The Ibanez GIO Series is a budget guitar series produced by Hoshino Gakki

Hoshino Gakki

is the owner of the Ibanez guitar and Tama drums brand names.-History:The Hoshino company was founded in 1908 by Matsujiro Hoshino originally as the Hoshino Shoten bookstore which mostly sold books and sheet music and then gradually over the years also began to import musical instruments into...

 (Ibanez

Ibanez

is a Japanese guitar brand owned by Hoshino Gakki. Based in Nagoya, Aichi, Japan, Hoshino Gakki were one of the first Japanese musical instrument companies to gain a significant foothold in import guitar sales in the United States and Europe, as well as the first brand of guitars to mass produce...

), replacing the Cimar

Cimar

Cimar was a Hoshino Gakki guitar brand. Designs of Cimar guitars are sometimes very similar to Hoshino Gakki's Ibanez guitar brand. Cimar guitars appear in Hoshino Gakki catalogues.-References:***...

 line. The GIO guitars are a "budget" model line similar to Fender's Squier

Squier

Squier is a musical instrument brand name owned by the Fender Musical Instruments Corporation.-History:Fender, under the ownership of CBS, acquired the Squier brand name in 1965 when it bought a USA based string making firm , but it lay dormant for many years...

 guitars and Gibson

Gibson Guitar Corporation

The Gibson Guitar Corporation, formerly of Kalamazoo, Michigan and currently of Nashville, Tennessee, manufactures guitars and other instruments which sell under a variety of brand names...

's Epiphone

Epiphone

The Epiphone Company is a musical instrument manufacturer founded in 1873 by Anastasios Stathopoulos. Epiphone was bought by Chicago Musical Instrument Company, which also owned Gibson Guitar Corporation, in 1957. Epiphone was Gibson's main rival in the archtop market...

 line. Unlike those particular budget lines however, these are produced as fully Ibanez branded, with a GIO logo above the standard Ibanez logo to indicate the series. This series of guitars were produced in either China or Indonesia, depending on model.

• GAX series: The budget version of the AX series. This guitar's neck is based on the 22 fret AX profile, and the guitar is fitted with a hard-tail bridge and a dual humbucker (H-H) pickup configuration. The GAX75GP comes with a Shortstop bridge and "downshifter" to allow for quick drop-D tuning.
• GSA series: The budget version of the SA
  Ibanez S
  The Ibanez S Series is a guitar series produced by Hoshino Gakki. Introduced in the late 1980s, the S Series is notable for being a streamlined mahogany bodied guitar with a maple neck that plays comfortably while retaining the resonance of mahogany...
  
   series. This guitar uses a variety of configurations including a SAT-10 bridge, instead of the SAT-Pro bridge on the SA models, and the body wood is Agathis
  Agathis
  The genus Agathis, commonly known as kauri or dammar, is a relatively small genus of 21 species of evergreen tree. The genus is part of the ancient Araucariaceae family of conifers, a group once widespread during the Jurassic period, but now largely restricted to the Southern Hemisphere except for...
  
  . This models neck is based on the 22 fret SA neck profile. Hardware configurations include a dual humbucker and single coil pickup (H-S-H) combined with a full locking system, a dual single-coil and humbucker (S-S-H) with a standard floating bridge, and a dual humbucker setup (H-H) with a standard floating bridge.
• GSZ series: The budget version of the Ibanez SZ
  Ibanez SZ
  The Ibanez SZ is a modern 6-string electric guitar made by Ibanez, and is an offshoot of the Ibanez S family. Like the S, the SZ features a mahogany body. The SZ has a 25.1" scale. All SZ are hardtail...
  
   series. This guitar uses a Full Tune II bridge instead of the Gibraltar III, and also comes with a Quik Change III tailpiece for easy and quick string changes, these are mounted on top of the body using a wrappiece instead of thru-body stringing. These models use a neck profile based on a 22 fret SZ profile, but use bolt on construction rather than set-neck.
• GRGA series GRGA series is the GIO version of the Ibanez RGA model. GRGA line features mahogany body, maple neck and Edge III bridge for the tremolo models.
• GRG series. Not including the GRGM, these are the budget versions of the Ibanez RG
  Ibanez RG
  The Ibanez RG series has the maximum subtypes of guitars under the Ibanez Electric Guitar catalog and a popular series of Ibanez electric guitars produced by Hoshino Gakki. The Ibanez RG was originally designed as a derivative of Steve Vai's JEM\Universe series and released in 1987. Manufacture of...
  
   series. The DX version uses a Fat 10 single-locking floating tremolo bridges instead of a double locking tremolo system. The body is constructed of basswood, although of a lower grade than that found in Ibanez' higher ranges. The neck profile is based on the 24 fret RG-series neck, and comes with shark-tooth inlay. The non-DX model is fitted with a standard Ibanez floating bridge and dot inlays.
• GRX series. The budget version of the Ibanez RX series (Similar in design to the RG, and with a similarly thin neck, but 22 frets rather than 24.). These guitars use the Fat 6 floating tremolo bridge instead of a double locking bridge design. The body is constructed of basswood, although of a lower grade than that found in Ibanez' higher ranges. The neck profile is based on the 22 fret RX-series neck. There are a number of configurations for this model including the use of pick-guards, humbuckers and single coil pickups. Models range from no pick-guard and two humbuckers (H-H) to a super-strat design with pick-guard, two single coils and a humbucker (S-S-H).
• GRGM series, also known as miKro RG series, this model is a smaller scale guitar designed for smaller hands, with a 22 inch, 24-fret neck, based upon the RG neck. These models use a fixed through body bridge. While normally provided with 2 pickups, a recent model was made available which replaced the neck pickup with an onboard 2.5 watt amplifier. With a recent update, the GRGM now uses Mahogany instead of Agathis for body wood.

External links

• http://www.ibanez.com
• http://www.ibanez.com/parts/2003_PARTS/el_guitar/index/gio_index.html