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dporto

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Everything posted by dporto

  1. Store owners/managers/employees have been treating the "freebies" that come with new guitars as their "own personal little treasure chest" or "perks" for many years. Where do you think all those "extra" whammy bars, hex wrenches, crappy cords, soft cases, hard cases with the company name on them, etc.... come from? If they think they need to "throw something in" to sweeten the deal and make a sale they will, otherwise you get "oh no we throw all that stuff away because we don't have room to store it all" - I can't tell you how many times I've heard that one. I've called them on it a few times - even called them liars (not that it helped- usually at that point the thought of buying something is usually the last thing on my mind).
  2. So I just got this thing back as my buddy still says "the jack is bad" (BTW I plugged it in and it's fine...) so I popped the jack out cut the lead wire back a bit re-soldered it, and guess what? It's still fine! Ha... anyway, I thought I'd post some photo's...
  3. Phwew! That's quite a post! Where do I start...? 1st paragraph I suppose - Lots of people "ask" for prices upwards of new models, but I don't see a lot of evidence to show they get what they're asking. FWIW I just bought a new 339 (Chinese) and it's a great guitar...I only paid $299.00 for it so I don't doubt I could get way more than I paid but that doesn't really count does it? I've owned a DOT Deluxe for around 10 years now - excellent guitar that I paid around $379.00 for with a nice gig bag (I believe it came from the Sean factory? - "I" precedes the serial#) - point being I rarely see this model go for any more than around $399.00 or so, many with hardshell cases. For my money a $20.00 return on a 10 yr. investment is not a good investment...Good guitar yes...Good investment no. Second paragraph: Really? Instinctively? I don't believe there is anything "instinctive" about facts as they relate to a Musical instrument manufacturer. As for my "generalizations" being "not always true when put into practice"...Uh, that's why they're called "generalizations"... You're clearly one of the people fomenting the very marketing BS I spoke of in my first post - hence your somewhat feeble defense contained herein. What do you consider a decent profit? Like I said in the previous paragraph, I've been watching prices on epiphones in general for at least the past 10 yrs.(when I bought my DOT in '02) and I haven't seen prices appreciate by any real margin. You state that "people continue to sell them profitably on ebay" Do you have any data to support that claim? How do you know how much profit anybody is making on ebay? I would venture to say that MANY people sell (all types of mechandise) for less than what they paid for it (this isn't rocket science btw.). Third paragraph: Uh, yhea I get that...incase you didn't notice, that's exactly what I was doing - discussing the differences in quality and desirability within the Epiphone market for my own amusement... Color me amused
  4. I think the bottom line is that Epiphone's are "production guitars"... IE. for all intents and purposes they're never going to be "collectible" so to speak, regardless of the factory or country or wherever else they were made - that's all just second hand marketing BS! There are just way too many of them out there. If it's a good guitar, it's a good guitar period. The shortcomings of many Epiphones (as well as any low/mid priced production guitar)are well documented (electronics, QC, etc.) and will continue regardless of origin. It's just the reality of producing large #'s of instruments. Caveat Emptor - do your homework and you should be able to find a good one that should give you many years of reliable service. Don't expect to sell it for any more than you originally paid for it - more likely you'll get less than you paid regardless of what mod's you've made to it. Good luck and go play!
  5. Your chances of finding that "control plate" (especially pre-wired) are pretty slim I think. Just remove the knobs/pots and polish it up (The knobs are removed by loosening the allen head set screw, The pots are removed by loosening the 12/13mm nut - hold the plate in a vice or with a pair of vice grips - use a piece of cardboard in the jaws to protect the metal and finish). If you really want to go all out, you could have it re-plated but why bother? - it doesn't look too bad. Good Luck
  6. A bound neck has a different feeling than an unbound one (not better or worse, just different). I've got many guitars both bound and unbound - I play them all to different degrees, but I can say unequivocally that there is a difference in feel. The biggest difference that covering the fret ends with the binding makes (besides looking different and really bad if not well done) is that if you need a fret job, it'll cost you about $100.00 more if the neck is bound this way.
  7. Looks nice. I own a DOT ('02 Korean "deluxe" model with "designed by Gibson" Alnico pickups)and the newer ES 339 Pro (bound neck and coil taps - along with a smaller body of course). If I would have had the choice for the "pro" model at the time I purchased the dot, I probably would have jumped on it. While I really like my dot the way it is, the bound neck and the coil taps are very nice features and worth the $100.00 premium IMO.
  8. I just did some work on one of these for a friend of mine. he said it had some issues with the output jack. It turns out it was just a loud buzzing, the jack itself was fine (obviously humbuckers shouldn't do this though). Well after pulling the guts out and re-flowing all the solder joints, and hitting the switch and pots with a little de-oxit it turns out she's fine! Dressed/polished the frets, and it's reay to rock once more! VERY nice guitar, plays and sounds beautiful!
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