I think I made a horrible mistake

Buying a new snark tuner at my local music shop, I grabbed a much nicer uke than my good entry level one and started playing it.

OOooohhhhhhhhh...... yeaah. Wow. Action was so much nicer, strings were nicer, bode feel was nicer, tone was nicer, and it was easier to play...Chords that I have trouble with on my current uke were easy on this other little soprano.

Sadly I am stony broke, so I have to content myself with drooling. But oh wow, what a difference! I can only imagine what a really really nice one feels and sounds like.

What kind did you try?

Looks like your uke needs its action adjusted and a new set of strings. Fairly easy to do and quite inexpensive upgrade. Hopefully you'll get the same wow factor with your own uke after that and you won't have to drool on other ukes

And now you know why I so strongly recommend that beginners especially only buy inexpensive to mid-priced ukes from "specialists" who set the instrument up (Mainland Mike, HMS, Mim, etc).

The good news is that if you're reasonably patient and have normal eye-hand coordination you can adjust the nut - the usual culprit in difficult to play ukes - yourself.

John

My ukulele arrived as a surprise gift from a generous friend. I have actually performed some minor surgery on it, I replaced the strings the first day with Aquila Nylgut (sp?) strings, let them settle for a week, then filed down the saddle from the underside to improve the action a bit.

The last few days I have noticed that the intonation is really bad on the first fret and it was driving me a little nuts, so I saw that the nut had been glued on at a weird angle- I removed it, scraped off the old glue, and re-glued it at what the guitar shop guy told me was a better angle. Now it's leaning away from teh fretboard a tad. I just restrung it thinking I had ruined it, but it's not bad. About the same maybe, I'll have to wait til the strings settle again.

It's still not as nice as the $250 Kala at the store, but it will certainly do for entertaining myself and torturing the family.

Time to start putting a dollar or two in your sock drawer every day. In six months or so...

Hi and welcome jamz. How high are the strings above the first fret? If its more than a couple of business cards than you are fighting the nut. If you have a capo or can borrow one, put it on the first fret and try playing. If that is easier than you need the action lowered at the nut.

Hope this helps. Keep us posted