The Casio DG-20 was a budget guitar synthesizer. It had plastic strings triggering onboard synthesizer sounds as well as a built-in speaker, built-in drum machine, drum pads and MIDI output.

Bob Murrell combined his knowledge of guitars and electronics to invent the GuitOrgan. It is a hybrid electric guitar and organ. The strings and frets are wired into a circuit such that the organ notes play when the string is fretted. The organ section in a Guitorgan is a 6-note polyphonic circuit, which allows full guitar chords to be played.

Dan Wagoner modified his first guitar (a Fender stratocaster) to include a weird sound generator analogue synth. The synth control knobs protrude from a hand made pick guard made from a motherboard. Three switches have been mounted in the fingerboard. This instrument liberates the synth player, allowing them to assume outrageous poses previously reserved for guitarists.

Casio Computer Co., Ltd. is a Japanese electronics company established in 1946. The 1980s saw Casio venture into synthesizers and music keyboards, with their Casiotone, CZ and SD models. In the late 1980s Casio released the DG series for guitarists, essentially keyboards in the shape of guitars with PCM synthesis.