Cecilio CECO-3BK Ebony Electric Silent Metallic Black Cello in Style 3, Size 4/4 (Full Size)

First off, I have never played a cello so I pretty much have nothing to compare it to. I was always interested, but never wanted to spend $800 on a quality "beginner" acoustic cello. I do know that every single bit of parts/manufacturing effects the tone of any piece of acoustic instrument. Coming from a little bit of a guitar background, solid body/ electric guitars are a bit more forgiving. (Meaning a cheap electric guitar can sound pretty decent, when a cheap acoustic guitar can sound down right awful) So for the price, I decided to give it a try over some of the bad reviews that just sounded like people didn't know what they were doing. And here's what i have to say about it.Some complaints about the pegs. I don't have a problem with mine. A couple don't stick out all the way through, but that makes no difference to me. As I tune it, I push them in as I turn them to keep them from loosening up as I play.Some more complaints about fine tuners, yet so far I have zero problems. They were free moving right out of box.Tuning/broken strings. I hear the A string is pretty easy to snap. SO I recommend that when you start tuning, you start on the C string to help avoid that problem. Also keep in mind that the pegs can raise your strings a half step without even trying and even more if your not watching what your doing. This thing does detune drastically out of box. But as far as I can tell its just the strings stretching. It took a couple weeks, but, now overnight its barely loosing any tune. (assuming the strings are still getting stretched in as I only play maybe an hour a day) From a guitar point, on a fresh restring, I would literally pull the strings to get the stretch out. Something I'm not willing to do to risk breaking and spending $50+ on new strings on a cello.The action is just a tad high (the height of the strings over fingerboard) only by maybe 1.5-2mm. But I don't have the problem of the strings hitting as I play.The Bow is something to beat the dust off the rug with. mine is bent and twisted, not all the hairs are even tight. But I can play with it. So it will HAVE to do until I can get another. Headphones are also junk.. I never even used them. I just laughed when I seen them.Overall, I knew what I was jumping into. You can defiantly tell this isn't put together with that much love and care. The red metallic is a beautiful deep red. Mine was painted pretty good, could have used a little better sanding in some spots. I notice lots of little defects/errors, but to me they're slight cosmetic and expected. It has awesome tone, and pretty crazy when I run it through my amp on some crazy distortion. Yet I rarely plug it in because its pretty loud stand alone. I doubt you will bother anyone sleeping in the next room, but your ear is right next to the thing. I know this probably wont even hold a candle compared to a $2000 Yamaha electric. But for a $350 package?!?..The price I paid, and What I got out of it?.. It gets the 5 stars.....So if you are looking for a masterpiece, just spend the $2k. But I'm on a budget, and I'm not trying to keep up with the Jones.

Background, I'm a beginner cello player, self taught but I had a year of violin and double bass in college. I made a project of a terrible eBay violin almost a decade ago and in the process learned to do a lot of my own repairs (replaced everything but the body and had a tolerable instrument at the end. Sadly, this is relevant to this review). Straight up: if you are not comfortable restringing your own instrument- this is not the instrument for you. Luckily it's not terribly difficult to learn to do via the Internet. This is a beginners instrument.I purchased a Cecilio cello (acoustic, not the lowest quality- but only one step up) several months ago and have really enjoyed it, so when I wanted to make an electric cello purchase it wasn't a hard decision to go with another Cecilio purchase. Things to know:The good1) It's pretty. The black is a metallic black with a tiny amount of sparkle to it.2) There's a fold out chest bar that helps simulate the feel of a full instrument.The bad1) The strings are questionable at best. I've had no problems with my acoustic cello's strings (they are color coded by string compared to a simple red for all four strings on this cello so I am working under the assumption this instrument has different quality strings), but the A string snapped on this cello after less than a week of minimal playing. Get a cheap starter set of strings to have on hand or you may spend a couple of days waiting for replacements.2) The fine tuners are even more questionable. I could barely remove the broken A string (took pliers) and could not replace it with the spare string I had on hand because the prongs were crimped together. Compared to my acoustic- different tuners, lower quality. Very sad. Replacing those as well.3) The pegs refused to hold. Constant slipping. I couldn't get all four strings tuned at one time out of the box. I have peg drops on hand, but if this is your first stringed instrument you might not. With peg drops I could get it to hold a tune for 5-10 minutes and was looking at possible reasons why it still was having trouble (my acoustic cello holds within a half tone for days) when my A string snapped. Hoping it was made worse by bad strings because I'd really rather not have to replace the pegs too. (Update: replaced strings, now holds tune just fine. Pegs are fine but the strings are terrible. Replace them asap!)4) The headphones are junk, but if you expected high quality headphones you're looking in the wrong price range. This was not an issue for me at all and it works great with headphones I already had.Cost to get the cello working is 40$ for the replacement fine tuners, 40$ for replacement strings, 8$ for peg drops, and a week and change of fiddling with it to try to get it to work decently. The good news: even with 90$ in repairs and providing my own headset, it's the cheapest electric cello I've found. Since I want a cello I can practice when people are sleeping- it's not a terrible deal. I'm not upset with the purchase because I knew going in that it could be bad. I wasn't expecting it to be quite this much work, but I don't mind the work.The bad news- the acoustic cello I bought that's done right- tolerable beginner strings, fine tuners that aren't crimped, pegs that hold a tune- costs less than this cello after repairs and came with a hard side case, an extra set of strings, and didn't require any start up care. If you can only take one home as a beginner, go with the acoustic set up. It's the better instrument by far.

I'm a cello student and I was looking for a cello that had a silent sound so that I could use it to practice on in the evenings and at night because I live in an apartment building.So I was searching online and found out that electric cellos have a quiet sound when they are not plugged into an amplifier, and since I already own a cecilio accustic cello which is a very quality instrument and has a lovely tone.I decided to purchase the cecilio electric cello and like the accustic cello it has a lovely sound and a quality build, I was able to tune it right out of the box and I did not have to replace or alter any of the parts on the cello not the tail piece, tuning pins, pegs, bridge, or the strings it came with. Another thing I like about cecilio is that their cellos are easy to tune and they will saty in tune for a couple of days at a time which is really nice. I am completely satisfied with my 2 cecilio cellos and I think they are wonderful instruments I would highly recommend cecilio to anyone looking for an affordable quality instrument.