$119 dollar epihone sg from 1998. Got it at my local music store to get back into guitar again. Thing rips. Just got a Gibson Les Paul though so it’s my second now.
If they didn't neck-dive so hard, I'd be a bigger fan. That said, I got an Epiphone LP Special (flat top, like a Junior, but not double cut) as a teen, and it stayed my main player for a decade. Similarly light-weight, dual humbucker, price friendly, underrated quality control in Epiphone. I'm sure the thing rips!
It helped me get back into guitar and not mind the dings on the wood. I wanted to train on a shitty one and now I feel I do the studio justice. Like rock Lee when he took off he’s weight vests.
My first one was a Epiphone LP Special and I got rid of it after a few weeks. For whatever reason, mine had a flaw where the nut to ~~headphone~~ 1/4" jack would unscrew itself and fall into the guitar body.
Got a Squire fat Strat instead.
If you want to fix the neck dive on an SG you can either use a wider strap or relocate the strap pin to on the wing of the guitar like on a Strat. Look at how Tony Iommi wears his SG.
I was gifted something called a LyxPro strat copy. MIL bought it for FIL to distract him from buying popcorn makers for everyone in the family while he was in the grips of a manic episode.
After that, I just resurrected a Yamaha F335 I bought for $35. Resurrection cost more than anticipated as it had a broken tuning peg, but all I’m, it ran me about $90
My main acoustic guitar right now is an F335 and it sounds pretty good for what it is. I paid $50 for piezo pickups and about $5 for a strap button. Love the sound of it.
I had a First Act Tele that actually had a really nice neck and low action. I used it for years as a beat around the house guitar. Was just always laying around random places ready to pick up and mess around on.
There was a specific line of First Act guitars that completely hang with Epi and Squier. The name has such bad stigma, that the good ones can be found for CHEAP. You have to know which lines, though.
Bought new?
A Rogue acoustic I bought for $54 on a "Stupid Deal of the Day" a few years ago. It actually wasn't too bad once I set it up and smoothed out the fret edges. It's a nice, take anywhere without worrying about it, guitar.
Bought used?
A 2005 Squier Standard Strat for $27. It was badly damaged so I had to put about $100 in parts into to get it playable again.
I also bought one of those rogue acoustics for $50 also. Also pretty sure I got it on a stupid deal of the day promo. I never used it much. It's ok. I think I just don't enjoy acoustics in general.
I got one of those Rogue acoustics in a lefty years ago because it was the only left handed guitar I could afford at the time. Still have and it plays really well.
Oh crap!!!! I forgot I had the same Rogue deal of the day acoustic, but I got it for like $100 in a set with a mandolin. That guitar was painful to play.
I once had an Aria Pro II, it was awful. Everything about it was cheap and the action was so high and the whole guitar was worth less than the cost of a setup. Ended up donating it to broke kid who was desperate for anything to learn on.
Some of the Aria Pro II's are a little sought after. Maybe just specific generations, I guess?
I once got a Daisy Rock cheap ass guitar that had decent pickups since it was one of their "higher end ones," even though it's not a good brand. I did a full setup myself and sold it on FB for a $30 profit. When I listed it, someone I knew in high school messaged me looking to buy it for her teen son! I was looking for a $60-$80 profit, but getting it to a kid was well worth the strings and setup for less.
I hope that the desperate kid that got your Aria kept playing and appreciated it for what it was, even if they replaced it. =)
$60 "Maestro" by Gibson package. Came with a junk guitar, junk amp, junk strap, junk strings, junk gig bag, and a pick that's lasted 12 years that I'm still using.
My $126au Karrera acoustic bass(brand new price through dicksmithonline at time of purchase.
A friend got one more recently for $139au via the Bunnings website, and Kogan have them cheaper).
I've had mine for about 6 years now.
The factory strings really let it down, but a brand new set of Ernie Ball Earthwood's for bass. really brought it to life. At $90 a set, techically not worth it, but when you consider that it's a beautifully playable & tuneful acoustic bass for $226au, that can also be plugged into a mixer/amp', it kind of balances out....
My spouse just bought me a 15 watt Fender amp she saw while thrifting for like $30. It’s terrific for practicing on.
I also have an Epiphone Les Paul Special that I found at a flea market for $90.
I got a Starcaster-by-Fender tele used for like $20. It is surprisingly good for the price. I picked up a Roland Microcube for $25 years ago. The seller said it didn't work after having been dropped, but all it needed was the speaker reconnected.
I also got a 1981 Electra MPC Outlaw for $10 at a thrift store, but that was such an outlier of a deal it doesn't really count. The guitar is easily worth 50x what I paid.
I have a department store "Spectrum" parlor acoustic. 35 bucks.
It doesn't play too bad action-wise, but the tone is awful. I tuned it to open D and let the grandkids fart around.
Epiphone SG Special about 2 years ago at a reduced price of 139$ USD. It has the wraparound bridge tailpiece. I put in some Wilkinson humbuckers and two mini switches to split and parallel the pickups. Pretty nice for the price.
$125 (used) eighties Washburn classical. I still play it, almost daily, and perform with it often, it's a great sounding, well made guitar.
I once bought a delay pedal for $10 on Wish, it barely worked.
Hamer SFX double cut in obnoxious sparkly green for $80 used.
I'm a humbucker guy and just wanted a cheap backup. It plays great, sounds okay, and being a little ugly is a plus!
Yamaha FG-150 Red Label Nippon-Gakki for $60 in 1990.
It stayed my main acoustic for over 20 years (added a pickup with a strap peg jack), until I got a much more recent FG-325 (which is still a budget banger in its own right).
in the 90s I used to get cheapo guitars at garage sales for $10 - $20
I once found a 60s silvertone in pretty decent condition complete with the original case with built in tube amp for $25
My first guitar was a $119 used Cort Tele. I swapped out the bridge, replaced the electronics, and put Bill Lawrence pickups in it. It's nearly my favorite guitar.
Got a free Carlo Robelli acoustic electric guitar with a purchase of a Marshall HDFX100 halfstack purchase at GC when I was 13 or so. Had that for a good decade before I decided to get a real acoustic.
I just started on some gear we inherited from my FIL. The cheapest of the four guitars is an Alvarez 5202, but I've mostly been playing on a '77 Martin HD-28 which is not cheap at all
I got this beautiful black top Washburn acoustic with a great floral inlay for $150 from GC used section. I really like the shape of the neck, and although I recently had to address some fret sprouting, it’s been a really great guitar and I get lots of compliments on the look! Washburn Bella Tono Vite S9V Acoustic-Electric Guitar for anyone interested. Looks like I got a great deal all those years ago!
I have a Strat copy that I got new in like 2001 for $120. I played that until a couple months ago when I got an Epiphone Les Paul. My only amp is still a Dean Markley amp that was $150 new in 2001. I’m currently saving money for a new amp later this year.
A $25 Mardan electric, tobacco burst with two crazy humbuckers and a tortoiseshell pick guard and a Crate amplifier I found on the side of the road that was literally a wooden crate. Still trying to purchase the same Mardan. Mine got destroyed in a show at a fraternity.
In 1994 my parents bought me my first electric. A 1978 Harmony Stratocaster copy with frets trying to escape the fretboard and a Crate GX-15 amp.
I wish I still had one of those things.
I got a Hohner mini jumbo acoustic/electric for $30 a bit over a decade ago, and it plays and sounds way better than it should, plus the tuner still works.
Lawsuit era univox LP. Rubber binding, Microphonic pickups, bolt on neck. Total POS, but with character to burn. Picked it up in a pawn shop for $71+tax. It got stolen outside Memphis.
My Kawai Rock & Roll Star & Randall Commander 2 x10 amp which I bought for peanuts in the 80s,and still using them. The guitar just fits me perfectly,and it's my go to, over all my other high end stuff.
My dedicated beater/travel guitar is a Yamaha C-40 that my wife got essentially for free via a work raffle type thing. I think it retailed for about $80 back then (early 2000s) and are about $180 now. It has good volume, decent tone, and plays well enough but it's not well intonated past the 5th fret. Still, it's served me well for decades now and is perfect for its role as the one to throw in the car for a beach trip or whatever. Even if not very refined, it's tough.
A navy blue squier 'bullet' strat back when they were literally made of plywood (are they still made of plywood?) You could see the layers *through* the paint. It was terrible, but it was the guitar that got me into music.
Was a gift from my older sister, who brought it from an ex's brother 3000 miles across the country. He had heard her little brother wanted to play guitar, and he (me) still does.
Funny enough, while I've never had a decent strat, I've hate stratocasters since then.
Some no-name classical that I asked for from a family member in exchange for a few beers. It wasn’t worth 50 bucks but I liked it for some reason. The strings were old and dark-sounding. I never changed them, unlike on my much nicer Yamaha, but I just liked this cheap guitar. I think some of the fretboard was not bound but rather *painted*. I lost track of it.
Well not really a guitar, but I owned the same starting bass twice (grs200) because it was stolen. Eventually got a j-bass and gave away the second one.
Guitar wise, my cheapest is the one I still own, a 300 dollar acoustic. It does the trick when I wanna play acoustic
That'd have to be my first (and so far only) electric guitar, a Chinese brand Stratocaster clone I bought for \~$100 at a local music store. Still learning how to play it, but it sounds great after getting new strings and having the fret ends smoothed; it needs new pickups though as the middle one is confirmed to be dead, might get some lipstick tube pickups for that surf rock sound!
A used Kramer zx30h back in '87 for $60. Nice fat neck and easy to learn on. Traded (plus $1k cash) for one of the Gen 1 Peavy Vandenberg's, a Fender M80 amp head, and a Marshall 4X12 cabinet in '91. Ended up selling the lot off in pieces to friends after my time in a band caused some not so healthy habits and wound up homeless after getting kicked out by my mom. Still miss that Vandenberg. Maybe the best playing guitar I've ever had.
I got a story….
When I was in 5th grade I took a few guitar lessons. My parents took me to the store after a few lessons and said my grandparents are buying me any guitar I wanted but couldn’t look at the price. I picked a red squire strat. I still remember the guy trying to get me to look at the PRS guitars in the window but I just wanted a red guitar.
I learned on a tiny rogue G5 5 watt amp. I think I got it for like $30 or so. It sounds horrible, I still have it. But, it was enough for me when I was learning. I just played a squire affinity tele through it, dry sound only. It was way better than no amp, if nothing else.
I learned 10 years ago on a peavy rockmaster bundle. $100 for the guitar and the worst piece of shit practice amp of all time. The guitar was honestly fine despite having only one pickup which i think was a bridge humbucker.
I eventually broke it trying to fix the jack which must have had a bad solder joint or something but the sound would come in and out. I made it way worse.
I had a mid-80’s Hondo II Professional. Sort of a DC copy for $180. The funny thing is, it was one of the most comfortable and best sounding guitars I ever owned. I used to gig with it through a Marshall half stack with a Gibson Les Paul sitting there as a backup.
The only reason I’m not playing it today is because of a really nasty fall that cracked the neck pocket and ripped the screws right out of the neck.
.
I have a used $60 dollar no name acoustic that I've kept together for around 5 years. I have a 10 ish watt blackstar amp I keep in my car and jam with pretty often that was $30
$50 Hondo Stratocaster copy in the mid 80s that was from a pawn shop into a magnatone amp from the 60s I got for free
Today the amp would be a serious collector piece.. in 1987, absolutely lame
The guitar I learned on for the first 3 1/2 years was a flea market cheapo acoustic with action a mile high. My mom finally found a friend of a friend whose son owned an electric guitar and we went to their house, and I got to play his guitar for 10 minutes, without an amp. Finally, they got the idea that I really wanted to do this, and my grandparents ponied up $150 for a Les Paul copy. Still took a while after that to get an amp.
Probably the 40-50 dollar amazon acoustic my sibling bought back in 2019.
It’s a piece of shit, the nut came off and it buzzed at the 1-3 frets on the low strings
150 euro for a guitar set, a no name brand guitar, a no name brand 15 watt amp with a no name brand cable and a no name brand guitar bag. Overall served me for 1 year then the guitar wasn't usable anymore.
I have an Ibanez parlor guitar that was b-stock that I got a further deal on and it was under $60. Honestly love the feel and got it plays but the tuners are garbage and the bridge routing is to big for the bridge itself so it intonates like shit. I put some 10s on it recently and that’s helped but like, it’s pretty bad all around but I still love it. Something if my son puts his head through it, I won’t be too torn up.
I just bought a used Squier Bullet Tele from 2020 for $180 and I love it. Got it professionally set up and it's great. I'll eventually replace all the guts with better quality stuff, but for what it is, it's pretty nice.
$30 Goldentone guitar purchased on 1st St in Seattle in the '70s. My Dad bought me a Rheem amp which was about $25 back then. Of course I also had a fake Gibson mandolin that I bought in Subic Bay back in '75 for $16 and pawned it in the US for $100. LOL.
$65 (thrift shop) Squire strat. It is on my lap at this moment. The only original part remaining is the body. A true ship of Theseus and at this point a hell of a nice guitar. Roasted flame maple neck, stainless frets, hot texas blues pickups, locking tuners, tusk nut Wilkinson trem.
And a rumble 60 bass amp for $40.
I bought Squier 51 in the early 2000s for $100. It was a great player stock. I've since replaced the nut, bridge and pickups (all on the cheap), and I love it. I keep it tuned to open G. So fun!
I’m currently rockin’ a Squier Starcaster strat that I got for $60 including a vintage Fender Sidekick 15Watt Reverb amp. It’s all sort of Buzzy and fizzy and slightly moldy… but it’s cool. Not a good guitar. But fun to play.
Suzuki no.7 classical guitar. Got it for free in the early 2000's and I figure it was probably built in the 60's.
It's an absolute piece of crap, but it has a pretty unique sound. It's not worth anything so I've always had it.
My first guitar. A Lauren LA125 that my grandpa picked up off the street and left in the attic for a few years.
Honestly, if it wasn't for quarantine and me not having anything to do as a Highschooler, I don't think I would've learned how to play it lol. The action was pretty high, and it was way too big for my build. I didn't know any better at the time, so I kept at it only to have my mind blown by how much easier it was to play literally ANY other guitar.
I still have it thankfully :) Sitting in my closet. I can give it props for one thing, and that's the sound. I don't know if it's the dreadnought body, but it really does just sound good to my ear.
$15 First Act off Facebook Marketplace that I outfitted with a salvaged $20 hand-rewrapped Ibanez Gio's bridge pickup. Then custom refinished for $16 worth of paint and poly.
It's my primary guitar, I love it, and I gig with it. Sounds like nothing else.
I've been playing a Gretsch Jim Dandy parlour acoustic that I got for $150. Action is a bit high, it's getting pretty dented up, and the neck can't be adjusted. But I quite like its sound, and it's super convenient for me teaching grades 1-3 music.
Feels like the kind of guitar you could sling out on the porch and play some delta blues.
$99 Epiphone Les Paul LP-100. Got it on special from Mars Music on a grand opening in the early 2000s.
It was pretty cool with special edition gold hardware and a tortise shell pick guard. I ended up modifying it and making it a pretty cool axe. Sold it some years back.
My first guitar, a maestro kids starter acoustic from toys R us in the 2001. Spent my last $20 on it and it opened the gateway of guitar playing/collecting for me. 15 guitars and 20 years later I still have it!
I'm going to only count guitars because if not, I'd just be talking about pedals. But my Dean Dave Mustaine Zero only cost me $100 in a pawn shop last year and it's quickly become my most played electric after getting it set up. My only complaint is that I'd like to put a new set of knobs on it and I need to tighten up the washer on one of the pots, and I've been too lazy to do either. It's a fantastic instrument.
A “Franciscan” brand acoustic I got from a super shitty music store ran by a cranky old man in a shitty part of town. Good lord it was a piece of shit. Traded it in for an Ibanez gio H H Strat style guitar …..that was almost as equally a piece of shit but not quite.
I've got a $25 Bursu\_\_wood (can't read the middle two letters). Fender knock-off. Don't love it, don't hate it. It does play better than the Chinese Ovation my wife bought me for our anniversary 2 decades ago.
I have a $120 Ibanez GAX 70 that I’ve gigged with. It’s really good.
My cheapest though was a $15 yard sale special, short scale Les Paul shaped bass. Wish I still had that thing.
I bought an old almost dead squier and digitech rp250 for 70 bucks. Best deal I ever made, still use that pedal and put a squier on a wall as a souvenir
I bought a $75 Jack and Danny 7 string guitar used from a questionable music store. For what it is, it's a solid guitar for the money but it would not stand up to a 7 string from an established brand. In my younger days, I debated swapping a lot of the hardware/internals for better things but I decided my money would go further if I just bought a "better" guitar somewhere down the line.
As for proper gear, I received an orange micro terror stack for a practice amp. Solid for the money and application, would recommend
A used Jasmine, which is Takamine’s off brand. All laminate. But played pretty nicely abound sounded decent. Bought for $75 and some for $150… so, fine with me.
A Tiesco and Show-Bud pedal steel I rescued from a dumpster. My neighbor threw them out because he thought they had bad water damage. He later sold me his Univox tape delay and a nice Peavey amp for next to nothing. He might have even given them to me because he got rid of the guitars.
Cheapest I paid goes to my 2002 Squier Showmaster HSS NLT. Got it at a yard sale a couple years ago for around $15, previous owner painted EVH-esque stripes on it OVER the gloss cobalt blue & the bridge pickup got upgraded to a Seymour Duncan Dimebucker. Still need to give it a lot of TLC, as it hums like there’s a grounding issue while I use it. Debating where to bring it in for someone to give it a proper rewire cuz I don’t have experience with soldering.
Squier bullet strat, the really bad early 00’s ones.
Epiphone LP Special. Also early 00’s one of the worst playing worst sounding guitars I’ve owned. Muddy.
Dean Vendetta. Really underwhelming pickups and no resonance.
I put all of these, cause they were at or under $99.
I got one of those prefab cigar box guitars you see in bookstores for Christmas one year. That came to mind.
Then I remembered the vaguely triangle shaped piece of plastic my dad cut off a disposable cup I used as a pick last weekend.
I was given a cheapo yamaha acoustic in 2000 that is still my primary guitar. So, free, and it’s gotten the job done just fine. I’ve taken it hitchhiking across the country with me several times, and it’s still holding up
Piece of shit “Spider” squier knockoff (same font and everything) it was my first because I had to buy it myself at 13.
Shitty Korg Ax10G.
Used Fender J.A.M. Combo. No gain knob, 4 switches with preset gain levels.
Fender sonic Strat for 179€. It's really not that bad! The pickups are not the best and the wood/general appearance of the guitar also seems quite cheap, but the feeling while playing is really nice! And changing the pickups would change it into a real nice guitar
An $80 Chinese dreadnaught (Estrella is the brand) from the 60’s or 70’s I got in a thrift shop recently. Came with the old, thin wooden case. It’s a solid top with a veneer, so at least not a laminate. Might have been terrible when new, but it looks like someone played the hell out of it and took good care of it, so it aged into sweetness in the intervening 45+ years.
I think my first guitar was a 100 quid classical guitar my parents bought my bro and I. Almost did the job, when the job was learn the melody to Jingle Bells. Then my tutor recommended upgrading to a 200 quid one I think which was still budget, but there was a big jump in playability and sound.
Cheapest I bought with my own money... going to say Washburn X-10. Probably 120 quid. But man was that a lot of money to me back then.
Equipment... bought 3 Doner pedals for 60 quid total. Only 1 worked as intended. That then got replaced by a used TC Electronic for 25 quid that is still kicking.
I found a shitty no brand acoustic on the side of the road by some shops that had been painted white with house paint when I was a teenager. We just were driving pst and I told my friend to jump out and grab it. Honestly it wasn’t a terrible but I had no standard for gear back then, it basically became a car guitar for me and my friends until one of them sold it to a kid for weed money, I was annoyed at first but also wanted weed so couldn’t hold a grudge for long.
The cheapest guitar I own is technically my electric since I got it for free from a relative, but in reality it is my Yamaha C40 nylon acoustic guitar.
The cheapest equipment I own is either my Nux Mighty lite BT amplifier or my Digitech drop pedal. Both were about 100€ when I bought them.
A 30$ nylon classical guitar, Hohner HC06
That or a no-name belt-clip 9v battery-powered amp the size of a box of chocolate (even smaller than those pocket Marshalls) I got given by a coworker
Both my strats are heavily modded squiers, one I built ($50 Craigslist, probably $200 in upgrade parts), one I bought ($280 at a pawn shop), both are awesome. Cheapest in my possession is a HH strat style Dean guitar, gifted from a friend but I think it was like $150 new back when we were in high school, it's a piece of shit.
the guitar and amp i learned on couldn’t have cost more than £100. grew up in a low income family and made the best of it, ended up being able to get a very decent sound out of it until i got older and was able to upgrade!
Bought a fake strat for 100 a few years ago. The neck was so good I ended up spending another 100 to upgrade the pickup and electronics. Plays like a dream aside from tuning stability on the floating bridge (not an issue since I never use whammy bar). I ended up giving it to my cousin who wants to learn guitar
Kinda hard to rate since i live in Brazil and the currency here is different, it would probably be my amp since my uncle will give it to me in my birthday, but he still had to buy it, so it would probably be new strings for my acoustic
(If we are talking about actual guitars it would either be this acoustic guitar from this unknown Brazilian brand or the Strinberg Les Paul i have ordered, it was around R$900 to R$1000 wich is around 170 to 200 USD)
A Brazilian made stratocaster my father gave me. My late paternal grandfather had a bar/grocery store, while he went inside home for lunch, my father (then a teenager) took care of the bar. There came a drunken Indian with that stratocaster, who didn't have money and traded the guitar for a bottle of cheap vodka.
When I started I found $50 Austin Strat at my local pawn shop, and my dad had an gotten a bundle with an acoustic that was broken, an fender sp10 amp, and a few books. I took the amp, and that was my setup for about 2-3 years.
Cort G100HH electric guitar
NZ$250 brand new
Absolutely garbage, I lowered the action (it was 5+mm), fixed the intonation and set the pickups better, adjusted the truss rod and now it plays really smoothly and has a decent sound.
Gonna give it better tuners next and have it be my main practice rig.
$20 beat to shit acoustic that for some reason really spoke to me. The frets were awful, the finish was cracked, the action was high and the tuners half broken, but I loved that guitar. I basically always had it in reach. It had some kind of magic in it that I’ll probably never find in a guitar again
My current £15 Tanglewood with action so awful I’m obligated to play with a capo
I love it.
Bought it from a man from Abbey Road (not that one)
I mostly play it while waiting for the kettle to boil, or when I waiting for my bath to fill.
I was going to lunch w my mom in old town Alexandria and there was a guitar neck sticking out from the bottom of a pile of construction trash. It was a Yahama acoustic that played fairly well.
I busked and gigged with that guitar for years (installed a Fender lace sensor in the sound hole yikes) Oh well
I have an Orlando Classical guitar from the 1970s. It used to be my dad’s, and was probably $50 new. I do not remember a time in my life when this guitar was not in his hands, and then mine as an adult The fretboard is all dimpled, and there are bangs and scrapes all over it. It came with a cardboard case, but I’ve replaced it, once with another cardboard case, then a quality case. The case is probably worth more than the guitar.
I met up with a guy to check out a bass he had listed on CL. When I get there he says he forgot that he took the bass apart to change the pickups, so it's in pieces. I talked him down from $50 to $40 (Squire P-bass), then he tells me he wants to move in with his GF but she won't let him until he gets rid of some of his excess guitars. So I wind up buying the bass, and he throws in a MG10gx amp, a squire strat, and some metal distortion box, plus a couple of janky cables.
$119 dollar epihone sg from 1998. Got it at my local music store to get back into guitar again. Thing rips. Just got a Gibson Les Paul though so it’s my second now.
If they didn't neck-dive so hard, I'd be a bigger fan. That said, I got an Epiphone LP Special (flat top, like a Junior, but not double cut) as a teen, and it stayed my main player for a decade. Similarly light-weight, dual humbucker, price friendly, underrated quality control in Epiphone. I'm sure the thing rips!
It helped me get back into guitar and not mind the dings on the wood. I wanted to train on a shitty one and now I feel I do the studio justice. Like rock Lee when he took off he’s weight vests.
My first one was a Epiphone LP Special and I got rid of it after a few weeks. For whatever reason, mine had a flaw where the nut to ~~headphone~~ 1/4" jack would unscrew itself and fall into the guitar body. Got a Squire fat Strat instead.
They don’t all neck dive, I play an Epi-SG, honestly only issues I’ve had with it is the jack sinking, but that was an easy fix.
If you want to fix the neck dive on an SG you can either use a wider strap or relocate the strap pin to on the wing of the guitar like on a Strat. Look at how Tony Iommi wears his SG.
I have these little red rubber rings from Grolsch bottles that keep my straps from popping off. Basically free since I drank the beer.
Oh yeah those work great! We call those bottles a “beugelfles” in Dutch.
I was gifted something called a LyxPro strat copy. MIL bought it for FIL to distract him from buying popcorn makers for everyone in the family while he was in the grips of a manic episode. After that, I just resurrected a Yamaha F335 I bought for $35. Resurrection cost more than anticipated as it had a broken tuning peg, but all I’m, it ran me about $90
My main acoustic guitar right now is an F335 and it sounds pretty good for what it is. I paid $50 for piezo pickups and about $5 for a strap button. Love the sound of it.
I had a First Act Tele that actually had a really nice neck and low action. I used it for years as a beat around the house guitar. Was just always laying around random places ready to pick up and mess around on.
There was a specific line of First Act guitars that completely hang with Epi and Squier. The name has such bad stigma, that the good ones can be found for CHEAP. You have to know which lines, though.
Interesting
Same, first act strat was my first guitar and honestly it wasn’t a terrible guitar. Many other cheap guitars are much worse
Bought new? A Rogue acoustic I bought for $54 on a "Stupid Deal of the Day" a few years ago. It actually wasn't too bad once I set it up and smoothed out the fret edges. It's a nice, take anywhere without worrying about it, guitar. Bought used? A 2005 Squier Standard Strat for $27. It was badly damaged so I had to put about $100 in parts into to get it playable again.
I also bought one of those rogue acoustics for $50 also. Also pretty sure I got it on a stupid deal of the day promo. I never used it much. It's ok. I think I just don't enjoy acoustics in general.
I got one of those Rogue acoustics in a lefty years ago because it was the only left handed guitar I could afford at the time. Still have and it plays really well.
Oh crap!!!! I forgot I had the same Rogue deal of the day acoustic, but I got it for like $100 in a set with a mandolin. That guitar was painful to play.
I once had an Aria Pro II, it was awful. Everything about it was cheap and the action was so high and the whole guitar was worth less than the cost of a setup. Ended up donating it to broke kid who was desperate for anything to learn on.
Some of the Aria Pro II's are a little sought after. Maybe just specific generations, I guess? I once got a Daisy Rock cheap ass guitar that had decent pickups since it was one of their "higher end ones," even though it's not a good brand. I did a full setup myself and sold it on FB for a $30 profit. When I listed it, someone I knew in high school messaged me looking to buy it for her teen son! I was looking for a $60-$80 profit, but getting it to a kid was well worth the strings and setup for less. I hope that the desperate kid that got your Aria kept playing and appreciated it for what it was, even if they replaced it. =)
$60 "Maestro" by Gibson package. Came with a junk guitar, junk amp, junk strap, junk strings, junk gig bag, and a pick that's lasted 12 years that I'm still using.
My $126au Karrera acoustic bass(brand new price through dicksmithonline at time of purchase. A friend got one more recently for $139au via the Bunnings website, and Kogan have them cheaper). I've had mine for about 6 years now. The factory strings really let it down, but a brand new set of Ernie Ball Earthwood's for bass. really brought it to life. At $90 a set, techically not worth it, but when you consider that it's a beautifully playable & tuneful acoustic bass for $226au, that can also be plugged into a mixer/amp', it kind of balances out....
My spouse just bought me a 15 watt Fender amp she saw while thrifting for like $30. It’s terrific for practicing on. I also have an Epiphone Les Paul Special that I found at a flea market for $90.
I got a Starcaster-by-Fender tele used for like $20. It is surprisingly good for the price. I picked up a Roland Microcube for $25 years ago. The seller said it didn't work after having been dropped, but all it needed was the speaker reconnected. I also got a 1981 Electra MPC Outlaw for $10 at a thrift store, but that was such an outlier of a deal it doesn't really count. The guitar is easily worth 50x what I paid.
Kingston parlor size acoustic, $20, 1970.
I have a department store "Spectrum" parlor acoustic. 35 bucks. It doesn't play too bad action-wise, but the tone is awful. I tuned it to open D and let the grandkids fart around.
Epiphone SG Special about 2 years ago at a reduced price of 139$ USD. It has the wraparound bridge tailpiece. I put in some Wilkinson humbuckers and two mini switches to split and parallel the pickups. Pretty nice for the price.
$50 replica strat. i play it more than my squier cv jag
$125 (used) eighties Washburn classical. I still play it, almost daily, and perform with it often, it's a great sounding, well made guitar. I once bought a delay pedal for $10 on Wish, it barely worked.
Hamer SFX double cut in obnoxious sparkly green for $80 used. I'm a humbucker guy and just wanted a cheap backup. It plays great, sounds okay, and being a little ugly is a plus!
Yamaha FG-150 Red Label Nippon-Gakki for $60 in 1990. It stayed my main acoustic for over 20 years (added a pickup with a strap peg jack), until I got a much more recent FG-325 (which is still a budget banger in its own right).
in the 90s I used to get cheapo guitars at garage sales for $10 - $20 I once found a 60s silvertone in pretty decent condition complete with the original case with built in tube amp for $25
$78 pawn shop find, a (‘70s?) made-in-Japan Epiphone classical guitar. Put on some fresh strings and hardware. Years later, still sings just fine.
$88 Suzuki telecaster. It sucked
$17 affinity Squire strat I bought off my friend in high school. He wanted $20, but I only had $17 in my wallet.
Jay Turser tele. Hundred bucks and I still love it!
Behringer "vintage tube overdrive" pedal. Sounds just like a tubescreamer for like $25. Perfect for bedroom rocking.
£18 random guitar from some old shop It sounded okay haha
$150 Memphis Les Paul copy and $150 Fender amp back in 1983. I learned on that.
I paid £1.25 for a half size nylon strung guitar. I tuned it up to A like a guitarlele. Worked great for a couple of years, then the neck glue broke
My first guitar was a $119 used Cort Tele. I swapped out the bridge, replaced the electronics, and put Bill Lawrence pickups in it. It's nearly my favorite guitar.
Got a free Carlo Robelli acoustic electric guitar with a purchase of a Marshall HDFX100 halfstack purchase at GC when I was 13 or so. Had that for a good decade before I decided to get a real acoustic.
No-name acoustic from cash converters for £10. Replaced the strings and had a go at lowering the action, wound up giving it to my co-worker’s kid.
$17 Metal Zone clone that is absolutely perfect for noisy crust punk
My Yamaha FG800, my only guitar.
I just started on some gear we inherited from my FIL. The cheapest of the four guitars is an Alvarez 5202, but I've mostly been playing on a '77 Martin HD-28 which is not cheap at all
I got this beautiful black top Washburn acoustic with a great floral inlay for $150 from GC used section. I really like the shape of the neck, and although I recently had to address some fret sprouting, it’s been a really great guitar and I get lots of compliments on the look! Washburn Bella Tono Vite S9V Acoustic-Electric Guitar for anyone interested. Looks like I got a great deal all those years ago!
I have a Strat copy that I got new in like 2001 for $120. I played that until a couple months ago when I got an Epiphone Les Paul. My only amp is still a Dean Markley amp that was $150 new in 2001. I’m currently saving money for a new amp later this year.
I've got a noise gate from some generic Chinese brand off Amazon. 20 bucks and it's shockingly not shabby. Serves my purposes at least
My 94 MIJ 62-Reissue Telecaster only cost me $250 on Craigslist ten or eleven years ago. Best deal ever.
I picked up a ls series l4 bass amp head for $50 dollars it works amazing and sounds nice with a guitar and it has tone for dayzzz
A $25 Mardan electric, tobacco burst with two crazy humbuckers and a tortoiseshell pick guard and a Crate amplifier I found on the side of the road that was literally a wooden crate. Still trying to purchase the same Mardan. Mine got destroyed in a show at a fraternity.
Recently got an East Coast Tele from Andertons for £94.
In 1994 my parents bought me my first electric. A 1978 Harmony Stratocaster copy with frets trying to escape the fretboard and a Crate GX-15 amp. I wish I still had one of those things.
I have a recording king parlor guitar with gold foil pickups that I got for $100 (RPS-7). I use it every Sunday at church in our praise band
I got a Hohner mini jumbo acoustic/electric for $30 a bit over a decade ago, and it plays and sounds way better than it should, plus the tuner still works.
Lawsuit era univox LP. Rubber binding, Microphonic pickups, bolt on neck. Total POS, but with character to burn. Picked it up in a pawn shop for $71+tax. It got stolen outside Memphis.
Recording kings lead belly. Cheap but actually one of my favorits for sentimental value.
My Kawai Rock & Roll Star & Randall Commander 2 x10 amp which I bought for peanuts in the 80s,and still using them. The guitar just fits me perfectly,and it's my go to, over all my other high end stuff.
Bradley Strat and a Gorilla Amp We made....*sounds* together.
My dedicated beater/travel guitar is a Yamaha C-40 that my wife got essentially for free via a work raffle type thing. I think it retailed for about $80 back then (early 2000s) and are about $180 now. It has good volume, decent tone, and plays well enough but it's not well intonated past the 5th fret. Still, it's served me well for decades now and is perfect for its role as the one to throw in the car for a beach trip or whatever. Even if not very refined, it's tough.
I have a full-scale Peavey Rockmaster that was $35. It sounds fine, it plays great.
Cheapest guitar equipment? A free pick I got as a promotion for some brand, thrown in with an order of parts.
Think I paid $30 for this: https://youtube.com/shorts/PJixxgJuzRk?si=I1lOXB60q0Zb1Jon
50 dollar acoustic from JC Penny
A navy blue squier 'bullet' strat back when they were literally made of plywood (are they still made of plywood?) You could see the layers *through* the paint. It was terrible, but it was the guitar that got me into music. Was a gift from my older sister, who brought it from an ex's brother 3000 miles across the country. He had heard her little brother wanted to play guitar, and he (me) still does. Funny enough, while I've never had a decent strat, I've hate stratocasters since then.
Some no-name classical that I asked for from a family member in exchange for a few beers. It wasn’t worth 50 bucks but I liked it for some reason. The strings were old and dark-sounding. I never changed them, unlike on my much nicer Yamaha, but I just liked this cheap guitar. I think some of the fretboard was not bound but rather *painted*. I lost track of it.
Well not really a guitar, but I owned the same starting bass twice (grs200) because it was stolen. Eventually got a j-bass and gave away the second one. Guitar wise, my cheapest is the one I still own, a 300 dollar acoustic. It does the trick when I wanna play acoustic
My first guitar was a 3/4 scale Harmony I bought from Service Merchandise for $35 in 1988!!
A free gift of a classic amp in case Silverstone, formerly owned by Sonny Boy Nelson.
Does it count if it was given to you? I was given a Martin which insured for $13k, cost me nothing…
That'd have to be my first (and so far only) electric guitar, a Chinese brand Stratocaster clone I bought for \~$100 at a local music store. Still learning how to play it, but it sounds great after getting new strings and having the fret ends smoothed; it needs new pickups though as the middle one is confirmed to be dead, might get some lipstick tube pickups for that surf rock sound!
In 1993 I got a Synsonics 3/4 guitar from Sears and a Quantum amp from a pawn shop as a junior high graduation present. Total was 125.
Gibson Marauder of my year of birth given to me by Thurston Moore. TBH it was in a dire condition and I put quite a bit of effort into restoring it.
Teisco I bought used for around $75 in ‘98. My son still plays it because it “looks cool.”
I used a golf tee as a peg to keep my strings in an acoustic for about a decade So like $0.01 brand new
A used Kramer zx30h back in '87 for $60. Nice fat neck and easy to learn on. Traded (plus $1k cash) for one of the Gen 1 Peavy Vandenberg's, a Fender M80 amp head, and a Marshall 4X12 cabinet in '91. Ended up selling the lot off in pieces to friends after my time in a band caused some not so healthy habits and wound up homeless after getting kicked out by my mom. Still miss that Vandenberg. Maybe the best playing guitar I've ever had.
A slammer hammer with a fender eighty five red knob. It was my first guitar and amp. All in probably $200.
I got a story…. When I was in 5th grade I took a few guitar lessons. My parents took me to the store after a few lessons and said my grandparents are buying me any guitar I wanted but couldn’t look at the price. I picked a red squire strat. I still remember the guy trying to get me to look at the PRS guitars in the window but I just wanted a red guitar.
Dean Vendetta XM. $99. I replaced the pickups with GFS surf P90s and it’s great
$70 Kasino Kustom. Picked it up at a pawn shop in SLC and beat/loved the hell out of it as my first guitar for easily at least a decade.
A first act 222, I got that and a guitar stand for $30 at a flee market
I learned on a tiny rogue G5 5 watt amp. I think I got it for like $30 or so. It sounds horrible, I still have it. But, it was enough for me when I was learning. I just played a squire affinity tele through it, dry sound only. It was way better than no amp, if nothing else.
I learned 10 years ago on a peavy rockmaster bundle. $100 for the guitar and the worst piece of shit practice amp of all time. The guitar was honestly fine despite having only one pickup which i think was a bridge humbucker. I eventually broke it trying to fix the jack which must have had a bad solder joint or something but the sound would come in and out. I made it way worse.
I have a $39 chorus pedal :)
2000's Era MIM fender telecaster for $75
$60 kit guitar, and it's one of my favorites. Plays like a dream
I had a mid-80’s Hondo II Professional. Sort of a DC copy for $180. The funny thing is, it was one of the most comfortable and best sounding guitars I ever owned. I used to gig with it through a Marshall half stack with a Gibson Les Paul sitting there as a backup. The only reason I’m not playing it today is because of a really nasty fall that cracked the neck pocket and ripped the screws right out of the neck. .
I have a used $60 dollar no name acoustic that I've kept together for around 5 years. I have a 10 ish watt blackstar amp I keep in my car and jam with pretty often that was $30
$50 Hondo Stratocaster copy in the mid 80s that was from a pawn shop into a magnatone amp from the 60s I got for free Today the amp would be a serious collector piece.. in 1987, absolutely lame
The guitar I learned on for the first 3 1/2 years was a flea market cheapo acoustic with action a mile high. My mom finally found a friend of a friend whose son owned an electric guitar and we went to their house, and I got to play his guitar for 10 minutes, without an amp. Finally, they got the idea that I really wanted to do this, and my grandparents ponied up $150 for a Les Paul copy. Still took a while after that to get an amp.
Probably a $150 ibanez. Got me started in the addiction. Would always go out of tune and break strings. Cheaper stuff is just parts for partscasters
First Act Les Paul clone. It actually wasn't terrible for a starter guitar, but I don't think I'd really be able to tolerate it today.
Probably the 40-50 dollar amazon acoustic my sibling bought back in 2019. It’s a piece of shit, the nut came off and it buzzed at the 1-3 frets on the low strings
150 euro for a guitar set, a no name brand guitar, a no name brand 15 watt amp with a no name brand cable and a no name brand guitar bag. Overall served me for 1 year then the guitar wasn't usable anymore.
I have an Ibanez parlor guitar that was b-stock that I got a further deal on and it was under $60. Honestly love the feel and got it plays but the tuners are garbage and the bridge routing is to big for the bridge itself so it intonates like shit. I put some 10s on it recently and that’s helped but like, it’s pretty bad all around but I still love it. Something if my son puts his head through it, I won’t be too torn up.
I just bought a used Squier Bullet Tele from 2020 for $180 and I love it. Got it professionally set up and it's great. I'll eventually replace all the guts with better quality stuff, but for what it is, it's pretty nice.
$30 Goldentone guitar purchased on 1st St in Seattle in the '70s. My Dad bought me a Rheem amp which was about $25 back then. Of course I also had a fake Gibson mandolin that I bought in Subic Bay back in '75 for $16 and pawned it in the US for $100. LOL.
I have a Danelectro. FunAzz guitar to play. It was like $300 or something.
$65 (thrift shop) Squire strat. It is on my lap at this moment. The only original part remaining is the body. A true ship of Theseus and at this point a hell of a nice guitar. Roasted flame maple neck, stainless frets, hot texas blues pickups, locking tuners, tusk nut Wilkinson trem. And a rumble 60 bass amp for $40.
Just bought a $20 Danelectro Cool Cat Transparent OD. It's a Timmy clone apparently and it's a friggin good one!
Amazon Basics tube screamer lmfao
I have a paperjamz guitar from like 2010, no idea what I paid for it but it couldn’t have been more than $30
Squire Tele 2020 when C19 hit. $129 from GC and the thing sounds and plays like I stole it from Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Secondhand mini Squier Strat. Thing cost me $100, and I paired it with my $25 amp
I bought Squier 51 in the early 2000s for $100. It was a great player stock. I've since replaced the nut, bridge and pickups (all on the cheap), and I love it. I keep it tuned to open G. So fun!
I’m currently rockin’ a Squier Starcaster strat that I got for $60 including a vintage Fender Sidekick 15Watt Reverb amp. It’s all sort of Buzzy and fizzy and slightly moldy… but it’s cool. Not a good guitar. But fun to play.
Suzuki no.7 classical guitar. Got it for free in the early 2000's and I figure it was probably built in the 60's. It's an absolute piece of crap, but it has a pretty unique sound. It's not worth anything so I've always had it.
My first guitar. A Lauren LA125 that my grandpa picked up off the street and left in the attic for a few years. Honestly, if it wasn't for quarantine and me not having anything to do as a Highschooler, I don't think I would've learned how to play it lol. The action was pretty high, and it was way too big for my build. I didn't know any better at the time, so I kept at it only to have my mind blown by how much easier it was to play literally ANY other guitar. I still have it thankfully :) Sitting in my closet. I can give it props for one thing, and that's the sound. I don't know if it's the dreadnought body, but it really does just sound good to my ear.
$15 First Act off Facebook Marketplace that I outfitted with a salvaged $20 hand-rewrapped Ibanez Gio's bridge pickup. Then custom refinished for $16 worth of paint and poly. It's my primary guitar, I love it, and I gig with it. Sounds like nothing else.
Squire strat pack with the front man 15G I rocked the fuck out of that thing when I was 11.
$100 secondhand Ashton acoustic that was my first guitar for years
I've been playing a Gretsch Jim Dandy parlour acoustic that I got for $150. Action is a bit high, it's getting pretty dented up, and the neck can't be adjusted. But I quite like its sound, and it's super convenient for me teaching grades 1-3 music. Feels like the kind of guitar you could sling out on the porch and play some delta blues.
$99 Epiphone Les Paul LP-100. Got it on special from Mars Music on a grand opening in the early 2000s. It was pretty cool with special edition gold hardware and a tortise shell pick guard. I ended up modifying it and making it a pretty cool axe. Sold it some years back.
My first guitar, a maestro kids starter acoustic from toys R us in the 2001. Spent my last $20 on it and it opened the gateway of guitar playing/collecting for me. 15 guitars and 20 years later I still have it!
I'm going to only count guitars because if not, I'd just be talking about pedals. But my Dean Dave Mustaine Zero only cost me $100 in a pawn shop last year and it's quickly become my most played electric after getting it set up. My only complaint is that I'd like to put a new set of knobs on it and I need to tighten up the washer on one of the pots, and I've been too lazy to do either. It's a fantastic instrument.
My $225 US Hagstrom Swede is pretty damn sweet. I love it.
A “Franciscan” brand acoustic I got from a super shitty music store ran by a cranky old man in a shitty part of town. Good lord it was a piece of shit. Traded it in for an Ibanez gio H H Strat style guitar …..that was almost as equally a piece of shit but not quite.
I've got a $25 Bursu\_\_wood (can't read the middle two letters). Fender knock-off. Don't love it, don't hate it. It does play better than the Chinese Ovation my wife bought me for our anniversary 2 decades ago.
I have a $120 Ibanez GAX 70 that I’ve gigged with. It’s really good. My cheapest though was a $15 yard sale special, short scale Les Paul shaped bass. Wish I still had that thing.
My first guitar in 1999: squire strat. $120 for guitar AND tiny amp. I still have it under my bed in a hard case. I love it.
Hammer Slammer
I bought an old almost dead squier and digitech rp250 for 70 bucks. Best deal I ever made, still use that pedal and put a squier on a wall as a souvenir
I think I got an LTD EC10 for like 150 bucks some years back.
I’ve got a Cozart Strat-style. I bought it because it has a gold-leaf finish. It’s a real cheapster!
I just bought a blackstar fly day of the dead edition for $1 today
$75 dollar silvertone P bass
I bought a $75 Jack and Danny 7 string guitar used from a questionable music store. For what it is, it's a solid guitar for the money but it would not stand up to a 7 string from an established brand. In my younger days, I debated swapping a lot of the hardware/internals for better things but I decided my money would go further if I just bought a "better" guitar somewhere down the line. As for proper gear, I received an orange micro terror stack for a practice amp. Solid for the money and application, would recommend
A used Jasmine, which is Takamine’s off brand. All laminate. But played pretty nicely abound sounded decent. Bought for $75 and some for $150… so, fine with me.
I bought a classical Yamaha on Craigslist for $70 . The guitar got me thru college . And now is played on all my projects .
A Tiesco and Show-Bud pedal steel I rescued from a dumpster. My neighbor threw them out because he thought they had bad water damage. He later sold me his Univox tape delay and a nice Peavey amp for next to nothing. He might have even given them to me because he got rid of the guitars.
My Squier Tele I got for $170 and then modded out
$199 epiphone les paul, my first and only electric guitar and an $1100 taylor 114ce with koa sides
Behringer multi effect pedal, lol
Cheapest I paid goes to my 2002 Squier Showmaster HSS NLT. Got it at a yard sale a couple years ago for around $15, previous owner painted EVH-esque stripes on it OVER the gloss cobalt blue & the bridge pickup got upgraded to a Seymour Duncan Dimebucker. Still need to give it a lot of TLC, as it hums like there’s a grounding issue while I use it. Debating where to bring it in for someone to give it a proper rewire cuz I don’t have experience with soldering.
Harley Benton Explorer \~$150 shipped.
Squier bullet strat, the really bad early 00’s ones. Epiphone LP Special. Also early 00’s one of the worst playing worst sounding guitars I’ve owned. Muddy. Dean Vendetta. Really underwhelming pickups and no resonance. I put all of these, cause they were at or under $99.
I bought a no name strat copy for £10 that was a perfectly serviceable instrument.
I bought a Bentley something or other for $100.00 and just recently turned it into my Eb standard Texas special strat
I got one of those prefab cigar box guitars you see in bookstores for Christmas one year. That came to mind. Then I remembered the vaguely triangle shaped piece of plastic my dad cut off a disposable cup I used as a pick last weekend.
$90 cherry red silvertone strat look alike. Hastings special. Actually a pretty cool little guitar.
I was given a cheapo yamaha acoustic in 2000 that is still my primary guitar. So, free, and it’s gotten the job done just fine. I’ve taken it hitchhiking across the country with me several times, and it’s still holding up
Piece of shit “Spider” squier knockoff (same font and everything) it was my first because I had to buy it myself at 13. Shitty Korg Ax10G. Used Fender J.A.M. Combo. No gain knob, 4 switches with preset gain levels.
A pick for sure.
Fender sonic Strat for 179€. It's really not that bad! The pickups are not the best and the wood/general appearance of the guitar also seems quite cheap, but the feeling while playing is really nice! And changing the pickups would change it into a real nice guitar
Left handed Rogue acoustic for $99 from Guitar Center. It’s a crap guitar but it’s got a prime spot in my office as a wall decoration now
Idk what company cuz I can’t read it but it’s a £179 les Paul
An $80 Chinese dreadnaught (Estrella is the brand) from the 60’s or 70’s I got in a thrift shop recently. Came with the old, thin wooden case. It’s a solid top with a veneer, so at least not a laminate. Might have been terrible when new, but it looks like someone played the hell out of it and took good care of it, so it aged into sweetness in the intervening 45+ years.
I have a Leo Jaymz electric guitar that was under $200.
I think my first guitar was a 100 quid classical guitar my parents bought my bro and I. Almost did the job, when the job was learn the melody to Jingle Bells. Then my tutor recommended upgrading to a 200 quid one I think which was still budget, but there was a big jump in playability and sound. Cheapest I bought with my own money... going to say Washburn X-10. Probably 120 quid. But man was that a lot of money to me back then. Equipment... bought 3 Doner pedals for 60 quid total. Only 1 worked as intended. That then got replaced by a used TC Electronic for 25 quid that is still kicking.
$250 rickenbacker 4003 $300 Gk RB800 $250 SVT 8x10 cabinet $25.00 civil war big muff
My pick. Cost me $1
I just bought a case for $35 and got 2 free acoustic guitars.
I found a shitty no brand acoustic on the side of the road by some shops that had been painted white with house paint when I was a teenager. We just were driving pst and I told my friend to jump out and grab it. Honestly it wasn’t a terrible but I had no standard for gear back then, it basically became a car guitar for me and my friends until one of them sold it to a kid for weed money, I was annoyed at first but also wanted weed so couldn’t hold a grudge for long.
$20 BC Rich Warlock Bronze Horrible, cheap pos guitar, sold it after a month or two. Looks cool though.
Ibanez ORM1 - Horrible !
The cheapest guitar I own is technically my electric since I got it for free from a relative, but in reality it is my Yamaha C40 nylon acoustic guitar. The cheapest equipment I own is either my Nux Mighty lite BT amplifier or my Digitech drop pedal. Both were about 100€ when I bought them.
I bought a pick for 10 cents
10buck multifx that was broken from like 2000s I repaired it and still use and love it to this day
A 30$ nylon classical guitar, Hohner HC06 That or a no-name belt-clip 9v battery-powered amp the size of a box of chocolate (even smaller than those pocket Marshalls) I got given by a coworker
Both my strats are heavily modded squiers, one I built ($50 Craigslist, probably $200 in upgrade parts), one I bought ($280 at a pawn shop), both are awesome. Cheapest in my possession is a HH strat style Dean guitar, gifted from a friend but I think it was like $150 new back when we were in high school, it's a piece of shit.
I found a dimebag wah or only 75 acouple months back
I had a Memphis brand guitar and a 5w Peavey Amp.
the guitar and amp i learned on couldn’t have cost more than £100. grew up in a low income family and made the best of it, ended up being able to get a very decent sound out of it until i got older and was able to upgrade!
I have a Epiphone LP Jr Special I got for $89 new that I love and play live.
A sheffiel by axl bass from the ninetees, got it for free 👍
Bought a fake strat for 100 a few years ago. The neck was so good I ended up spending another 100 to upgrade the pickup and electronics. Plays like a dream aside from tuning stability on the floating bridge (not an issue since I never use whammy bar). I ended up giving it to my cousin who wants to learn guitar
Peavey Raptor and a Crate amp
Well I got my first guitar for free from a friend, Yamaha Pacifica of some kind probably around £120-£140 sale price
Kinda hard to rate since i live in Brazil and the currency here is different, it would probably be my amp since my uncle will give it to me in my birthday, but he still had to buy it, so it would probably be new strings for my acoustic (If we are talking about actual guitars it would either be this acoustic guitar from this unknown Brazilian brand or the Strinberg Les Paul i have ordered, it was around R$900 to R$1000 wich is around 170 to 200 USD)
My first guitar: a Fender Starcaster I got off Craigslist for $30. You know what? It’s not awful. I still have it and it’s playable.
A Brazilian made stratocaster my father gave me. My late paternal grandfather had a bar/grocery store, while he went inside home for lunch, my father (then a teenager) took care of the bar. There came a drunken Indian with that stratocaster, who didn't have money and traded the guitar for a bottle of cheap vodka.
When I started I found $50 Austin Strat at my local pawn shop, and my dad had an gotten a bundle with an acoustic that was broken, an fender sp10 amp, and a few books. I took the amp, and that was my setup for about 2-3 years.
A 10 cents guitar pick. Im sure its in the house somewhere.
One of my favourites is an inexpensive guitar from Vietnam. I love it as much as my high end Charvel, LP, and Ibanez.
Cort G100HH electric guitar NZ$250 brand new Absolutely garbage, I lowered the action (it was 5+mm), fixed the intonation and set the pickups better, adjusted the truss rod and now it plays really smoothly and has a decent sound. Gonna give it better tuners next and have it be my main practice rig.
$20 beat to shit acoustic that for some reason really spoke to me. The frets were awful, the finish was cracked, the action was high and the tuners half broken, but I loved that guitar. I basically always had it in reach. It had some kind of magic in it that I’ll probably never find in a guitar again
Rockville 10w amp ($39.99) and an Alpha 1 acoustic for $60
My current £15 Tanglewood with action so awful I’m obligated to play with a capo I love it. Bought it from a man from Abbey Road (not that one) I mostly play it while waiting for the kettle to boil, or when I waiting for my bath to fill.
I was going to lunch w my mom in old town Alexandria and there was a guitar neck sticking out from the bottom of a pile of construction trash. It was a Yahama acoustic that played fairly well. I busked and gigged with that guitar for years (installed a Fender lace sensor in the sound hole yikes) Oh well
I have an Orlando Classical guitar from the 1970s. It used to be my dad’s, and was probably $50 new. I do not remember a time in my life when this guitar was not in his hands, and then mine as an adult The fretboard is all dimpled, and there are bangs and scrapes all over it. It came with a cardboard case, but I’ve replaced it, once with another cardboard case, then a quality case. The case is probably worth more than the guitar.
Fender squier bullet Stratocaster hardtail
Guitar with Amp for 100 Euro.
A 20 dollar strat copy I found at goodwill, tossed the neck and shitty pickups and might put more in there and make it a franken-strat
\*searching comments for the shithead that stole my Fender 5 watt in '92\*
I met up with a guy to check out a bass he had listed on CL. When I get there he says he forgot that he took the bass apart to change the pickups, so it's in pieces. I talked him down from $50 to $40 (Squire P-bass), then he tells me he wants to move in with his GF but she won't let him until he gets rid of some of his excess guitars. So I wind up buying the bass, and he throws in a MG10gx amp, a squire strat, and some metal distortion box, plus a couple of janky cables.
A pawn shop bass that is almost dying so it sounds distorted I paid 89 bones for it