Not everyone can afford a top of the line Martin Guitar. But that does not mean you have to deny yourself the opportunity to own a Martin and to enjoy that unmistakable Martin tone. The Martin DXME with built in Pre amp and System one equalization / volume mechanism is a great choice for a musician that wants tone and to save some money.
Straight Out of the Box
Straight out of the box you get that killer Martin tone but with a few tweaks it can become quite a great musical tool.
For starters you should take it to a luthier and have him do a set up on the guitar. This will make the guitar play able. It will be set up to use your favorite strings and at an action height that will allow you to easily finger it for hours on end. While the luthier is working on it, if you are serious about your tone, have him or her install a bone nut and saddle set. This will give you much better sustain and a clear ringing tone that is very desirable for a guitar of this type.
If you want to stop there you will have a guitar that plays the way you like it and will sound a lot more like a Martin costing several hundreds if not thousands of dollars more. If you often play live and want to get much more control over the sound that is going into the sound board at shows or songwriter nights, you may wish to upgrade the pickup / preamp combination to get more variety and control over what is coming out the quarter inch output end pin jack.
A Brighter Sound
The tone of this guitar when set up correctly will be a little brighter than your average acoustic, much like any other Martin branded guitar. What is unusual is that it is earth friendly because it is made of a special laminate which gives stability in humidity and still sounds great.
On top of this you get a warm feeling knowing that you are not causing the death of any precious exotic woods in the process. So you can sound great and have a good clear conscious as well.
Martin is a great name in acoustic instruments and with the DX line of guitars they have become very affordable and gets them within the range of so many more working people that there is no excuse to not own one of these great guitars.