buying guitars that you've never played _online

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controlled_voltage

controlled_voltage

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i have been saddled with enough amazon gift cards that I can afford a new guitar,but the thought of dropping 1300 bucks on a guitar i never played is daunting.
if i turn the cards into cash thru a service i lose about 2-300 dollars.

i once before had this same issue and bought THE most pimped out i_phone available and sold to get the cash it but it was a real pain in the ass and couldn't believe how many scammers popped up.
it also took me 2 months to sell the phone,

i will make sure i can return whatever it is that I buy but this is a first for me.
i'm leaning towards an Ibanez Koa rg prestiege;
thoughts?
thanks
 
controlled_voltage":3q5kc9bo said:
i have been saddled with enough amazon gift cards that I can afford a new guitar,but the thought of dropping 1300 bucks on a guitar i never played is daunting.
if i turn the cards into cash thru a service i lose about 2-300 dollars.

i once before had this same issue and bought THE most pimped out i_phone available and sold to get the cash it but it was a real pain in the ass and couldn't believe how many scammers popped up.
it also took me 2 months to sell the phone,

i will make sure i can return whatever it is that I buy but this is a first for me.
i'm leaning towards an Ibanez Koa rg prestiege;
thoughts?
thanks
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I guess I'd try to post "info needed" here and see what everyone else's opinion is on the guitar you're looking at..I'm with you, I always stay with brands that I'm familiar with like Charvel, Jackson, Hamer and Ibanez. ESP is a brand that I've always wanted to try but I finally played a nice Jap MII, and the neck is too thin for me.
Guitars are so personal and jumping in without playing is daunting. I tried a Washburn USA a few times and the neck profiles were night and day from each other. The first was a 93 MG120, great shredder neck but the truss rod was broken. Back it went. Picked up a 95 MG104, and it had an LP baseball bat neck, couldn't play it without turning my wrist lol.
 
Personally I don't know how anyone would buy a guitar they couldn't play. The exact same model will just feel and sound different in my experience. Others may have a totally different attitude...but I could not ever purchase something without playing it and feeling how it plays in my hands.
 
So what exactly is your question and plan? You want to buy a guitar to turn around and sell 2nd hand to get cash? If you you are better off trading in your cards for cash and take the $250 cut.

I have no problem buying a guitar online. In fact I'd prefer that over buying something from a local dealer that has had something swinging on their wall for 60 days, has been handled multiple times per day by idiots that can't afford it anyway with their greasy sausage fingers, and is still trying to be sold to you as "new." Give me the one that just came into the warehouse and is still in the box. A quality guitar should be pretty similar from one to the next being the same model and all produced around the same time frame, at least we could presume.

But, I'm not real picky. I usually buy stuff and at best just check to make sure everything works and then decide if I actually like it once I get it home. If it's a dud or I don't like it, back on the chopping block it goes.
 
ZachMN":3ugidj6g said:
Personally I don't know how anyone would buy a guitar they couldn't play.
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That assumes you have the option to play the guitars you want before you buy them. If you live in a less well served area, you have no option but to buy before you try. For example, up here it's all Fender, Gibson and PRS. Unless I want to get on a plane, I have to buy Suhr, Anderson and Jackson 'remotely'..
 
I'd buy the guitar online as well. I'd Find something I've been wanting to try out, get it NIB and give it a rip. If you love it great, if not, sell for wha you can get for it...probably a few hundred off new price which is what you'd lose in a card swap anyway. At leAst you get to try the guitar first.

My .02.
 
I must've owned 30+ guitars over the years, bought all but two online.....one of the guitars I bought in person turned out to be a dud but that was my fault because I never researched that Ibanez was putting shitty trems on them at the time / early made in *KOREA* days.

If you are buying NIB then it may be worth buying from somewhere that has a return policy for piece of mind.

In all my buying, have only returned two guitars...one damaged in transit and one manufacturing defect.

If you are looking at Ibby Prestige, these are wonderful (as is the Koa one you mentioned) :

Ibanez_RG652AHM-NGB_zpsj94jcxm6.jpg
 
Every guitar i own i bought/ordered eight unseen. On most of them i have endured well over six months build times. I have a specific neck carve, body style and pickup layout i love,and I have mostly stuck with that. I never see ANYTHING in a store i really want because I have become so particular. My stuff is pretty much purpose built for my needs.

In a way,it is kinda sad. I don't enjoy playing anything else but my guitars. I can't window shop. I don't get horned up by someone's NGD thread. Other than seeing a beautiful top or pretty finish or custom paint job...it's just kinda...meh.

On the other hand,I totally dig my guitars and never want to let them go or even get another one anymore.
 
Nothing wrong with buying online/sight unseen so long as you know what you want and it has the specs etc you are looking for. The high end stuff is very consistent so I have no worries. In your price range why not get an LTD of some sorts by ESP and be done with it. For the money they are nice guitars.
 
Buy it through guitar center online or used. Good return policy if needed. I've only returned one guitar, and it was an explorer I bought through them. It was a nice guitar but I couldn't get along with the shape and where my forearm rested. They took it back no problem. My other two main guitars I bought online without trying them, but I made sure I got a good enough deal on them to afford to put them in the shop and get fretwork/nut cut, etc, and not lose my ass on them.
 
Every guitar I own at the moment except 1 that I bought local off Craigslist, I bought or traded for online. But it really depends on you, how picky you are or aren't. I normally expect to add new strings, clean it up and set it up to my liking. I actually enjoy that and it's part of the experience of getting new gear for me. I think these days, it seems (at least my impression) that most people buy higher end guitars online rather than in stores.

If you are really worried about it, maybe buy and Amp or some studio monitors or something like that and flip it. Those are pretty much like buying a book online rather than buying clothes that might not fit.
 
I went thru 25+ guitars over the last few years, just trading and trying stuff out; all but two were traded/bought online without ever trying them out...some just weren't available in my area but some were complete customs that I would have had no way of trying except for actually ordering from the luthier, waiting for the build etc...

You really shouldn't expect perfection, but you'll more than likely get something decent that you can set up to your liking.
 
I have bought sight unseen over 20 times, but that is because I play lefty. 99% of the time you can't walk into a store and try something so it's basically order something and wait 6+ months or buy it online and hope its worth it.

The only negative type experience I ever had was buying my dream guitar: PRS Custom 24. Always wanted one but could never try one in person. Ordered it from an online store in Canada and had it shipped to me here in Australia. Cost me nearly $4500AUD all up. Beautiful guitar but when I played it, it was never comfortable and I just couldn't gel with it. Ended up trading to a fellow lefty for an awesome CS ESP MII and an nice acoustic.
 
I never thought about it much, but almost every guitar I own I bought this way. My two best/favorites that I currently own, a Hamer Monaco Elite and PRS CU24, were bought on-line without playing them. To be really honest, I don't know if this is good or not, but I seem to do it a lot and reading these posts I'm not alone! I bought a JP 7 string that way and a PRS Tremonti. All of those guitars are/were fantastic.
 
I've bought nearly all of my guitars except for three of them in person. Two out of the three were great, so that my experience online.

I will say that in all of the guitars I've owned, one of the guitars that I've had the longest was my Ibanez RG. I received a MIM Fender Strat from my parents when I had just learned how to play, and I told them "I need a humbucker guitar cuz I play Heavy Metal", so I exchanged my Strat for my Ibanez RG in Jewel Blue. I have tried to sell it a couple of times, but every time I post it up, i take the ad down. I love how fast this guitar is, but years of playing it have resulted in what feels like tendinitis because my hands are huge, and the neck is so thin.

I really wish I had that Strat back (midnight blue with maple neck and fretboard), but this RG is a great guitar too. Probably more useful in the long run...

Started off as Jewel Blue with black hardware, but when one of the saddles broke, I replaced all the hardware with gold...



 
raz311":2yvadwdt said:
I have bought sight unseen over 20 times, but that is because I play lefty. 99% of the time you can't walk into a store and try something so it's basically order something and wait 6+ months or buy it online and hope its worth it.

The only negative type experience I ever had was buying my dream guitar: PRS Custom 24. Always wanted one but could never try one in person. Ordered it from an online store in Canada and had it shipped to me here in Australia. Cost me nearly $4500AUD all up. Beautiful guitar but when I played it, it was never comfortable and I just couldn't gel with it. Ended up trading to a fellow lefty for an awesome CS ESP MII and an nice acoustic.
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My Les Paul, my Strat, and my Fender acoustic were all purchased "sight unseen". Like you, I play lefty. Most GCs have a few token lefty guitars - and they are usually lower-class denizens.

I would guess (and it's actually that, a guess) lefty guitars are a niche market. I am guessing they are not flipped and sold as much as righty guitars.
 
I've had good luck buying sight unseen. But my favorite guitar is one I picked out from a bunch of Heritage 535s. Jay Wolfe was the closest dealer so I made a couple hour drive and tried a bunch but wasn't feeling it. It wasn't until I was about to leave empty-handed that he broke out 'the one' . It was sent straight from Kalamazoo to Jay Glaser in Nashville who had a fancy new machine (at the time) called a PLEK. He yanked the original frets and PLEK'd it with new SS frets. It was no contest between that 535 and every other.
 
I rarely buy brand new and buy used. I bought plenty of guitars I never touched before I bought them. If you get fair deals on used you won't lose any money of you don't bond with it. I've bought 3 LP's (2 CS RI's) and a CS Tele without touching them
 
Guitar Center has a thing were they take gift cards as payment. You will lose some value. Id just buy from Amazon and check the return policy. I have bought 1 guitar from a store in the last 10 years. All the rest have been online. The stores around me have shit in stock.
 
Don't do it. I did it and regret it. Bought a BC Mockingbird Pro and it sounds great, but it I never bonded with the playability.
 
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