for a first guitar, a 400USD Fender strat is an awesome guitar.

In my experience, you generally get what you pay for in the world of guitars. I find that in many cases, the more expensive model is nicer to play, or nicer sounding...although I may just be programmed to say that?

I dont mean to say that a Gibson is nicer than say, a Cort, because it is more expensive, because they are very very different beasts, but in general, a similar guitar, but unpgraded, say an Esp M100 and and M1000, the better one tends to be the more expensive one...oh look I've lost myself and started talking rubbish