parts caster to meet your own bespoked tastes
I definetly prefer the neck pickup on the HB over the one on the Fender.
For chords I prefered the bridge on the Fender. But not for single notes. The HB sounded more full and spanky to me. I mostly do single notes (have actually never been a fan of the sound of guitar chords for some reason 😅), and I'm pretty happy with my own TE-20 😊
You should try the Harley Benton TE-52 or TE-62 series, its much more closer to the player series
Bought a number of HB, I have a couple of customs and I would be terrified at a questionable place to leave it out. So yeah I use my really nice ones for recording at home. The others can be replaced. So I would buy a bunch before a really nice guitar if I were a beginner, the guitars in the 80's were pretty bad, and HB makes them better than anything I had back then.
And there are better HB Teles for not much more. I have the TE-70 Black Paisley which was OK from the off but I soon did extensive set-up, changed the pickups and electronics. Thus better still. The problem I had with the stock pickups was that the neck was dark and the bridge was shrill which could be managed with the tone control somewhat but they were not a great match as a pair; I swapped them for a pair of Iron Gear Steel Foundry pickups which are individually nicer and much better matched as a pair than the stocks. Fairly inexpensive upgrade and still several times cheaper than the Fender (but the Fender is nice).
I bought HB and changed out the pups/nut and saddles.
Why do people continue to compare apples and oranges? Why the TE20 and not the 62 for a fairer comparison?
It is great that in this day and age there are so many budget friendly options available of good quality for beginner and intermediate level players. And they also make great travelers and backups for more advanced players. Go up to 500 dollars or so and you can get excellent professional level guitars these days. Higher level instruments are out of reach for many people. I have about 20 guitars and just two are higher end U.S. made guitars, but as an intermediate player who does't record or gig (I play alone and with friends and co-workers) it is great because I get so many to choose from and they are good quality even if not tons of money. Squire, Epiphone, Yamaha, Jackson, Ibanez, Harley Benton, AIO/Wolf, Firefly, and IYV all make great budget-friendly guitars. :-)
My cheap solution: HB TE-52 (mine its the old model) with cooper saddles and CV 50s pickups. The improvement worth for the money.
I' ve mounted fender noiseless pickups on the Te20 (that was good right out of the box) Now i'ts ust amazing.. 😂
The Fender guitars should be about half the price (talking about their standard series) . That company have had several years to refine and reduce their manufacturing costs. I haven't tried this tele. An advice is to buy a HB and then Fender pickups separately and install.
I ordered a Strat player and had to return it already 3 times it was always something broken and the quality so pure, full of damages.. I was so happy to get a fender but this get on my nerves. Always have to send it back .. my Harley benton literally has perfect quality, no damages .. the sound may be something different, but only from the quality point of view I’m very very upset with the fender player… was so happy to be able to afford one finally.. hm
@@pitchblvke sorry to hear that. I had a mim strat and I think that was fine qualitywise. Som ppl say that quality have decreased recent years
Waiting for mine to arrive 😊
I have owned mainly Gibson guitars in the past 74 Les Paul deluxe, 63 firebird, newer sg. Now I own a Hagstrom Viking and a Harley Benton te52. Although I wish I still had the Gibson's I love the te52.
I could notice some noise with the Harley Benton when you used the overdrive.
HB is great for the price. Its more a question of what neck radius you prefer
I think it is a queston of taste. I like the HB more. It has more bass. But I think the HB has more noise.
I'd always go for bunch of cheaper guitars, if they are good that is, which Bentons tend to be. As someone who's a beginner I only have benton guitar and for a simple reason - they are cheap. I've now teached myself how to do intonation, adjust string height, setup tremelo/bridge (?) to float and most importantly I've done full neck fretwork and it works now. Granted it took me 3 sessions and total of like 18hours which is ridiculous, but I was extra careful since I didn't want to change the frets if I filed them too much, that is something for future. While I was learning all of that I had another Benton that was working fine and I was able to practice. I want to do and learn more things however I don't have time or enough money atm lol :D So yah cheap guitars FTW.
P.S. do not buy harley benton fret rocker, long side isn't flat , i've learned hard way even tho it was in the reviews on website which I didn't read... ;( fret file is awesome tho.
I think the Fender had much better trebles, which brings out the sound of each note really well.
🧐
(However, I own about 7 or 8 Harley Bentons.)
🙄
I liked the sound of the Fender better. It was richer intones, very noticeable. Having said that, I'm really excited as I am picking up my new Harley Benton TE-80 Deluxe tomorrow in Dubai.
I agree you can make any guitar sound great. I do think the sustain is better on the Fender and I like the tone of the pickups better on the Fender as well .... but not 8 times better! Lol!
The TE 20 can't be beat for the money. It is good out of the box or a great mod guitar. I got that same one, the red is beautiful. I put a white pearl pickguard on mine, brass saddles, and Guitar Fetish vintage tele pickups and I play it a lot. I like you, have all the basic (so-called good) guitars, but I have been trying these less expensive ones for the last few years. Mainly Harley Benton and Firefly and I have been shocked at how good they can be. If there is something like the pickups or switches you don't like you just change them. Nice demo and good info!
Dial in the pickup height of the HB, swap the nut for TuSQ and the pots for quality pots and you'll beat the 7ender
I have a HB TE90 that I just can't get attached to. I can't get a sound that I would use. But listening to you with your comparo, I didn't like the Fender either. But in all honesty, I think a lot of it is me. I have a HB fusion with the Floyd that I wouldn't sell for any amount (but has Seymore Duncans swapped in).
Great review...the new cheap kid on the block, Donner, is great reviews on their Telecaster.
The Harley Benton is definitely a worthwhile great instrument. Especially for the money. Make no mistake it’s the little things and an American made strat or tele is a Cadillac. You’ll know it as soon as you pick one up. I have both.
I was going to get a harley benton but got the player telecaster instead. Its second hand for £400. For that price i would always regretted it if i didnt get it. Nothing wrong with harley bentons though. I would of just spent more money upgrading it.
The feeling of the neck is what matters the most and the sound comes from your fingers. On stage EQ and the amp matters.
As a pro for half a century now I’ve owned numerous top end guitars, but the HB’s match up.
I use three HB’s: TE-52 with Wilkinson pups on tour, TE-52 with Roswell pups at the studio sessions and a TE-20 at home.
No mods needed, just a good set up and keep in mind every instrument in every price range has to be maintained on a daily base.
The TE-20 is fun and although the TE-52’s are heavy as hell, those chunky, glossy Fifties necks are heavenly.
Just get an HB, bond with it, keep practicing technically and you’ll have a companion for years to follow.
Sound advice.
Fender sounds better, obviously, but benton sound very descent too.
And i know that Harley Benton has Good guitars, if you dont get one with flaws.
And these are very customizable also. 🙂
I would prefer ,overall, the Harley Benton, crazy? I have a Fender tele special, a Fender Blackie, and i cant fault the Blackie specially, but, the Tele? I am rather taken aback. I will sell my Fender tele , now and just get a couple of upgraded pups. Slightly mod it. Also, i can buy another Harley Benton amp too.. :) And i do not work for Harley Benton ...
Thanks Jake :)
Going on sound alone, the fender sounded better. Id say the HB would be ideal for someone just starting, or as a backup. A guitar the price of the HB would be ideal for modding also. New pickups, locking tuners....... could end up with a guitar of much better quality than what you started out with, and it would give you practice doing such stuff without worrying you were going to break your prized possession.
In my opinion the Harley Benton sounds clean much better than the fender. The HB has more lowend. The Fender sounds a little bit cold. Crunch and Distortion is better by Fender. I would prefer the HB.
Harley Benton TE 20 does not have a 9 1/2" radius (0:20sec) it is 12" radius.
I just got one of each. Well se
The Harley Benton also has a flatter radius of approx 13,78”
This is their biggest problem. You could bolt on a different neck but kind of a lot of trouble.
I've just played a Fender Player Nashville Tele, the one with 3 noiseless p-ups that they've just released. The guitar sounded good, but it had the most horrible electronics I have ever touched. I have owned several super cheap Harley Bentons, even the old ones that were not nearly as good as the ones they build today. I have never touched such cheap feeling pots and switch like the ones on this Fender, they were practically unusable and needed replacement. I expect more from a 900$ guitar. I own a te-30 and a te-52 from Harley Benton. Both fanstastic guitars, the te52 already sounds awesome, and all I did to the TE-30 was to change the p-ups with Fender Yosemites and...guess what? Now it sounds like a Fender that I paid 200$ for(including upgrades). Plus, it feels better, plays better and the high notes don't fret out like they do on Fenders.
Se ve que tu canal tiene muy buen contenido pero sería agradable que pusieras subtitulos en español ya que imagino que tendrás seguidores de la comunidad hispana que quiere aprender de tu contenido, un saludo, gracias 😊
Pienso igual
I have 2 Fenders, an Ibanez, and 4 Harley Bentons. Tell ya anything?
All except one Fender and the Ibanez are telecaster style guitars.
I suspect a pickup swap and maybe some nicer hardware would get that Harley Benton sounding more like the Fender. Plus you could do all that and more for much less than the price of the Fender.
What can you say about how they felt playing on, how do they keep the tuning and are they both well adjusted out of the box? I’m considering a HB as a practice guitar at home, but dont want a guitar that goes to much out of tune and has to cost a lot of money to get adjusted.
The HB stood up very well to the Fender so I'm in the, buy a range of HBs and have more fun for your cash. I have a Rolex Daytona but do the same with watches, and to a lesser extent with cigars. Just enjoy yourself.
Fender has much more clarity and is better, but if You get some decent pickups (Tone Riders are 75$ set and are way better then HBs) and pay for setup for Benton, You still are at least 3 times below Fender price...
Trying to find if its worth it in just the sound is a joke. That is the pinnacle of personal preference and these days even the cheapest guitars sound good.
Anyone can say a sound is too muddy/icepicky depends if they want to like the sound cause they like the brand.
Fender's player line are great.
If you can do a basic setup or know someone who can, its hard to beat HB for a starter at this price, period. I like the sounds except for the Bridge clean and the Neck Lead on the HB. The rest of the the tones, I felt, held up. I do prefer a “darker” neck single, though, for the cleans. Do a search for a HB SC beautiful flamed maple top and get it for less than $400, come on? The middle price Donner’s are getting surprisingly good as well. I feel with a neck and fret dress, maybe some Seymour Tele pickups, (the bridge rails scream if your into that), some hardware updates and you have as good or better guitar for less than half the price. As you progress so can your guitar which will be real familiar to you at that point. The only difference is bragging rights of the headstock print. If you are inspired and your music can do the talking, then it wouldn’t make much of a difference to me then anyway. Fender seems to be trying to step up but I guess Gibson is happy with their Epiphones. I think this could be a healthy push for Fender and Gibson to do better for the prices they are charging for a headstock. I would have loved to have these types of guitars to grow with when I started. Hell, Eddie seemed to do fine with his strat body “Frankenstein”. Imagine what he could do with these? RIP Eddie.
What I'd say is, the TE-20 is the bottom of the range Harley Benton tele, if you'd demo'd the TE-52 with it's ash body and better pickups this would've been a different video, and whilst it's twice the price of the TE-20 it's still only around £133
Bit of a stretch comparing the Fender Player to the TE-20 which is like £68, you're talking about a guitar that is to the Harley Benton range more like the Squier Bullet is to the Fender stable
Even the TE-52 is still around the middle of the range Harley Bentons, I have a TE-90 which are around £180 and that's an insanely good guitar at that price, I've seen and had much more expensive guitars that aren't really any better, maybe try a TE-90 against the Player in a future video, you can still get four or five of those for the price of a Fender Player
An interesting comparison could be a Harley Benton with the same pickups against the Player as there's certainly room in the price difference for a pickup upgrade even at what it'd cost to get a shop/luthier to change them
Kind of a large majority of Harley Davidson riders. They get locked into the mindset if it ain't Harley Davidson, it ain't shit! ( They are missing out)
Nice playing. I think you can make any guitar sound good 👍
What a nice comment, thank you so much! You’ve made my day 😊👍
also what strings are on them? same or the stockers? the harley isn't coming with any NYXLs or anything so
HB is a bit thin, but my boss Katana clears that up easily.
Fender sounds almost always better. However not 8x better. Big brand prices are simply just not justified. Should cost half of it.
To answer your question: A bunch of cheap guitars for me, thanks :)
The Fender has a more distinct tone, as if the notes are better separated. However, if you are playing the HB, and concentrating on the music, you are not going to be thinking 'I wish this was a Fender'. The Fender is not 8 times better, and you can get great music out of this guitar.
For the money the HB is a great buy, from every angle, you can't go wrong. If you like the guitar, you can replace the pickups, one day.
Harley benton as a much better over all sound a lot less tin to it. Unless I was in a heavy metal band and even then maybe not.
At the price difference Id go for the HB all day every day...takes a few minutes to eq to make each sound like the other..too much name/brand snobbery
Fender has Alnico pickups but TE-20 - cheap ceramic ones. You better compare TE-52 with Fender and you'll find there is no difference at all. And there is Harley Benton Fusion-T HH for example which is better than Fender but still cost a third of a price. I love Harley Benton guitars and have a few of them. Their bass guitars just beyond comparison.
My new #1 bass is a Harley Benton. The JP-45OP in blue. Looks and plays the business. Also got the RB 414, which is pretty nice as well (otherwise I typically play several vintage Japanese basses from Fujigen factory, so . . . ). And a metallic blue TE-20 is also on the way to from Germany to me in LA. I rather like how it sounds with both pickups selected.
Harley Benton looks like a Telecaster, but it's not.
what if you swap pickups? put good ones on the Harley and bad one on the Fenner? yup, $400 and that Harley sounds like a world beater
I wish HB made guitars with 9.5" neck radius instead of having only flat necks.
Both pickups is where it's at for the HB. Each alone not so much to my ears.
That’s not clean . That’s added reverb dude come on
One Harley Benton SG style, and one Harley Benton Tel style + learn to set them up, maybe do some upgrades yourself. Fender and especially Gibson can @#$% right off!
I have three guitars and a bass, that all sound and play great, and including all the upgrades done to them, all four combined cost 1/4 the price of a lower end Gibson with a crappy "easy-break©" headstock.
One has noiseless pickups and the other has noisy pickups.
haha waste of money on that fender just saying.
😂😂😂
This is why we paid more, no other way.
I cannot justify buying a fender when less than 100 dollars could have the Harley Benton sound just as good
Frender does sound more superior but that hb tele is a good sound