Starting to look very overpriced.

ThePrettyDamned

crunchman said:

thegummy said:

crunchman said:

thegummy said:

Barnezy said:

The "it's just a tool" apotoach is interesting. I heard someone compare it to knives recently. A top chef may spend £1k+ on a top kitchen knife. Can you taste the difference in the food vs a £5 knife... no. Does the chef prefer using his £1k knife, yes. The same with guitars really. 

That analogy would only work if a £1k guitar sounded the same as a 2k one but didn't feel as good or wasn't as easy to play.

A more appropriate analogy would be the top kitchen knife vs one with an equally good blade but a fancy Gucci ornate handle that was over 2k.

A chef would find either just as good to use to cut food with; some would get more pleasure out of owning the fancy one while others wouldn't see any point in paying a penny more for it.

Your analogy might work when comparing a £2k guitar with a £4k guitar, but corners have to be cut to reach a £1k price point.

At £1k, the dealer will probably be buying it in for £600 to £700.  They normally buy it from a distributor or some kind of middle man, who also has to make a profit, plus there are transport costs and import duty to think about.  The factory gate price on that £1k guitar is probably going to be around £400, and the manufacturer has to make a profit on that, so they have to be able to make for for somewhere around £350.

It's hard to make a decent guitar for £350.  There is an awful lot labour involved.  I built a guitar at Crimson last year.  I didn't quite finish while I was there, and did the wiring at home, but I put around 60 hours into that build.  With the tools I have in my shed at home, it would be 80 hours.

Someone who is doing that on a regular basis in a production line environment would be a lot quicker than me, but no-one is going to make a guitar with a nice finish and a really good fret job without a significant amount of work being done by hand.

You can cut the amount of hand work down, but that requires very expensive machinery.  I've seen 6 figure sums bandied around as the cost of a plek machine for instance.  That's not a one of cost either.  There are ongoing maintenance costs with it.  The blades go blunt etc.

You are either going to be doing a significant amount of hand work, or buying millions of pounds worth of expensive machinery.  Even with CNC, you would need multiple machines to get maximum efficiency.  You don't want to have to keep changing the cutting bit and loading new programmes.  Again, they will require maintenance, and cutting bits will wear out etc.

Let's say you spend £2m on expensive equipment to automate things, and make 100,000 guitars with it, that's still £20 per guitar just on the capital costs.  You still have to maintain that equipment on top of that, and there is still labour involved as somebody has to put the guitar onto the CNC/plek machine, and take it off, and transfer it to the next machine.

If you get that £2m of machinery, then you need a significant floor space that you have to rent and heat.  You have a lot of other overheads as well.

Then you start looking at the cost of parts and hardware.   I've been looking at online prices for wood for a build.  It's not cheap to get good quality wood.  To buy decent wood to make a guitar, it's likely to cost me around £100 - even without going for something exotic.  Big manufacturers can buy in bulk, but it's still a significant cost.

Decent hardware costs as well.  I put a nice set on Gotoh tuners on the guitar I built, but they cost about £70.  They are much better than the tuners on my Mexican Fender.   That Fender is built to a price, so it gets Fender's generic own brand tuners.

The pickups aren't great on that Mexican Fender either, but to get nice hand wound pickups, or to programme a sophisticated machine to do scatter wound pickups, would cost a lot more.

Likewise the pots.  The more expensive pots on my US Fender feel much nicer, and will probably last longer as well, but they don't fit into the budget of the Mexican guitar. 

Cheaper guitars tend to have cheap fretwire that is soft and easy to work, but doesn't last nearly as long.  I think that's partly for labour saving doing the frets as much as saving on the fretwire itself.

Individually, buying better fretwire, or better tuners, or better pots, or better pickups, or a better quality jack socket might not seem a lot, but add them together, and it takes you well over the £350 or so that you need to be able to build a guitar at to sell in a shop at £1k.

Without having to go in to all that theory about numbers and price points, it makes a lot more sense to just look at the market.

What tangible benefits does a 2k guitar have over one that can be bought for a grand?

You listed some hardware drawbacks of a 500 quid guitar but all of them can be upgraded without taking the total over a grand.

Not the cheap soft fretwire.  A refret by someone decent will set you back over £200.  Closer to £300 in London where I live.

By the time you do that, and replace all the hardware, you are up to the £1k mark, and maybe beyond if you go for high end hardware.

Then you still have a guitar that's probably made from cheap wood and got a horrible thick gloopy plastic finish.  I seem to remember you being from the wood doesn't affect the tone camp, so their may be some logic to your view that you can buy a cheapy and upgrade the hardware, but in reality wood does affect the tone.  A lot of knowledgeable people are also of the view that thickness of finish has an effect as well.

There are some who think that, but someone recently made a guitar from concrete. Guess what? Sounded like a strat... I'd not have noticed it wasn't made of wood, let alone tonewood, from the recording through a clean amp. 

Fwiw I do think wood etc does play a role, and especially in the only bit that does truly matter - does the player enjoy it?

I'm only talking about solid and thinline electrics. Acoustics are a different ballgame, more like pianos where there is a lot more happening... 

LastMantra

I would have thought the nice woods would be used on the ones where it can be seen. The solid colour painted ones it doesn't really matter. 

thegummy

TINMAN82 said:

thegummy said:

TINMAN82 said:

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

Assuming you don't mean "cognitive dissonance" (because it wouldn't make sense), the Squier comment is true but you've had to make up an extreme example; no one is saying that 200 quid is the price point of diminished returns.

Cognitive dissonance was Devil#20s point, but yes I think you could apply it at both ends of the scale. 

I used the extremes but I would also apply this argument to the vintera range (which according to you’re arbitrary £1k cut off would be as good a guitar as Fender produces). 

If you really mean cognitive dissonance then I have no idea what you're talking about so I have to assume you don't mean that.

The Vintera range isn't one I'm familiar with but my "around a grand" point really refers to the American Standard/Professional point; I paid a grand for mine a couple of years ago and they could be had for that price commonly or not much more. Until, of course, Fender has now decided to hike the price massively hence this thread.

If there's anything a Custom Shop model has over the American Standard (or equivalent) that actually makes it a functionally better guitar, what is it?

It has other things that don't make it a functionally better guitar that some people desire and are happy to pay for. But my point was never that no one ever benefits from buying more expensive guitars, just that people who only care about functionality don't. People who desire things for reasons other than function (in general, not just guitars) are probably the majority of people so there's no reason for anyone to feel defensive for desiring a guitar for reasons other than its functionality.

Bigsby

TINMAN82 said:

thegummy said:

TINMAN82 said:

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

Assuming you don't mean "cognitive dissonance" (because it wouldn't make sense), the Squier comment is true but you've had to make up an extreme example; no one is saying that 200 quid is the price point of diminished returns.

Cognitive dissonance was Devil#20s point, but yes I think you could apply it at both ends of the scale. 

I used the extremes but I would also apply this argument to the vintera range (which according to you’re arbitrary £1k cut off would be as good a guitar as Fender produces). 

Cognitive Dissonance isn't something that's employed or used, it's a form of psychological stress that is experienced when beliefs, values, etc., are in conflict, and in theory, will be resolved by changes to one of those beliefs, values, etc. For example:

Two beliefs held:
1] I'm no fool
2] Custom Shop Fenders are better than Mexican Fenders and totally worth the extra price

Then: Custom Shop Fender is bought and experienced as only marginally better than a Mexican Fender, so why did I spend all that hard earned cash on it? = Cognitive dissonance, the two beliefs are now in conflict. (Note: The CS might be 'experienced' as better, which avoids the dissonance arising).

Possible resolutions:
1] I'm a fool, and totally wasted my money, what an idiot!
2] Something needs to change regarding the Custom Shop Fender, e.g. 'Well, it'll hold it's resale value much better, so it's an investment really...' (And endless other possibilities) The point is that it's generally much easier to change beliefs about the world than beliefs about the self - so Cognitive Dissonance tends to cause changes to those types of beliefs.

crunchman

TINMAN82 said:

Devil#20 said:

thegummy said:

It's amazing the way our brains will be so influenced by biases and that's certainly taken in to consideration with guitar pricing.

I remember once I watched a Youtube video that was a perfect example of it - I can't remember the specific models but it was comparing two guitars, one more expensive, and the whole video was a very detailed breakdown of the guitar, deconstructing every part explaining what makes one more expensive while having identical function to the cheaper one then at the end the conclusion was "so this is a really good deal for a guitar, unless you're a pro you really are better off getting this one."

So even though he'd just spent the whole video explaining that the expensive guitar wasn't functionally better in any way, he still clung to the idea that "a pro" would still opt for the more expensive one!

This is an example of where you justify paying way over the odds for a guitar that's no better by employing cognitive dissonance. 

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

This is true, but I think you can pay a premium for certain brands.   The most obvious one I can think of is in the acoustic market.  A European maker like Furch sells great quality guitars at a much cheaper price than Martin.  I would take a Furch over all but the high end Martins, which cost a lot more than a Furch.

At a higher price point, I'd go for an Atkin over a Martin.

Martin will always be a bit more expensive due to the cost of transporting fragile acoustic guitars, and because import duty will add to the cost.  The big problem though seems to be their UK distributor jacking up prices.

It's maybe less obvious in the electric market, but there is a premium for Gibson and Fender.  At the lower end of their ranges there will be far Eastern made guitars of similar quality that are probably 20% cheaper.  At the top end, I'd go to someone like Feline or Patrick Eggle rather than pay full price for a Gibson Custom shop, and I'd save some money in the process.

Within the allowance that certain brands (or countries of origin) have a premium, what you say is correct.  Depending on the guitar construction, £1200 (bolt on) to £1800 (set neck carved top) is probably where the improvements start to get marginal.

thegummy

Bigsby said:

TINMAN82 said:

thegummy said:

TINMAN82 said:

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

Assuming you don't mean "cognitive dissonance" (because it wouldn't make sense), the Squier comment is true but you've had to make up an extreme example; no one is saying that 200 quid is the price point of diminished returns.

Cognitive dissonance was Devil#20s point, but yes I think you could apply it at both ends of the scale. 

I used the extremes but I would also apply this argument to the vintera range (which according to you’re arbitrary £1k cut off would be as good a guitar as Fender produces). 

Cognitive Dissonance isn't something that's employed or used, it's a form of psychological stress that is experienced when beliefs, values, etc., are in conflict, and in theory, will be resolved by changes to one of those beliefs, values, etc. For example:

Two beliefs held:
1] I'm no fool
2] Custom Shop Fenders are better than Mexican Fenders and totally worth the extra price

Then: Custom Shop Fender is bought and experienced as only marginally better than a Mexican Fender, so why did I spend all that hard earned cash on it? = Cognitive dissonance, the two beliefs are now in conflict. (Note: The CS might be 'experienced' as better, which avoids the dissonance arising).

Possible resolutions:
1] I'm a fool, and totally wasted my money, what an idiot!
2] Something needs to change regarding the Custom Shop Fender, e.g. 'Well, it'll hold it's resale value much better, so it's an investment really...' (And endless other possibilities) The point is that it's generally much easier to change beliefs about the world than beliefs about the self - so Cognitive Dissonance tends to cause changes to those types of beliefs.

I love that you not only gave the real definition of "cognitive dissonance" but then gave an appropriate example for the topic!

Let me buy you a theoretical beer.

thegummy

Companies heavily exploit cognitive dissonance (as well as every other known human weakness that will allow them to make more money).

A fundamental example is sponsorship; e.g.:

I love/admire Cristiano Ronaldo
Ronaldo only uses this specific type of football boot

Disagreeing about how good those boots are causes a form of cognitive dissonance which we always try to avoid so the easier option is to go along with his apparent view that they're good.

A lot of it is largely subconscious but that's a big part of sponsorship and product placement etc.

TINMAN82

@thegummy I’ve not seen a new (non sale) American standard/Pro Fender for £1000 for the best part of a decade. I got an am std strat for £1012ish in 2012 but prices increased shortly after. So perhaps you’re £1k cutoff needs re-calibrated for 2020. Builders on here clearly think so, a popular tfb business member sells his bolt on’s for a going rate of around £1600. Also, you seem to view guitars purely as tools in a very black and white way. I’d argue that instruments are much more than that, you can’t put them in the same category as a screwdriver.

@Bigsby, I agree those are both ways in which cognitive dissonance could be relevant here. Again, I quoted someone else’s term.

@crunchman, definitely there are brand premiums involved. I wasn’t really adjusting for that within my own perspectives and compared within Fender Co. But yeah, if two guitars are identical save for a name on the headstock then the more expensive one is over priced (from a purely functional standpoint). Speaking hypothetically though, being an instrument and means of producing art, it’s possible a player could fulfill they’re musical potential more on the premium branded version due to subconscious factors. Or just feel generally happier with it...which might be worth the premium to that person.

thegummy

TINMAN82 said:

@thegummy I’ve not seen a new (non sale) American standard/Pro Fender for £1000 for the best part of a decade.

Now you have.

TINMAN82

thegummy said:

TINMAN82 said:

@thegummy I’ve not seen a new (non sale) American standard/Pro Fender for £1000 for the best part of a decade.

Now you have.

I said non sale. Pretty sure that wasn’t the release price in 2016 (in fact that would’ve been the Am Std blowout after the Pro series was released). You can continue being pedantic but £1000 is not the going rate for an American Pro strat or tele in 2020 nor will it ever be again.

darthed1981

thegummy said:

TINMAN82 said:

@thegummy I’ve not seen a new (non sale) American standard/Pro Fender for £1000 for the best part of a decade.

Now you have.

They had an end of run Standard in my local PMT for £899 for ages actually, back in 2016.

Was all about LPs at the time so didn't really look twice but looked lovely

skullfunkerry

I’ve just read this whole thread and my head is aching now... around page 3 though I started feeling very happy about my pair of through-neck superstrats that combined cost me £708

Tenebrous

TINMAN82 said:

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

I mostly agree, but I'd just add two things.

1) Cost doesn't always equal higher quality, but it typically does if within the same style of guitars. Fender tend to do the best job of demonstrating value & consistent quality throughout the range, but some Les Pauls as an example are just dogs, & in many cases a well made Epiphone might very well be a much better guitar.

2) I'm also not sure it extends much past £1k either. You can get guitars with pretty much all the hardware one could desire for under a grand, & after that you're paying for production location or extras like nitro finishes.

I'd say the sweetspot is probably in the £500-800 range, depending on whether you're buying new or used. At that point, you can get pretty much everything you could want besides things like a nitro finish.

thegummy

TINMAN82 said:

I said non sale. Pretty sure that wasn’t the release price in 2016 (in fact that would’ve been the Am Std blowout after the Pro series was released). You can continue being pedantic but £1000 is not the going rate for an American Pro strat or tele in 2020 nor will it ever be again.

No, it's £1600 - that's the whole point of this thread and it's a ripoff.

thegummy

Tenebrous said:

TINMAN82 said:

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

I mostly agree, but I'd just add two things.

1) Cost doesn't always equal higher quality, but it typically does if within the same style of guitars. Fender tend to do the best job of demonstrating value & consistent quality throughout the range, but some Les Pauls as an example are just dogs, & in many cases a well made Epiphone might very well be a much better guitar.

2) I'm also not sure it extends much past £1k either. You can get guitars with pretty much all the hardware one could desire for under a grand, & after that you're paying for production location or extras like nitro finishes.

I'd say the sweetspot is probably in the £500-800 range, depending on whether you're buying new or used. At that point, you can get pretty much everything you could want besides things like a nitro finish.

Aye I was being generous saying a grand because that's what I paid for my American Strat a couple of years ago.

Take a couple of guitars in your 500-800 range - the Schecter Nick Johnston and the PRS SE 245. I don't think anyone would be able to explain what is lacking on those that a guitar costing double has.

A completely possible reason someone would believe something's better but not be able to say why is that they expect it to be better because it costs more so have a psychosomatic interpretation where it is actually better (hence not being able to say why).

But if they were handed 2 guitars they didn't know which was 800 and which was 2 grand (and nothing on the guitars gave that away visually) would they feel the 2 grand guitar was better? I really don't think so.

My first proper Strat was an American Standard, my second was a Player and the only thing better about the American was that the fretboard edges were rolled. If they did that on the Player and charged a tenner extra or whatever, it would be equal.

Tenebrous

thegummy said:

Tenebrous said:

TINMAN82 said:

Some on here doth protest too much, methinks.

I agree the new Am Pro 2 series seems over priced relative to what’s on offer. But you do get what you pay for with guitars, with a linear relationship between price and materials/ build quality up to a certain point. That point extends above £1k in my experience. Those who genuinely believe their unmodded squires are a match for the custom shop are applying as much cognitive dissonance as those forking out £6k for a heavy relic master built.

I mostly agree, but I'd just add two things.

1) Cost doesn't always equal higher quality, but it typically does if within the same style of guitars. Fender tend to do the best job of demonstrating value & consistent quality throughout the range, but some Les Pauls as an example are just dogs, & in many cases a well made Epiphone might very well be a much better guitar.

2) I'm also not sure it extends much past £1k either. You can get guitars with pretty much all the hardware one could desire for under a grand, & after that you're paying for production location or extras like nitro finishes.

I'd say the sweetspot is probably in the £500-800 range, depending on whether you're buying new or used. At that point, you can get pretty much everything you could want besides things like a nitro finish.

Aye I was being generous saying a grand because that's what I paid for my American Strat a couple of years ago.

Take a couple of guitars in your 500-800 range - the Schecter Nick Johnston and the PRS SE 245. I don't think anyone would be able to explain what is lacking on those that a guitar costing double has.

A completely possible reason someone would believe something's better but not be able to say why is that they expect it to be better because it costs more so have a psychosomatic interpretation where it is actually better (hence not being able to say why).

But if they were handed 2 guitars they didn't know which was 800 and which was 2 grand (and nothing on the guitars gave that away visually) would they feel the 2 grand guitar was better? I really don't think so.

My first proper Strat was an American Standard, my second was a Player and the only thing better about the American was that the fretboard edges were rolled. If they did that on the Player and charged a tenner extra or whatever, it would be equal.

Funnily enough, the fretwork on all my MIM guitars is better than the fretwork on my USA Troublemaker which cost 2-4x the price It's pretty crazy how good "budget" guitars have gotten.

Just to add a few more guitars into that £500-800 range, the Yamaha 611/612 specs are incredible on paper. Alder body, SD pickups, Gotoh locking tuners, Graphtech nut, Wilkinson bridge, Rosewood fingerboard, & the consistency of the ones I've played have all been spectacular.

Add to that superstrats like the MIJ RG550 ressiues or the MIM Charvel's. Alright the Charvel's lack the absolute best Floyd bridges & the RG550 pickups aren't to everyones taste, but everything else on those guitars is comparable to models costing 4x the price.

I enjoy my more expensive guitars just as I enjoy my super cheap refinished Squier & everything between the two extremes. Maybe the difference is more pronounced when looking at Gibson style guitars, because as a bolt on fanboy, I really don't see much value in spending four figures... (Despite that, I'm still likely to get an AZ2204 next year GAS is a funny thing).

TINMAN82

I’ve honestly never played a sub £1k guitar that is in the same league as my more expensive instruments. I currently have a custom shop Fender and Gibson, an MIJ Jem and a Martin. Fundamentally, I don’t view an instruments value through the lens of my own personal budget, which I think can influence perception.

Edit: long post cut short. I regret getting embroiled in this! Bias on all sides. If you’re happiest with the cheaper option, play on.

crunchman

thegummy said:

Aye I was being generous saying a grand because that's what I paid for my American Strat a couple of years ago.

Take a couple of guitars in your 500-800 range - the Schecter Nick Johnston and the PRS SE 245. I don't think anyone would be able to explain what is lacking on those that a guitar costing double has.

A completely possible reason someone would believe something's better but not be able to say why is that they expect it to be better because it costs more so have a psychosomatic interpretation where it is actually better (hence not being able to say why).

But if they were handed 2 guitars they didn't know which was 800 and which was 2 grand (and nothing on the guitars gave that away visually) would they feel the 2 grand guitar was better? I really don't think so.

My first proper Strat was an American Standard, my second was a Player and the only thing better about the American was that the fretboard edges were rolled. If they did that on the Player and charged a tenner extra or whatever, it would be equal.

Some of what I said above applies here.

I'm pretty sure the PRS SEs have softer fretwire than the US PRS guitars.  That's a significant difference.  If SEs have bird inlays, they are likely to be plastic.  The tuners on the US PRS are definitely better.  Some or all of the other hardware is probably better as well.  These days, new US PRS have nitro over catalysed acylic finish, while I'm pretty sure the SEs will be "poly".  Whether or not you think it makes any difference, the US finish will be more labour intensive - and will probably age better as well.

I've owned an SE, and it was a great guitar.  Technically I still own it - I lent it to my brother in law years ago but he never gave it back!  It's not the same as the US guitars though.

I own a Mexican Classic Series Strat and a US AVRI as well.  Again the hardware is a lot better on the US guitar.  For example, the pots on the Mexican guitar feel scratchy in comparison.  They probably won't last as long either.  The pickups are ok, but not great.  It won't age like the nitro finished US guitar.  I've had that about 17 years, and it's really starting to look good.  Admittedly, a US Standard/Pro isn't nitro finished so there isn't as big a difference with those.

Again, the Mexican guitar is a great guitar, and sounds better than a lot of more expensive ones, but it does have some shortcomings against the US guitar.

You could upgrade the hardware and pickupson the cheaper guitars and get close, but it would be hassle, and would eat up a lot of the price difference.

thegummy

crunchman said:

thegummy said:

Aye I was being generous saying a grand because that's what I paid for my American Strat a couple of years ago.

Take a couple of guitars in your 500-800 range - the Schecter Nick Johnston and the PRS SE 245. I don't think anyone would be able to explain what is lacking on those that a guitar costing double has.

A completely possible reason someone would believe something's better but not be able to say why is that they expect it to be better because it costs more so have a psychosomatic interpretation where it is actually better (hence not being able to say why).

But if they were handed 2 guitars they didn't know which was 800 and which was 2 grand (and nothing on the guitars gave that away visually) would they feel the 2 grand guitar was better? I really don't think so.

My first proper Strat was an American Standard, my second was a Player and the only thing better about the American was that the fretboard edges were rolled. If they did that on the Player and charged a tenner extra or whatever, it would be equal.

Some of what I said above applies here.

I'm pretty sure the PRS SEs have softer fretwire than the US PRS guitars.  That's a significant difference.  If SEs have bird inlays, they are likely to be plastic.  The tuners on the US PRS are definitely better.  Some or all of the other hardware is probably better as well.  These days, new US PRS have nitro over catalysed acylic finish, while I'm pretty sure the SEs will be "poly".  Whether or not you think it makes any difference, the US finish will be more labour intensive - and will probably age better as well.

I've owned an SE, and it was a great guitar.  Technically I still own it - I lent it to my brother in law years ago but he never gave it back!  It's not the same as the US guitars though.

I own a Mexican Classic Series Strat and a US AVRI as well.  Again the hardware is a lot better on the US guitar.  For example, the pots on the Mexican guitar feel scratchy in comparison.  They probably won't last as long either.  The pickups are ok, but not great.  It won't age like the nitro finished US guitar.  I've had that about 17 years, and it's really starting to look good.  Admittedly, a US Standard/Pro isn't nitro finished so there isn't as big a difference with those.

Again, the Mexican guitar is a great guitar, and sounds better than a lot of more expensive ones, but it does have some shortcomings against the US guitar.

You could upgrade the hardware and pickupson the cheaper guitars and get close, but it would be hassle, and would eat up a lot of the price difference.

The fretwire - is it worth paying over £2'500 quid extra (360% of the price lol) so that in 10 years or whatever you don't have to pay a couple hundred to have the frets replaced?

With the pots it's literally about a fiver for the set and pickups you're talking 200 quid even for the fanciest.

Can you really say it eats up a lot of the price difference to upgrade those parts? It's really a fraction of the price difference.

The other things you mention are aesthetic things and the aesthetic differences do change right the way up the price ladder, up to insane prices, it just depends what you like the look of. It was specifically the functional aspect that doesn't improve after that price, the aesthetic aspect quite clearly changes.

crunchman

thegummy said:

crunchman said:

thegummy said:

Aye I was being generous saying a grand because that's what I paid for my American Strat a couple of years ago.

Take a couple of guitars in your 500-800 range - the Schecter Nick Johnston and the PRS SE 245. I don't think anyone would be able to explain what is lacking on those that a guitar costing double has.

A completely possible reason someone would believe something's better but not be able to say why is that they expect it to be better because it costs more so have a psychosomatic interpretation where it is actually better (hence not being able to say why).

But if they were handed 2 guitars they didn't know which was 800 and which was 2 grand (and nothing on the guitars gave that away visually) would they feel the 2 grand guitar was better? I really don't think so.

My first proper Strat was an American Standard, my second was a Player and the only thing better about the American was that the fretboard edges were rolled. If they did that on the Player and charged a tenner extra or whatever, it would be equal.

Some of what I said above applies here.

I'm pretty sure the PRS SEs have softer fretwire than the US PRS guitars.  That's a significant difference.  If SEs have bird inlays, they are likely to be plastic.  The tuners on the US PRS are definitely better.  Some or all of the other hardware is probably better as well.  These days, new US PRS have nitro over catalysed acylic finish, while I'm pretty sure the SEs will be "poly".  Whether or not you think it makes any difference, the US finish will be more labour intensive - and will probably age better as well.

I've owned an SE, and it was a great guitar.  Technically I still own it - I lent it to my brother in law years ago but he never gave it back!  It's not the same as the US guitars though.

I own a Mexican Classic Series Strat and a US AVRI as well.  Again the hardware is a lot better on the US guitar.  For example, the pots on the Mexican guitar feel scratchy in comparison.  They probably won't last as long either.  The pickups are ok, but not great.  It won't age like the nitro finished US guitar.  I've had that about 17 years, and it's really starting to look good.  Admittedly, a US Standard/Pro isn't nitro finished so there isn't as big a difference with those.

Again, the Mexican guitar is a great guitar, and sounds better than a lot of more expensive ones, but it does have some shortcomings against the US guitar.

You could upgrade the hardware and pickupson the cheaper guitars and get close, but it would be hassle, and would eat up a lot of the price difference.

The fretwire - is it worth paying over £2'500 quid extra (360% of the price lol) so that in 10 years or whatever you don't have to pay a couple hundred to have the frets replaced?

With the pots it's literally about a fiver for the set and pickups you're talking 200 quid even for the fanciest.

Can you really say it eats up a lot of the price difference to upgrade those parts? It's really a fraction of the price difference.

The other things you mention are aesthetic things and the aesthetic differences do change right the way up the price ladder, up to insane prices, it just depends what you like the look of. It was specifically the functional aspect that doesn't improve after that price, the aesthetic aspect quite clearly changes.

You don't have to spend £2500 extra.  You can get S2s for just over £1100, or around £1300 for a gloss finish.  When a lot of the SEs are £800, I'd rather get the S2.  I really like the satin finish on some of the S2s.  The neck feels absolutely lovely once you have played it a bit.