I have been looking for a guitar with a proper midi output for ages now. It seems like you can go straight from the TRS-midi out to the midi in of hardware synths without using an app or a computer. 799$ in the US, quite a lot more pricy here in Germany, only one retailer has it listed for 1158€.
It’s also possible to use both midi and the audio out of the guitar simultaneously, which offers quite some possibilities for layering.
The reviews I’ve seen so far have been quite positive so far. Does anyone here have any experience with this yet?
With a latency of 10ms (then he said something about 6-15ms), I wouldn’t buy it without trying it in my own hands first. I mean, 10ms is enough that you have to personally experience if that’s something you can live with. It’s on the borderline for me, but if it tracks perfectly and does everything else it claims (MPE for string bends makes a lot of sense) with the only downside being that 10ms, then it’s promising.
Also, it’s not cheap. It looks like $300 worth of wood, pickups, and craftsmanship (tops), so you’re mostly paying for that digital processing. That’s not outrageous, I guess; I have an electroacoustic hand drum that I estimate I’ve paid $800-900 for its digital processing cleverness, and it’s my favorite instrument these days.
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Good points, thanks for your reply.
It is quite expensive, especially as I mainly want to use it as a midi controller for the DN.
I really do suck at playing keys and I’m much better at translating ideas on the guitar, so not having to deal with keyboards alone might be worth the price.
Of course, testing it in person before a purchase would be ideal, but that’s not possible in my case. Only one German retailer lists it, and they are located on the other side of the country. They’ve got a 30-day return policy, so I might make use of that, even though I don’t like the idea.
Then have you considered this: https://playjammy.com/
I don’t have one, but am considering it myself.
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I was just about to suggest Jammy as well, but only because I keep getting targeted ads for it.
Sonicstate has a write up about it as well: Sonic LAB: Jammy MIDI Guitar Controller - Sonic State Amped
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Jammy looks kind of cool, but costs enough that I wish I could try before I buy. I mean, aside from the usual tracking and latency questions, given the shape and the scale length, it’s hard to tell just how it will feel to play. I also like how they’ve gotten the weight under 3 lbs.
By the way, I used to have one of these Ztars with the strings assembly option. I can’t recommend it.
Haha, that sonic state video about the jammy got me into looking for midi guitars again, which is how I ended up on the jamstik studio.
The jammy seems like it’s about to fall apart in most of the videos I’ve seen on it. Also, you need to buy an extra expansion to have a proper midi out port, which already gets you pretty close to the price range of the jamstik studio.
The last (and perhaps final) synth guitar that I’ve played was the DG-20:
Hilarious? Yes. Useful? Definitely not.
The tech demo for the jamstik looks pretty legit though!
I do wonder where the bottleneck is for latency - certainly not in transmission over USB-C, so it’s gotta be in signal processing. At a certain point I’d almost rather have my beefy computer handle the processing rather than the dinky microprocessor they’re almost certainly stuffing into these MIDI guitars. If they could sell a retrofit bridge option that allowed slightly slower latency by doing processing on the host machine, I could see that being pretty appealing. Of course, for many people they’d rather have an all-in-one device, but I guess I’d rather have lower latency and better performance over portability.
Okay, thomann had the jamstik studio available and I ordered it. In summary, it feels good to play and works well (mostly). Latency via trs midi to control the DN was unnoticeable (to me).
However, there were some major issues and I returned it.
The tracking works best if the strings are 1mm above the midi pickups. I was able adjust the small screws for 5/6 strings fine, velocity tracked okay. For the remaining string, the little screws were worn out on arrival, I couldn’t adjust the string height at all. Notes barely registered, very low velocity values, even when playing very loudly. Adjusting this with higher sensitivity in the provided software had no perceivable effect (to me).
This sadly broke the deal for me, especially as the remaining screws will eventually also wear out.
Maybe they’ll come up with a revised version, but at this stage, it’s to much of a hassle to use for me. Which is sad, as playing the DN with the guitar and feeding the guitar signal through its inputs can sound completely otherworldly.
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Hope you sampled 
Thanks for report though - and hope they can improve it - can definitely see the appeal of having nothing between the guitar and the synth