When I unpacked the instrument (during corona time) I had the unfortunate experience of fatty fingerprints all over the instrument. So, what to do, send it back, or clean it? I decided for the latter, cleaned the plastic proper (tubing / mouth pieces with hot water and soap, it was coronatime) and after having the instrument a week in quarantaine I started playing the melodica.
One of the first things that is noticeable is that is is not extremely well tuned (even I can hear that), Hohner should do better there as a major German instrument building brand, but beware that voicing one tongue is expensive, and this thing has 32 of them. The build is cheap, the feel is cheap, the keys in particular feel cheap (not as cheap as the microKorg keys though), it makes soft clicking noises, everything is cheap on it, it is cheap.
Now the good things: For the cheap price it is not even that bad, actually pretty OK. So I can definitely recommend it as a beginner instrument. Also the smaller keyboard is well suited for kids hands. Slightly to small for mine, but still playable.
Since it is very portable, and still quite expressive, I regularly play it in my kids group. It works out properly there together with a guitar. The "horn" as it is called by some in the group, is just a very basic replacement of my accordeon, that is not well transportable by bike. I'm quite happy with it in the end, although a high-end, even more expressive, and better tuned instrument is still on the list (as well as a bass melodica). That these are also a multiple of the price of this melodica makes that that still did not happen.
