Bare Knuckle Pickups Forum
Forum Ringside => Guitars, Amps and Effects => Topic started by: HTH AMPS on January 11, 2008, 06:54:00 PM
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A guy at work wants to buy a Strat to learn on and has a £300 budget.
I'm not a Strat guy, so I've no idea on what would be the best Strat for that price. When I say Strat, I dont mean 'Superstrat'.
Anyone?
:twisted:
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I usually try to disuade learners from strats. It makes no sense to me that they are still the most popular model for learners... having a trem on a first guitarseems illogical to me
having said that i dont think you can beat yamaha pacificas for value for money. 112's are under £200 and very much strat like. 412 and 612 are less strat like but great guitars and still in budget.
they are a great base for modding as well
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Pacifica is the best value for money.
Also you can pick up a second hand one for less on ebay.
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If you want a more vintage feel strat i would say early mexican strat used, pro tone korean squier, E series (or earlier) MIJ strat or a Blade strat. Or look for an allparts(fender official replacement bodies/necks) seller and try to get one together from parts which should work IMO for around 300 pounds i think.
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I'm assuming you mean a Fender Strat?
You wont get a new one for £300 but a decent Mexican one should be available second hand for around that price.
Bear in mind though that he will need other things to go with it, which will bump up the price. I'm talking about everything from an amp, strap, tuner etc.
To be fair I would go for the advice WesV gave. A Yamaha Pacifica 412 is a great guitar to start with and be got new for £200, leaving spare for a practice amp and other things.
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i'd say second-hand MIJ tokai, out of what i've tried. i've seen them here for £250, which is pretty decent. shame the colour was horrible, or i'd have had it. :lol:
i realise you said "no superstrat", but what does that mean? no locking trem (presumably)? No bridge humbucker (i'm guessing so)? only 21 frets?
etc.
of course if he's only starting there's a good chance he doesn't know...
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mexican strats are £300 new! any colour. as a first guitar its nice to have a new one that you can call yours and youve broken in. you'd get alot for £300 second hand though. I assume the £300 doesnt include an amp?
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Doesn't have to be a Fender, in fact I'd say to stay away from Fender as he'll get a better guitar for the money if he stays away from the 'name'.
Tokai seems like a good place to start.
By Superstrats, I mean bridge humbuckers, downsized bodies etc... He wants a vintage type of Strat straight-up for Hendrix & Knopfler noodlings.
£300 doesn't include an amp, he's got another £100 for the amp - can't go wrong with a Line6 Spider for that kind of cash.
8)
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With a 400 budget I'd halve it between the guitar and amp, tbh.
I dont really have any advice for the guitar though. I will say that I had a similar quest to get a cheap strat, but the money I wanted to spend was lower and I ended up with a Westfield, which, despite its obvious and fairly numerous flaws is a goiod guitar in a lot of ways that count: well enough put together, good acoustic tone, good pickups for the price point, around £100: I got it for 50. Flaws include poorly matched multi-piece body, pretty lousy frets (at least level, but rough), cr@p nut, slack feeling, quite unstable tuners. All to be expected for a very cheap guitar and tolerable or fixable.
I may have lucked out though. I dont know what the overall quality of westfield is.
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Blade, they are awesome for the money and have a twist with that active preamp!
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How about a Vintage AV6?
Theyve been getting high praise in guitar mags for build quality and tone and are designed by Trev Wilkinson. Slightly over £300 but looking good for the money.
http://www.guitarampkeyboard.com/en/72470
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As a different consideration, how about getting a used but decent korean strat which is checked on playability for around 100 pounds and order a set of BKP's and pots right away?
If i think back the best motivation in the beginning is getting a decent sound, at least this way you can manage that and the BKP's will stick and he can put them in a better guitar after a couple of years.
At least i think this would be the best value for money for a starter.
+1 on the spider, pretty complete/versatile package and sounds OK which is remarkable for a cheap amp IMO.
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When I had my first guitar and amp, I never plugged in because the sound between them just wasn't any good, personally I would spend more on a guitar and then buy a decent amp later when you know if its what you want to do
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Fender mexicans are supposed to be quite good. you can usually find them for around the 300 mark
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I seriously can not find anything wrong at all with the Mexican Fenders. They could cost 50 quid more and still be well worth it. All I've played were resonant, very well built with solid Strat tone. Say what you want those are great guitars.
Also what's wrong with a trem for a beginner? My first guitar had a Floyd, took it apart as soon as I got it to figure it out and it's never bothered me since. Trems are easy to setup. Now to use that's another problem. But the advantage with Strats with the vintage trem is that you can screw it down all the way and effectively end up with a hardtail.
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Its horses for courses on the trems, peirre.
My second guitar, first 'real' guitar (a jackson thats now pigged and IT'd and is my #3) has a floyd.
Being mechanically minded I understood it really quickly.
A lot of peolpe have real difficulty with them, though.
For beginners, its just another thing to get in the way of learning to play. Something that can easily make the guitar a chore if they arent comfortable with how it works and setting it up.
I dont advise a floyd untill you have basic competency with normal playing, are well hooked on guitar in general and specifically want one.
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Most of the beginners strats i see have major playability isssue because of the fact the person wont have learnt good tuning technique yet or wont have bothered to get the guitar set up... easy to fix when you know how but generally they dont even realise there is a problem and just think they are doing worse than they probably are.
now give them a nice simple hardtail guitar and all that goes away, they dont need to worry about tuning technique other than getting the note to the right place and they can happily get on with bashing the guitar around and the action shouldnt be affected the way it can be by mistuning a strat.
now if all beginners strats came with high quality trems and a good set-up it would be less of an issue - but they dont
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if they're looking for the vintage look you cant go wrong with the vintage guitars. The reviews are always saying they are much better then guitars of their cost because they are mande in china and the labour is so cheap but the wilkinson name still adds great components and ensures the labour is of sim quality to the western guitars!
http://www.jhs.co.uk/vintageelectric.html
i love the look of the relic vintages. You can buy them new for sub £250!
the extra 50quid can go towards the amp. you can get one of the VOX ADVT amps.
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I've found a few Fender Japan and 80s Tokai Japan Strats that look good for around the £300 mark - I've emailed them to my mate at work.
He's set on a Strat, but I keep telling him to get an Epi Japan Les Paul junior - mine is fantastic.
I can see why so many beginners like Strats - lots of bells & whistles.
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With a 400 budget I'd halve it between the guitar and amp, tbh.
generally i would too, but at £400 total, £200 will rarely buy you a great guitar... while if he's only playing stuff like hendrix and knopfler, something like a peavey valveking royal 8, or vox valvetronix would be good enough, i'd say.
could be the difference between getting one cool piece of kit and one ok, and two mediocre.
Blade, they are awesome for the money and have a twist with that active preamp!
yeah, they're very nice, but you're struggling to get the blade strat for under £400 here. :)
I've found a few Fender Japan and 80s Tokai Japan Strats that look good for around the £300 mark - I've emailed them to my mate at work.
He's set on a Strat, but I keep telling him to get an Epi Japan Les Paul junior - mine is fantastic.
I can see why so many beginners like Strats - lots of bells & whistles.
if he's set on the strat, i'd let him get the strat.
a one-pickup guitar, in my opinion, is a bit like an epiphone valve junior- it's nice if it's not your only guitar/amp. but if you need any versatility at all, i'd look elsewhere for a first purchase.
i was even concerned with suggesting the royal 8, but if he only plays hendrix and knopfler, it'll be cool, and it's the "real thing". if he needs more versatility, the valvetronix would be cool... isn't the spider more aimed at higher gain stuff?
I'd say, when you're starting, you want access to as many different tones as possible, unless you know you only play the one style. :)
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There's an Edwards Strat on Ebay at the moment for £300, only 4 hours left though!
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if they're looking for the vintage look you cant go wrong with the vintage guitars.
I had a very quick play on one a few weeks back, and thought it was very playable which is the main thing for a beginner (wish I'd had one when I started :) ) and if the pickups ain't so hot you can always introduce him to BKP's :P
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Exactly, the vintage relics are £179 from GAK and a BKP are £170 thats only £49 over budget!