Not at all important ,most strats come with 9s and I change them immediately to 10s. I am not that good at setups yet so I still have a luthier do intonations. The DG Black strat is the only guit I did not do that with. Ihave a luthier inspect my guits about twice a year.

It's somewhat important to me. It shows that someone has, at a minimum, at least checked the guitar and it is playable and I can adjust it from there.

not important, I usually set to my liking.

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2012 American Vintage Telecaster 1958
09 Fender american deluxe strat.
97 Gibson les paul special P90's double-cut
65 Princeton reverb re-issue
2010 Guild Gad-F40e

Can't say it's very important to me either, first set up is free in my place anyway. The guy there makes a point of talking with the customer, and finding out exactly what they want.

It absolutely makes sense, yes.

But then the only reason the factory setup straight out the box might matter... is if you buy a guitar in a box.

I've only ever done that once and in fact I got away with it fine. But really I don't ever want to buy a guitar I haven't demo'd first. It's a musical instrument, not a production line TV, camera or whatever. No matter what they do with the factory process each one is always going to be subtly different - they're made of wood, bone and such after all.

Play it and buy it if it's nice. And the setup will be part of that, which is why you want to buy from a shop that attends to such things.

Cheers - C

I've always considered "factory set up" to be at best a decent starting point. Not an issue at all for me!

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"I started out with nothing, and still have most of it"

Hi bbrodie: ha - how interesting. To be clear, I'm talking about the individual camera, not the model, which I'll have been messing with on the store's display item for hours if not weeks. But I've never even thought of examining the actual individual one I'm buying before walking out the shop with it in it's box. That's the difference between a hack and a pro, I guess.

Which just supports the point we're all making - try before we buy!

Cheers - C

Agreed, however, i have only bought one guitar brand new from the store! I get mine set u at least every 3 months sometimes more often...it is a maitnence thing, like changing strings......

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Check us out at http://www.brianburkeband.com

To me, it's gravy. Expect it to need at least really severe tweak, and hope that is all it needs. The best setup guitar I ever got was a Squier ... it was perfect. Who'd a thunk 'dat?

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Laughing out loud with fear and hope, I have a desperate plan ...

Ooo - I am surprised, and a bit shocked!

Riskiest thing I ever did camerawise was to purchase quite a nice Canon lens on Ebay from a seller in Hong Kong. I've had problems buying photographic stuff in person in Hong Kong, so purchasing over the internet seemed just plain stupid.

But I did it anyway and thankfully got away with it. Never again though! Too scary...

Cheers - C

Not a big deal to me. The first thing I do when I get a new guitar is change the strings and do a complete setup to my liking.

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Chet Feathers

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I didn't Lose my mind, I traded it for this guitar.