^ they have a certain type of chime you don't get from other guitars and deliver some of the best sounding clean tones you can get IMHO. Add that to the fact that they can scream with a drive pedal and are pretty to boot and you've got an all around winner. If you don't want to spend much money...
Squier Affinity Tele with mods; Dimarzio Area T neck and Hot T bridge pickups, new pots, 4 way switching with new selector switch, new caps, shielded wiring, shielded cavities, and graph tech saddles. I immediately bonded with it when i first picked it up. Plays like a dream and looks good too...
All the time. Never use expedited shipping that costs more though. It won't get to you any faster. One time I ordered two different items the same day; one 2nd day and the other regular delivery. Guess which one I received first? seems to be the same with just about any music supply house online...
Yes and i was in your shoes around the same time in my life only there was not nearly as many instructional aids online. Invest some QT watching instructional videos on YouTube. That's what I did and I can definitely see a lot of improvement in my playing the last 2 years (my friends and family...
I've set my own up or over 30 + years now and I've done setups more times than I can count for friends and other musicians and never had a complaint yet. Some keep coming back so I guess I'm doing it right.
As to guitars that are setup right; I recently got a Schecter C-1 Plus after setting up...