Looking for a new guitar

I have been playing a Cort guitar for a little while now, although I am very much a beginner still. Anyway the guitar has been good to me up until now. I want a bigger sound from my guitar now, more sustain, more punch and the Cort just doesn't deliver it, or I can't get it out of it. I am taking it to a tech to have a look at it though.

Anyway I have been visiting guitar shops for the past 6 weeks or so in an effort to find something around the $1000 range. I have played Taylors, Martins, Larrivees, Epiphone, Guild, Takamine, Seagull, S&P, and a Gibson J-45, just because it was there. :lol:

After my first outing I had ruled out the Martin, Taylor and Larrivee as being too thin sounding, no oomph. I liked the Epi AJ-500 and the Guild GAD-50. The S&P CW in cedar was real nice too. I asked at the shop if they could bring in an Epi AJ in the vintage sunburst for me to look at and play because I thought I was going to fall in love with the colour and I liked the sound of the natural one that I played previous.

Today was the day. What a let down. The guitar looked like a toy shop guitar and it didn't sound much better. It was very thin sounding with no resonance which I know could be the setup. Anyway I was a bit disappointed and wandered around the store some more, reaching for some of the ones I had done earlier and the results surprised me.

Today the Taylor won hands down. It's just a DM, but it was crisp and bright with good sustain, second was the Larrivee LV-03 (used), sounded very full as if it had opened up somewhat, last today was the AJ I had played before which was the reason I wanted to look at the burst one.

Now I have no idea what I want.

I will keep playing and I guess pull the trigger on something that sounds good and plays well on the day that my credit card is willing to accept something new.

Anybody else run into this?

Case