Crafter is one of a number of cheaper-range instruments coming out of large factories in the Far East and Malaysia, and you can see a fair range of what's available in music chains like Hobgoblin. They're a very mixed bag, in my view, and - if you're a beginner in any field - take a more experienced player with you when choosing an instrument. I was looking at an Ozark resonator "Dobro" style guitar recently. Superficially, it looked very good value at around £300+, but a close-up inspection revealed a very interesting aspect of it: the metal resonator was very thin and almost pliable. The fundamental issue was that resonators are meant, by their very nature, to be solidly constructed so as to give the volume which is the purpose of their design.

The point here - and I'm sorry to be so long-winded in getting to it - is that the Chinese makers of the instrument had got it looking right, but had a basic misunderstanding of the nature of the guitar. This is something that you have to look out for when buying instruments such as mandolins from these factories. They can look very nice, and the spec says they're made from all the right sort of woods, but they're often just not "right" when you pick them up.

The other factor to watch out for is that makes such as Cort, Crafter, Ozark, Tanglewood and many other more famous names are manufactured by just a few large factories - and the makers often swap round where their particular brand is currently being made. I've had several discussions about instrument ranges with friends who own music shops in Sussex, and they have sometimes had to stop or start stocking an instrument make because the manufacturing source had changed and the spec had altered for the worse. This is not to say that makes like Ozark, etc. are not worth buying - merely to say that you have to be careful what you buy at the time that you're buying.

Better, IMHO, to save one's pennies and acquire an instrument with more of a known provenance - though this doesn't always help the would-be player. I also believe that price is not always an indication of quality and playability, but that's just a hobby-horse of mine!