Cheap Guitars

[Tonray's Ghost]

Dang..these cheapo guitars are getting more playable by the day....

This things sounds great and the volume and tone pots actually work better than many higher priced options

Really brings into question the whole Alnico vs Ceramic thing too...if you have a right proper amp setup...I don't think it matters squat

amazed at what you can get for $113 bucks US

[BatUtilityBelt]

Yeah. A lot of cheap (or budget if you will) guitars seem to punch well above their class right out of the box. Even a few that have had issues needing to be addressed right away have turned out to be great guitars after I got past the bugs. There have been some dogs I've rejected too though. As he said, if you know how to do a setup and address QC issues, many can be well worth buying. I like that he admitted not liking it at first and it grew on him. I've had the same happen with a couple brands.

[Tonray's Ghost]

Yeah. A lot of cheap (or budget if you will) guitars seem to punch well above their class right out of the box. Even a few that have had issues needing to be addressed right away have turned out to be great guitars after I got past the bugs. There have been some dogs I've rejected too though. As he said, if you know how to do a setup and address QC issues, many can be well worth buying. I like that he admitted not liking it at first and it grew on him. I've had the same happen with a couple brands.

I've had some good experience too. Out of my three current guitars:

Maya brand strat (China) for about $160 is fabulous. My only regret is I originally owned another Maya (vintage white with mint green guard and HB in the bridge) and I sold it because at the time I thought I was finished with Thailand and was going to Malaysia. I replaced it with this surf green model, which is a real player...but I really don't like the color. I may pick up another vintage white model at some point and make this a donation guitar.

Kazuki Soul Series acoustic $140 (China): needed some setup (saddle shaving, sharp fret edges filed) and I was disappointed at first because the solid top was about as thin as balsa wood...but as it broke in...man does it project and sound great. And it has a very playable thin neck that might annoy me on an electric but for stretching around for chords on stiffer strings it really works great and is super confortable.

The 3rd is a Century LP style with P90s. The first one they shipped had a broken headstock out of the box, but they replaced it no issues at the store. The P90s were meh, the action and setup were crap and still has some issues. But I replaced the wiring harness with an Epiphone set and the pickups with some Wilkinson P90s and aside from some soldering issues I still have to fix, it sounds great but again...this may become a donation some day..not really crazy about it. Total cost to playability: $220

But 2 out of 3 aint bad...and actually if you count the white Maya Strat I sold (sadly) 3 out of 4 perfectly playable instruments at bargaiin prices.

[peskypesky1]

yeah, IMO the inexpensive guitars are getting crazy good for the price.

The Monoprice Indio offset I got a few months ago is not perfect. But overall it looks beautiful, plays great and sounds amazing. The neck in particular is to die for. And the cost me about $85, with free shipping. That's insane.

[dabbler]

... I like that he admitted not liking it at first and it grew on him. I've had the same happen with a couple brands.

I have had a similar experience a number of times which has caused me to understand something about myself and, I think, human nature (at least in the culture in which I live). I have preconceptions about everything. As it relates to instruments, if it doesn't destroy my preconceptions quickly it is VERY easy to ASSUME I was right and move on.

But what I have come to realize that, in addition to getting it set up, I have to spend time with it because each instrument reacts to playing style differently. This has caused me to try to find the way each instrument wants to be played (to show its strong points). I have found this a very educational endeavor and I have come to enjoy that process as much as playing it once I've hit the aha moment.

Now, I still will decide that I don't want certain of them, for various reasons, but it has caused me to appreciate more instruments for what they are and what they can do.

And, more in line with the intent of this thread, I wholeheartedly agree that there are gems all up and down the price scale, and I am quite happy with my "value" guitars!

[Tonray's Ghost]

... I like that he admitted not liking it at first and it grew on him. I've had the same happen with a couple brands.

I have had a similar experience a number of times which has caused me to understand something about myself and, I think, human nature (at least in the culture in which I live). I have preconceptions about everything. As it relates to instruments, if it doesn't destroy my preconceptions quickly it is VERY easy to ASSUME I was right and move on.

But what I have come to realize that, in addition to getting it set up, I have to spend time with it because each instrument reacts to playing style differently. This has caused me to try to find the way each instrument wants to be played (to show its strong points). I have found this a very educational endeavor and I have come to enjoy that process as much as playing it once I've hit the aha moment.

Now, I still will decide that I don't want certain of them, for various reasons, but it has caused me to appreciate more instruments for what they are and what they can do.

And, more in line with the intent of this thread, I wholeheartedly agree that there are gems all up and down the price scale, and I am quite happy with my "value" guitars!

You know all of my guitars have always been in the less than $250 range. I've wanted to get a couple of guitars (Gretsch and Yamaha) that would run more in the $800-$1000 range but I'm deathly afraid that after acquisition I would never play my cheapo guitars again. Partly because I know the feel and playability if these higher tier guitars would be markedly better but perhaps not sound much different in the end. I've bonded in some manner with my cheapo guitars and I've adjusted so they feel pretty decent but I know on the few occasions I've picked up a higher end instrument at a shop, even not plugging it in and I know it feels better in the hands already. We'll see..I have to fix the wiring issues in my P90 LP clone before I add anything new and maybe get rid of 1 or 2 cheapo guitars before I do either via low-ball sale or donation to a school.

[tobijohn]

You know all of my guitars have always been in the less than $250 range. I've wanted to get a couple of guitars (Gretsch and Yamaha) that would run more in the $800-$1000 range but I'm deathly afraid that after acquisition I would never play my cheapo guitars again...

It's exactly the opposite with me. I'm afraid I'll nick or scratch the expensive ones so I'm much more comfortable playing the less pricier ones. Consequently, guitars like the Custom Shop R7, Heritage, Rickenbacker, and anything else worth over $1000 rarely get played and languish in their cases under beds (I bought the R7 in 2016 and it's probably been out of its case less than an hour). Although it really cuts across my grain, from time to time I seriously think of just selling them. I have identical pickups from all of them in other cheaper guitars with similar specs so it's not like I'd no longer have their sound/tone....

[golem]

I always feel like cheap is relative. And not just compared to what you earn.
@andrewsrea can confirm that while I'm willing to spend a decent chunk of change, I'm actively trying to pay less for guitars than what they can be sold for. This includes a Wood Library PRS Hollowbody I bought with damage near the switch tip and two Artist model PRS. Although that second one turns out to have been more hassle than it was worth (trade drama thread).

[Tonray's Ghost]

You know all of my guitars have always been in the less than $250 range. I've wanted to get a couple of guitars (Gretsch and Yamaha) that would run more in the $800-$1000 range but I'm deathly afraid that after acquisition I would never play my cheapo guitars again...

It's exactly the opposite with me. I'm afraid I'll nick or scratch the expensive ones so I'm much more comfortable playing the less pricier ones. Consequently, guitars like the Custom Shop R7, Heritage, and anything else worth over $1000 rarely get played and languish in their cases under beds (I bought the R7 in 2016 and it's probably been out of its case less than an hour). Although it really cuts across my grain, from time to time I seriously think of just selling them. I have identical pickups from all of them in other cheaper guitars with similar specs so it's not like I'd no longer have their sound/tone....

One thing that I learned about myself is that if the guitars are in a case or bag I almost never take them out and play. I am the laziest SOB on the planet if something impulsive takes me more than 10 seconds to setup. Once I hung them on the wall I find I play every day, many times 2 or 3 times a day, plugged in or unplugged later in the evening. I think my playing skill has improved immensley just from this one simple change. I know for you it would be impossible unless you switch homes to something like the Taj Mahal or Balmoral Castle and then you would have to worry about the servants scracthing them when they polish the hardware....ha ha ha ha

[jhull54]

Enjoying this thread. The main thing with these "cheap" guitars is that they are so much better than the "cheap" guitars of the 70s that were available to folks that wanted to learn to play. Many, if not most brands of cheap stuff were so bad as to be unplayable. Now you can find gear in the $100--$200 range that is close to pro quality.

The SX Furrian I bought a couple years ago is plenty sturdy enough to gig with, and in my opinion, damn close in quality to the higher end Squier stuff. I definitely think it's higher quality than the Affinity and even Standard lines.

And, I have come across several brands that are absolute steals in the cost to quality equation. The Austin brand from St. Louis Music is a great guitar, as are some of the earlier Lotus and Johnson (AXL) brands. Having said that, there are also some brands I've been disappointed with: Behringer, the Peavey Rockmaster, Crescent...

[tonebender]

Back in the 60's and maybe even the early 70's cheap products were either made in the USA of lesser quality components, i.e., plywood, pot metal, etc., or in Japan of the same type inferior materials. They were junk for the most part. The wages in Japan were not that far behind the US so the savings had to be in materials. These days labor costs are so low in China, Indonesia and other countries that they can use better quality materials and still sell it at well below USA made instruments. You guys are correct, many of the "cheap" guitars are quite good. I am a Gibson guy, but out of curiosity I purchased a Firefly 335 copy and the platform itself is quite good. The tuners, pickups, etc., were not good but even after upgrading said components I still have less than 25% of the cost of new Gibson 335 in it. It is not on par with my Gibson 335 but it is a nice guitar. Nothing at all wrong with the Epiphone line either but they are not nearly as affordable as they once were.

[Tonray's Ghost]

Back in the 60's and maybe even the early 70's cheap products were either made in the USA of lesser quality components, i.e., plywood, pot metal, etc., or in Japan of the same type inferior materials. They were junk for the most part. The wages in Japan were not that far behind the US so the savings had to be in materials. These days labor costs are so low in China, Indonesia and other countries that they can use better quality materials and still sell it at well below USA made instruments. You guys are correct, many of the "cheap" guitars are quite good. I am a Gibson guy, but out of curiosity I purchased a Firefly 335 copy and the platform itself is quite good. The tuners, pickups, etc., were not good but even after upgrading said components I still have less than 25% of the cost of new Gibson 335 in it. It is not on par with my Gibson 335 but it is a nice guitar. Nothing at all wrong with the Epiphone line either but they are not nearly as affordable as they once were.

I had a Strat clone in the late 90's that was outrageously heavy. One day I decided to buy one of those GFS preloaded Humbucker pickgaurds and upgrade it. When I took the thing apart...it was indeed made of plywood and I had to manually (did not have any power tools) enlarge the rout to accomodate the new pickups. Man tapping that out wiith a hammer and chisel was brutal but there is definitely something to the tonewood thing becuase of the density of the body that thing was pretty much an LP sound in a Strat format.

[tonebender]

Many of them were made of plywood back then. Not that it's a bad thing but it did make them heavy.

[mozz]

Lot of them aren't really plywood, some are laminated hardwood which is probably even more dense.