Harley Benton ST-Modern Plus HSS LPB

Guitar was in transit for a while and traveled in a roundabout way to get to me. The outer box was really beat up and torn but thankfuly the inner box with the actual guitar was intact.

After unboxing and closer inspection I found a paint crack near the neck pocket.
Fret ends are rounded and frets themselves appear to be medium jumbo but are not tall.
Fretboard had some glue residue and some dark brown or black gunk near frets. Neck plate feels cheap and had a very sharp edge. No other visual flaws found.
Peeling off the double layer of protective plastic required taking off the pickguard at which point it immediately warped but it doesn't really bother me. After peeling off the plastic the volume and tone knobs turned a lot more smoothly and the push pull pot was easy to pull up.
The routing is HSH configuration.
The 5 way switch feels really nice.
Input jack secures the cable really well.
Weight is about average for guitars at this price but slightly heavier than what I think a strat type should weigh.

Out of the box experience
Out of the box the guitar was almost in tune which was a surprise. Strings looked like new.
That said playing it was really hard. Especially bending. Frets were really scratchy. They looked polished enough but on a closer inspection you could see tiny dents all over.
There was also sympathetic resonance when playing C notes. Trem was really responsive.
Tuners are staggered and locking but very hard to turn. There's a bit of skipping on one or two strings. I might change them in the future.
Neck on my guitar is half flamed and half not but feels really good in the hand. I like it more than Fender necks. It was also dead straight out of the box.

After some tinkering
I cleaned and moisturised the fretboard and changed strings.
Polished frets with polishing rubbers. Now frets feel a lot better but not ideal.
Tried to lower the action but there was buzzing and dead notes below 2mm.
Sympathetic resonance when playing C notes is gone.
Changing strings made bending possible again.
Tuning the guitar was surprisingly difficult. Maybe it's the tuners. I really don't know. After tuning different individual strings would always go sharp. So I had to tune more flat and fiddle around to get all strings in tune. But after that the actual tuning stability was good.

Sound and overall thoughts
To my ears the Tesla pickups are all midrange with some bass and no treble. Which is basically not at all like a traditional strat. To me it really works for rock but clean sounds a bit too dull. Some metal is possible but I don't think these pickups were made for that.
Babicz trem took about 2 days to get used to and still palm muting doesn't work as well for me as with other bridges. Otherwise it works really well.
Overall I'd say for the price ST Modern Plus is a really good value proposition. The compromises made seem to be in the less important areas of the guitar so you would get you a quality bridge, a good feeling neck, and premium specs that other manufacturers can't give you. Just be prepared that you might not get a perfect guitar each time.

Really surprising quality for this price... very nice stainless steel frets, "usual strat Fender size" (with rounded ends), not the "medium Jumbo" SS as on the higher end HB Les Pauls (I have two of those).

Sounds great, Tesla pickups are actually very good... I'm in the USA, import / customs hit a snag for a few days but that straightened out.

Slightly more "shoulder" to the neck shape compared to usual Fender Strat shape, but I'll get used to it. Seeing the sample photos of flame in the maple / the neck, I wasn't optimistic on getting one with a flamed neck, but to my surprise the one I got did have a pretty good amount of flame. You never know what your going to get. No flaws, great value!

I am really impressed about how many great features they could fit in such a cheap guitar. The bridge alone costs 150 euros, and the locking tuners are also sweet. The frets are nicely polished and rolled, the finish looks great, and I really like the neck. I do have some issues though:

1. This isn't really an issue with the guitar but, the included strings broke instantly, so I would advise getting some backup strings asap.

2. The volume pot got a bit scratchy after a few days of use, but it's back to normal now.

3. The fretboard is really dry. Like my sweat would change the color of the wood, and it was kinda hard to slide. So, just get some fretboard oil with your guitar.

(Way more expensive guitars can also have these issues, so it's really not a big deal, I'm just writing this to help people out with their first guitar because this was my first electric guitar, and it sucked I couldn't play for a few weeks cause my strings broke.)