Total Beginner Needs A Little Guidance

First off, hi there I'm Chris and I just joined the site recently.

This website was a great find. I orignally tried to start on the guitar when I was 14 with some totally naff Encore guitar and an even worse amp. Took a few lessons from a local guitar teacher who was more interested in getting me to play national anthems and nursery rhymes on the guitar rather than music I actually wanted to play. Needless to say with crap lessons and a guitar that sounded like a weak fart most of the time I gave up.

Anyway, I am 23 now and eager to learn, properly. However I am stumped at chosing a decent amplifier to get started with.

The guitar I own is an Ibanez SA 160. I bought it off a friend for a good price and he threw in a really useless Squier Sp-10. I'd probably get a better sound with a karaoke box taping the microphone to my guitar to be honest. Overdrive is a button for chrissakes. It's a real drag because when I am trying to follow the lessons on the site the sound coming from my guitar sounds nothing like the sounds in the videos, so I can't tell if I'm even playing basic chords correctly. The sound from the speaker is just one big garbled mess.

As you may have guessed I am interested in playing or learning to play heavy music mostly. Metal and hardcore punk. Though I would like an amp that will give me a bit more versatility besides metal, because I would also like to play some mellower stuff from time to time such as rock, indie, blues or pop punk.

I am more interested in an amplifier that gives a nice tone rather than massive volume. I don't plan to play in any bands for a while until I have learnt to play fairly well. When I do feel ready to join or start a band I will splash out on an amp that is decent enough for gigs.

My budget is around £100-150 ($200-$300 for the yanks!), don't mind stretching that a bit for an amp that would good for practising as well as early gigging. Buying a used amp is no problem for me, probably a better option infact.

I had been looking at the Line6 Spider 3 amps, but I hear a lot of conflicting opinions on these amps. Some say they are good for beginners because the sound emulation provides a good sound for the amount you pay and can make cheaper guitars sound better. Others say transistor amps are worthless and I should stick to a 15w Marshall tube amp for a "warmer" sound.

Well being a novice with a budget guitar I'm not sure I'd notice this warmer sound, especially if I'm more interested in playing heavy music.

So to some that up I'm after a decent beginner amp that isn't too expensive, sound is more important than volume, and I want to play mostly metal/punk but still be able to get a reasonable sound when playing softer styles.

Any advice will be greatly appreciated!