Originally Posted by: Bbmuddywolf
Secondly and more importantly is that I wanted to know whether it was possible to diagnose the sound I am currently hearing from my setup and determine whether the pickup or amp should be changed.

Barring a bad setup:

Have you experimented with guitar picks and strings? Two of the hugest tone improvements in tone come from guitar strings and guitar picks. I have guitar picks that make bright strings sound worn and guitar strings the brightest picks won't effect.

It's like night and day between a bad pick and string combo and a good pick and string combo.

If you're happy with your strings and pick, amp settings have a huge effect on tone.

A good pickup helps.

After all that and your guitar still doesn't sustain and sing, it's junk, get another guitar!

And, you don't need to spend a lot of money on a good guitar. I've got a $150.00 Jackson that sounds as good as and plays as good as all import guitars I've played around $1,000.00. A jaw dropper my roommate won in a bar raffle. But also, don't skimp if you don't need to, good wood and a high quality guitar are real nice too. But the Jackson reveals big money doesn't necessarily mean big tone. I sold off a Gibson SG Standard that just didn't cut it for me, the cheap Jackson replacing the SG because it just works, always, no finiky issues.