What to upgrade first?

By the way, the genre's that I play are punkrock (real punkrock) some metal.. examples: Led Zep, Nirvana, Sex Pistols, Gray matter, Vines, Metallica etc..

If reasonably satisfied with your guitar, I'd recommend doing the amp -- that's where the biggest tonal upgrade is usually found. If you are thinking of moving from single coils to 'buckers, you might consider a pup swap in your Squier, as well -- then you sort of would be doing both guitar and amp for not much more money than the amp ... but again, only if you like your Squier.

-Greg

Well, ive never really had any other guitar, so I dont have anything to compare my current one to. You suggested putting buckers in my squier strat, I would have to get the body cut to do that, so I dont think its really worth it on a squier. Im still not sure wether I should upgrade my amp or guitar first.. :(

:wink: Depends on how much money you have to spend, I have a Marshall MG100DFX for $475 but you could go with a Marshall MG50DFX for around $300, I would go with the AMP first then guitar, Epiphone LP100 would sound good with the Marshall they seem to work very well together, I think you can get the Epiphone LP100 for around $200 or $250

:D

I would get the amp first. Like Greg said, that would be your biggest tonal difference. You'll be surprised how good your guitar really sounds. I have my Squire hooked up to a Fender HotRod Deluxe and the guitar does sound good. After playing the Squire stock for a while, I desided to change the pups in it.

You suggested putting buckers in my squier strat, I would have to get the body cut to do that, so I dont think its really worth it on a squier. :(

I have a Squire that I put in

2-humbuckings, Both single coil size so you DON"T have to router out any extra cavites. And 1-neck pup.

What does modest budget mean?

i say the guitar dude....wtf is the point of getting a new amp when ur guitar still sounds like shit

i say the guitar dude....wtf is the point of getting a new amp when ur guitar still sounds like poop

It's a common mistake to blame the guitar ("It's just a Squier, dude, it must be bad."), when actually the amp sucks.

Cheap guitar + good amp => good tones possible

Great guitar + crappy amp => neverending crappola

If the cheap guitar is a good player and has good intonation, keep it.

I'd go with the amp too, with similar logic to Greg's...

Bad guitar + better amp = better sound... you sure won't get worse sound

Better guitar + bad amp = marginally better sound. Depending on what it is with the amp that's limiting your tone, you might not even be able to hear a difference.

But there's one big qualifier - you eventually want to move from a Strat copy to a Les Paul copy. You've probably got single coils now, and the change to humbuckers, plus the added sustain that comes from the weight of the LP style will give you a radically different sound. So, if you're unhappy with the sustain, or with hum that you've narrowed down to the pickups, swap out the axe. Otherwise, do the amp.

Get the amp.

You are probably getting to the stage where you will want to start playing with others. You may meet some people and decide to start a band. You are going to need a good amp for that. Your Squier will sound much better than you think through a good amp. But the best guitar will not sound very good through a cheap amp.

By the way, you CAN get humbuckers the size of single coils. Got them on my Strat right now.

How much do you have to spend??

Definitely amp. Squiers are ok, and you don't really *need* to upgrade it (although we all dream of that one custom guitar, right?). Those starter amps, however, are total crap. One of the amps I am most impressed with is the Vox Valvetronix series. The AD30VT or AD60VT (220 and 480 USD respectively) are easily worth their money, and about as much tonal quality and variety as you could hope to get.

Thanks very much for the response guys. I have decided i'm gunna go with the amp first. I wouldn't want to spend over £275, I dont really want anything fancy anyway, I would like to just keep it simple. Any suggestions for a particular Marshall amp?

Thanks,
NYN

By the way, could anyone give me a basic lesson on amps, ive heard alot about pre-amps, heads, stacks, etc, What are all of these things, and whats the difference between them?

Thanks again
NYN

PS. For future reference, I have found an LP100 for £200 on http://www.regentguitars.co.uk/acatalog/Les_Paul_Collection.html
This is the cheapest i've found so far, if anyone see's one for less, please give me a shout. I know its not the best idea to buy guitars without trying them, but I'm not really in a great spot for music shops unfortuantly.

If your budget is 275GBP, don't get a marshall. There is really no marshall sound to be found in those MG and AVT amps, and you pay a truckload just for the brandname. In your pricerange, I would go for the Vox AD30VT, hands down. It simply sounds that good. Other amps worth mentioning:

Peavey Bandit 112
Randall RG 75
Zoom Fire 30
Fender FM65r
Behringer GMX212
Line6 Spider II (I HATE them, others love them)
Behringer V-ampire (same here)

Some techno-talk:

Pre-amp: the first stage in amplifying the signal coming from your guitar. In all the amps mentioned above the pre-amp is where you shape your sound. All those treble, bass, mid, gain etc knobs influence the pre-amp stage.

However, when the signal leaves the pre-amp, it should sound grand but noone can hear it yet. That's why we need a poweramp. A transistor amp simply makes the sound from the pre-amp louder. A tube poweramp actually changes the sound, depending on the level of PA tube saturation. Note that the Vox actually does have tube saturation, but that's an entirely different story.

Now we need a speaker, since we still don't hear anything. If you have a pre-amp, power-amp and speaker(s) in one box, we call it a combo. You plug your guitar in, and sound comes out of it. A stack consist of a seperate pre/poweramp (these two can be in seperate units or in one unit), and seperate speaker cabinets. Remember those huge marshall towers? That are stacks. Use two 4x12" cabs and you have a stack. Use one cab and you have a half-stack. Since the pre/poweramp are on top of the cabinets, we call those head. So cabinets+head=stack.

With your budget, go for a combo.