Until recently, I haven't used hard cases all that much for many years. The first hard case I had was made by my father, the outside was made from polished stainless steel with all the obligatory things it needed. He cut the foam out to exactly cradle my $125 strat-copy perfectly. It was heavy.. but it had A LOT of sentimental value. It was stolen from my house years ago, along with my much-loved strat and my Takamine acoustic. :mad: Anyway.. with the insurance money I bought a bunch of cool things.. but still to this day I wonder what became of the stuff.. I'd gladly buy them off someone if I was able to track it all down..

Anyway.. so now I have this el cheapo hard case that I bought about 3 weeks ago now. Well.. I say el cheapo but it was still $129 Aussie dollars.. More than that old strat I had stolen.. lol.. It does its job at keeping my guitar sealed in time during its journey to the gig. It also has this really useful compartment inside so you can keep extra picks, spare strings, tuner, slide thingy, tremolo bar, string cleaner and soft cloth.. etc.. It's amazing how much stuff I can fit in there and it's all just as secure as the guitar... hehe.. and another bonus is that it still has that nice new smell.. :) haha