So you think squier and sx are lousy guitars?
- Thread starter j_m_s
- Start date
Whitestrat
New member
Honestly, the thing about these SX guitars and MIMs and whatever isn't to do with wood. Nor is it to do with parts. It's all about finishing.
Look carefully at the finish on a Squier... It's thick, polyurathane or polyester coating. Meant to conceal plywood or whatever. You add thick paint to a non-reasonant wood, you get a dead acoustic tone. Some people like it (like Joe Satriani), some people don't (Like Eric Johnson). It's all up to you. If you talk to a die hard Fender enthusiast, you'll be dead before he finishes talking about Thin-Skin Nitro and how it allows the body to breathe better, or how 2 to 3 piece Alder bodies on MIAs are better than multiple blocks of alder found in MIMs. :?
Then we look at the bridge. They use Zinc blocks. Apparently, Zinc blocks don't sound too good, nor sustain too well unlike Stainless Steel blocks. And if you're into Callaham, not even the stock steel ones are good enough. It has to be milled, 316L surgical stainless steel. :roll:
Then we talk about fretwork. The squiers, SX, TGMs and whatevers have frets that tear your skin off. You'll NEVER get that with an American strat. :?
And don't even get me started on pickups... :evil:
We can go on and on about nuts, tuners, etc etc. But at the end of the day, if the SX or TGM guitars bring a smile to your face, then SO BE IT! Why continue wasting your time trying to defend your position? Jeez! We all play our guitars to make ourselves happy! Not to please others!!! :wink:
Look carefully at the finish on a Squier... It's thick, polyurathane or polyester coating. Meant to conceal plywood or whatever. You add thick paint to a non-reasonant wood, you get a dead acoustic tone. Some people like it (like Joe Satriani), some people don't (Like Eric Johnson). It's all up to you. If you talk to a die hard Fender enthusiast, you'll be dead before he finishes talking about Thin-Skin Nitro and how it allows the body to breathe better, or how 2 to 3 piece Alder bodies on MIAs are better than multiple blocks of alder found in MIMs. :?
Then we look at the bridge. They use Zinc blocks. Apparently, Zinc blocks don't sound too good, nor sustain too well unlike Stainless Steel blocks. And if you're into Callaham, not even the stock steel ones are good enough. It has to be milled, 316L surgical stainless steel. :roll:
Then we talk about fretwork. The squiers, SX, TGMs and whatevers have frets that tear your skin off. You'll NEVER get that with an American strat. :?
And don't even get me started on pickups... :evil:
We can go on and on about nuts, tuners, etc etc. But at the end of the day, if the SX or TGM guitars bring a smile to your face, then SO BE IT! Why continue wasting your time trying to defend your position? Jeez! We all play our guitars to make ourselves happy! Not to please others!!! :wink:
j_m_s
New member
The squier i startedn with is not even an alder body. haha.
Its laminated "-something-"
Yes the finish wasnt too nice. But hey. My squier's becoming a natural relic already. So many dings. Finish rubbed of from a strap. Strap pin came out on stage.
Dont go into finishes please! :lol: EJ is a tonal purist, and i love his tone.
I agree with you on the frets. On most american strats ive played. I loved the neck. The rolled edges feel good and the fretwork is well done. And then again, there are the "lemon" american strats ive tried with very bad set ups. But thats subjective.
Pickups. I mod almost every guit i have. I transplanted some extras into my squier and it sounds decent. Yes, i wholly agree on the fact that the pickups make a great difference. If it didnt, why would we be spending 400++ on kinmans!
hehe. Nanoshred don need lah. Buy me an Anderson tele or strat! OT for awhile. I think your setup is one of the coolest ive seen(Pedalboard). So simple yet so cool.
Its laminated "-something-"
Yes the finish wasnt too nice. But hey. My squier's becoming a natural relic already. So many dings. Finish rubbed of from a strap. Strap pin came out on stage.
Dont go into finishes please! :lol: EJ is a tonal purist, and i love his tone.
I agree with you on the frets. On most american strats ive played. I loved the neck. The rolled edges feel good and the fretwork is well done. And then again, there are the "lemon" american strats ive tried with very bad set ups. But thats subjective.
Pickups. I mod almost every guit i have. I transplanted some extras into my squier and it sounds decent. Yes, i wholly agree on the fact that the pickups make a great difference. If it didnt, why would we be spending 400++ on kinmans!
hehe. Nanoshred don need lah. Buy me an Anderson tele or strat! OT for awhile. I think your setup is one of the coolest ive seen(Pedalboard). So simple yet so cool.
Whitestrat
New member
That's PR talk for plywood. :roll:
WTF? Finish rubbed off by the strap? uh... ok. You just justified NOT buying one. :lol:
Kinmans for $400++? That's CHEAP! These days, pluss shipping, exceeds $500! So you see? You have to do ALL that to get your Squier to sound "decent". Imagine a nice 1962 American Vintage with stock Fender 57/62 pickups. Do you think you'll need to change anything? Not really. Heh. I changed the pickups on mine simply because I wanted something noiseless. But the stock 57/62s were very good to begin with. :twisted:
NanoShred
New member
As with Shredcow's example earlier of buying one maybe, 2k plus American deluxe and one of the "fantastic 4" . The chances are if you buy it blind, the American deluxe is gonna be very obviously the much superior guitar. Different story if you go around testing for months and checking out many pieces.
Leaving the player out of the equation, the budget for making these budget mass produced guitars are just not there for them to place attention into quality, set up, better parts, good wood, blah blah . They cater to a certain group of people, and they do that job well.
Non-the less. Starting out with any guitar is better then no guitar.
Leaving the player out of the equation, the budget for making these budget mass produced guitars are just not there for them to place attention into quality, set up, better parts, good wood, blah blah . They cater to a certain group of people, and they do that job well.
Non-the less. Starting out with any guitar is better then no guitar.
well i firmly believe there are gems among the stones. i veyr much prefer my 600 dollar strat than anything else in my humble collection. if you met the right one, you like it, who cares about the specification. i personally like the variax 300 i tried too even when pp say shlt about it
Whitestrat
New member
Maybe not hor... I had one. I got rid of it quickly!!! The tone was dead, and no matter what I did to it, it was still dead. that one was a dud. Nice to play, but could never get it to sound right. :wink:
definitely it wayy easier to spot a nice one among the high end stuff.
maybe i got lost but i tot is talking whether brands like squier and sx are generally lousy stuff? maybe i really got lost haha
most of the squier hanging around sport ranking(that the only place i could try in peace) are pretty okay, sure they arent gems but still very acceptable, no way near lousy.
maybe to someone else, if a squier doesnt sound as good as a custom prs than the squier must be lousy. but to me its not the case, if the squier doesnt sound awefu and sound audible its still acceptable to me even though the prs sound wonder so i wont term it as lousy
i have seen bunch of youtubers having real aweful tone with mid range stuff. god knows what did they do with their settings
anyway in short, im saying cheap guitar arent lousy and it possible to find real nice one, but high end stuff is defintly better in almost every single thing
we are talking about guitars right? cheap amp is a whole new level
oh yeah its excusable if your a beginner, but if you know what you should be getting but yet you brought home some digusting tone machine, some thing is seriously wrong with you
maybe i got lost but i tot is talking whether brands like squier and sx are generally lousy stuff? maybe i really got lost haha
most of the squier hanging around sport ranking(that the only place i could try in peace) are pretty okay, sure they arent gems but still very acceptable, no way near lousy.
maybe to someone else, if a squier doesnt sound as good as a custom prs than the squier must be lousy. but to me its not the case, if the squier doesnt sound awefu and sound audible its still acceptable to me even though the prs sound wonder so i wont term it as lousy
i have seen bunch of youtubers having real aweful tone with mid range stuff. god knows what did they do with their settings
anyway in short, im saying cheap guitar arent lousy and it possible to find real nice one, but high end stuff is defintly better in almost every single thing
we are talking about guitars right? cheap amp is a whole new level
oh yeah its excusable if your a beginner, but if you know what you should be getting but yet you brought home some digusting tone machine, some thing is seriously wrong with you
Whitestrat
New member
I just had an interesting experience. I aimed my old Fender Bronco towards a corner where my table and the wall meet. Then the sound fom the amp just became bigger, a more "wooden" tone, and more analog (It's a solid state amp).
Kinda like putting the small 8" speaker into a much bigger cab and letting the air volume do it's thing. Interesting... :lol:
Actually, I find it harder. Because everything is already so good amongst the high end ones. The crap ones are very easy to tell. But finding a good one? It's harder than finding a good Squier. Getting that little bit extra from the top is much harder to attain than rising from the bottom.
Take my sunburst 57 Hotrod for example. It's got to be the lightest Strat I've ever found. ALMOST 7lbs in weight. That's really light. The tone is inherently fantastic, and the neck is surprisingly thin. I think Fender actually made a mistake with this one. There's no other FENDER strat I've come across that sound like this, plays this easy, and is this light. None. not without paying Custom Shop Prices!!! (And I've really played a lot of strats hunting for my perfect 2... I have 4.) But it was really difficult to find this, and it was by pure luck. Swee Lee brought this in by mistake for me (I ordered an American Vintage 57 instead), but when I tried this, I knew there was no point in looking any further.
Kinda like putting the small 8" speaker into a much bigger cab and letting the air volume do it's thing. Interesting... :lol:
Actually, I find it harder. Because everything is already so good amongst the high end ones. The crap ones are very easy to tell. But finding a good one? It's harder than finding a good Squier. Getting that little bit extra from the top is much harder to attain than rising from the bottom.
Take my sunburst 57 Hotrod for example. It's got to be the lightest Strat I've ever found. ALMOST 7lbs in weight. That's really light. The tone is inherently fantastic, and the neck is surprisingly thin. I think Fender actually made a mistake with this one. There's no other FENDER strat I've come across that sound like this, plays this easy, and is this light. None. not without paying Custom Shop Prices!!! (And I've really played a lot of strats hunting for my perfect 2... I have 4.) But it was really difficult to find this, and it was by pure luck. Swee Lee brought this in by mistake for me (I ordered an American Vintage 57 instead), but when I tried this, I knew there was no point in looking any further.
noodle
New member
well, this guitar is certainly not cheap, plays darn good, sounds great, playability is top notch with a straight neck and low action.
http://soft.com.sg/web/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=33550
keke.. supporter for a more personalised guitar here.
http://soft.com.sg/web/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=33550
keke.. supporter for a more personalised guitar here.
firestormee
New member
god ive tried SX strats. The one with the floating bridges are affordable, but OMG the they just dont stay in tune. bad experience man.
EugeneSmasher
New member
Is it a real ESP neck?...
noodle
New member
its even better than ESP...haha, just joking, its a warmoth treated with lots of tweakings like fret leveling and took 4 months to fine tune the whole action.
Anyway, i've read a post in this thread saying ppl who plays cheap guitar must try to play expensive guitars... yup, i've been there done that. Owned 2 gibson les pauls, 2 fenders and 2 ESP in the past.... yup, they are good sounding. But there are something that each of these guitars that doesn't suits my requirement...
It has to be light, it has to have good playbility and neck access like a ESP, and sound wise, i'm not too picky..
its all about finding a guitar that can make yourself happy. No point getting a les paul when you always complaint that its heavy and higher neck access is limited.
Fenders are good guitars but i do not need 3 pickups, just a neck and bridge will do for me.
ESP is so far the best compromise of all the features i need, BUT i just didn like their LOOK as they has the generic gutiar look that doesn't appeal to me. Signature models are not my cup of tea anymore...
So i've decided to 'custom' assemble' a guitar that suits my requirement. ANyway, i'm chaning my guitar body soon..its a tad on the heavy side.
thats the kick you get out of cheap guitars, you can do whatever to it without worrying for staying 'the way it should be' to remain its value.
my 2 cents, dun flame me.
Anyway, i've read a post in this thread saying ppl who plays cheap guitar must try to play expensive guitars... yup, i've been there done that. Owned 2 gibson les pauls, 2 fenders and 2 ESP in the past.... yup, they are good sounding. But there are something that each of these guitars that doesn't suits my requirement...
It has to be light, it has to have good playbility and neck access like a ESP, and sound wise, i'm not too picky..
its all about finding a guitar that can make yourself happy. No point getting a les paul when you always complaint that its heavy and higher neck access is limited.
Fenders are good guitars but i do not need 3 pickups, just a neck and bridge will do for me.
ESP is so far the best compromise of all the features i need, BUT i just didn like their LOOK as they has the generic gutiar look that doesn't appeal to me. Signature models are not my cup of tea anymore...
So i've decided to 'custom' assemble' a guitar that suits my requirement. ANyway, i'm chaning my guitar body soon..its a tad on the heavy side.
thats the kick you get out of cheap guitars, you can do whatever to it without worrying for staying 'the way it should be' to remain its value.
my 2 cents, dun flame me.
EugeneSmasher
New member
Haha I wont't flame you, I don't really like Fender strats either because of the unnecessary pick-ups. I kinda prefer a dual humbucker config since I play heavy metal and hard rock most of the time.
I find ESP too generic for me too...
I find ESP too generic for me too...
subversion
Moderator
there must be an understanding to the number of pickups/ configuration a certain guitar has to offer. we don't have to dislike one just because it has excessive features on board.
