You guys make it sound like the jump from 400 to 1700 is easy! LOL. (Truth be told, finances just aren't there these days. there are so many things I need before dropping that kinda coin on another guitar) Seriously, I have another brand guitar I love, that I never play. Maybe if I finally get motivated enough to sell it? But, honestly, I don't really use humbucker pickups much.... If there was a Core Santana with P-90's I might be diggin' out a kidney. Is there? No, wait, don't tell me... No, never mind tell me... Wait, no... yes? No? yes? For now, I love my SE and have no real desire to chase. (I Know blasphemous, but that's where I am in life these days)
What’s that old saying? The grass is always greener or something? Yeah... keep rockin that SE man, nothing wrong with that at all.
LOL. Thanks man. The only thing I feel bad about loving my SE is somehow having derailed this thread! But, here's my attempt at getting it back on track.... All you folks with Core model Santanas, what is it you love about them over an SE? Have any of you directly compared an SE Santana with a Core Santana? What differences did you see or feel? (and no, this is not a 'my SE is as good as your Core' thing... I honestly want to know what the differences are! I have no real, extended experience with a Core model PRS)
I haven't played a core but I didn't love my old (I sold it) SE Santana. The short scale length that many of you like, I disliked. A short scale length over 24 frets obviously means the upper frets were really close together. I don't think I have fat fingers but I struggled playing up at 15th or higher frets. ...of course my back ground was with 25.5 scale strat with 21 frets so that's a gigantic change. ...perhaps i needed to give it more time or transition into it from a customer 24 first? ...I do love the 25" scale CE24 I upgraded to though. The one other thing I didn't love was the Double Cut Les Paul type body was a bit more difficult to play sitting down. It didn't seem to sit in the right spot. it wasn't a problem playing standing up with band though.
I've never played an SE Santana, so I can't be much help comparing them. But I can tell you what I DON'T like about mine. 1. I just don't particularly like 24 fret guitars for a variety of reasons, so there's that. The only 24 fret guitar I had previously was an L6S which I got refretted with 6130 frets from 1 to 17, and then smaller size fret wire from the 18th to 24 frets. This improved the cramped feeling up high. 2. The frets feel too tall for me. My preference is for wider lower frets (about .04 high is perfect). At some point I may get mine milled. 3. One advantage of the neck pickup placement on a 24 fret guitar is the way it makes the sound cut through in a live setting with a band. But I don't like what it does to the tone just practicing solo at home. ...that's pretty much it...I kinda love everything else about the guitar
I haven't played a core Santana model yet but it's on my to do list. I flat out LOVE my two SE's though, both 22 and 24 fret. From the first moment I picked mine up it just felt so right, like I had finally found what I had been looking for all these years.
