Hello! As a newbie I am not familiar with a lot of technical aspects of a guitar. I have been told that I should have my guitar ( it is an electric guitar given to me) set up by a professional. What does that mean and is it necessary at this stage of my learning? How will it help ?
Thanks
im also a newbie to guitar, and i just bought an acoustic from richards guitar in the uk.
every guitar he sells goes through a professional set up before it leaves his store.. have a look at this video from his website, and it shows a professional set up
https://youtu.be/oGtr1b-Gvqw
If it has never been done on your guitar, I would say yes, especially for a newbie. I had it done and the guitar was much easier for me to play afterward. In my case, they were able to lower the action quite a bit, so I didn't have to push down so hard and far in the first couple of frets. They also adjusted the relief on the neck and lowered a couple of frets that were too high, reducing fret buzz. Another thing they should do is adjust intonation, which will ensure that when you tune your guitar, each string will be in tune all the way along the fretboard, not just when you play open strings.
Whether it makes a big difference for you depends on the current condition of your guitar. It is not clear to me whether you were given a used guitar or someone bought you a new one. In either case, it may have already been done. Many (but certainly not all) shops will do it as part of the sale. In the case of used, the former owner may have had it done.
Mine was a special case, as it was built by an inexperienced amateur, so it needed lots of tweaking.
^^^
Exactly what jrpierce06420 said. You won't notice this difference until after it is done. But if it needed it your experience trying to learn guitar will improve dramatically.
I will go one further, there are a lot of knowledgeable guitarists that recommend one has a guitar have a setup done routinely. I agree.
I live in a part of the country that is brutally cold and dry in the winter and miserably hot and humid in the summer. I try and minimize the effect on my guitars as much as possible with humidifiers in the winter and dehumidifiers in the summer. Still I try and have a set up done on my guitars every spring and fall.
[u]Guitars:[/u] 2014 PRS Santana, 2013 PRS Paul's, 2009 PRS Hollowbody, 1972 Gibson ES-325, 2012 Fender Strat American Standard, 2012 Yamaha Pacifica, Martin M-36, Martin 000-15M, Seagull S6 Classic[br][u]Amps:[/u] Fender Blues Junior III, Boss Eband JS-10, Line 6 POD 500X, Quilter Microblock 45
I neglected this aspect and was highly rewared when I started trying to set it up myself with some basic tweask like intonate-ing, changing the height of the strings and moving the pickups closer to the strings and slanting them. However, now I know how poorly it is set up and really want someone who know's what they are doing to gove me a hand. I found that my manufaturer Epiphone (Gibson) has just released a free virtual guitar tech service where they help you set up the guitar online: https://www.epiphone.com/Support/Virtual-Guitar-Tech
A professional would be great but I have heard you have to be dicerning as some only do very basic setup. I also found this amazing viedo by a skilled guitar tech setting up a guitar for a friend. You can learn a lot from there even if most of it is out of my skill range. If you watch this you will know what to ask for when you take the guitar to a professional. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HO790NLp-M&list=WL&index=8&t=6987s
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