Cheapest Fender or most expensive Squier?

[Joe Nation]

Imagine you're after a new Jazz bass and you have about £500 to spend. Do you opt for the £489 Squier CV Active 70s - active pickups, nice block inlays, lovely turquoise or mocha colour options; or do you shell out a little more on the £549 Fender Standard - simple classic Jazz spec and colours (blue/black/burst/white), but it has "Fender" on the headstock? Are you likely to feel and hear much of a difference between them (assuming both are set-up well and if you want to get real picky you can fit the same strings)? I guess the active electronics of the Squier will give you more options for sound output, but is it "better"? Or does the enhanced quality of the Fender actually show through?

 

Personally, I'd go for the Squier CV 60s in daphne blue, but that's beside the point.

[Schnozzalee]

Sire.

[Lozz196]

I think it depends on both sound and the feel of the bass. Some just don`t like actives so that may be a factor. I`ve played (and owned) Squiers that when set up properly play like a dream. The sensible option of course is to simply play both on a visit to a music shop and buy the one that gave the most enjoyment when playing. Years ago I bought a Squier VM 77 Jazz bass, one on a long list of basses I really shouldn`t have sold as it was one of the best Jazzes I`ve ever played.

[HeadlessBassist]

It's a difficult one...

 

The new standards with the ceramic pickups made by the Cort factory (is that correct?) have received very good reviews. I would say the new Fender standard would just edge it. The cachet of the Fender brand definitely helps, too. Maybe a well set up Squier 40th Anniversary Jazz would just pip the scales in Squier's favour. I sourced one of these for a pupil in recent months and it was an excellent instrument. There's definitely not a lot between them.

 

I'd say it's down to the individual player to play both and decide which they like the sound of best.

 

 

[lemmywinks]

Which logo do you want on your Cort?
 

[Cato]

The Fender Standrds sit in a odd niche if you look at them as part of the overall guitar market rather than as part of the Squire/Fender range.

 

Put bluntly there are better specced guitars from the likes of Sire, Ibanez and others in that £500 bracket and the Standards themselves are, with the most generous interpretation, at best a step sideways from the Squire CVs, rather than a step up.

[Jean-Luc Pickguard]

I'd get a secondhand Fender player series