Keepitclean said:
Phoenix09215 said:
But yeah if your going Epiphone i would go for an Imitation SG maby?
DasUberCow said:
I suggest an Epiphone SG. Reasonable price as well as good sound.
How far behind the quality of the Gibson are they?
Not very. In a blind A-B listening test you'd be hard pressed to tell the Epi SG and a Gibson apart. In fact, to be honest I much prefer the Epi SGs over the Gibsons just because the Gibson SGs all have chunky cricket-bat necks like a Les Paul and the Epi SGs have slightly thinner ones. The Epi SG model to get is the G-400, it has the best quality pickups and hardware plus a set neck as opposed to the bolt-on necks of the other models. They normally retail for about $600-700AU but you should be able to get one for $500 if you shop around secondhand or find a new one on special.
I don't recommend ever paying over $1000AU for an electric - anything above that price and you're paying for the name on the headstock, not the actual quality of the instrument. A great player will sound great with any crappy instrument, and a shitty player will still sound shitty holding a $5000 guitar, so prioritise in terms of what looks cool, sounds nice and feels good in your hands.
Set necks vs bolt-on - well, bolt-ons are prone to going out of tune a little more, because there's always a bit of movement in the "bolt" area. That's the only real difference of worth.
Forget Godin - out of your price range. Ibanez RG series is decent, SA series is also good - a little more money but if you find one on special - nice guitars. Jackson and BC Rich also do reasonable budget instruments. Personally I'd go the Epi though. You're almost always better off going for the high-end model of a budget brand, than the low-end model of a prestige brand.