I did things the reverse way - I bought Guitar hero 3 before 2 and with it came the Les Paul wireless controller. After completing Guitar Hero 3 (and I do mean complete) I bought the second game and decided to buy it with the wired x-plorer controller so that I had two for co-op play. Now I have both the 2nd and 3rd game and an x-plorer guitar controller as well as a Les Paul. First off the Les Paul looks and feels fantastic - much more realisic and easier to use than the x-plorer and of course battery life depends on the regularity of play. There's no denying that it feels like more like a guitar than the wired controller and looks a helluva lot cooler and gives a greater ease of play as you can jump around like an idiot all you want and not have to worry about a wire. However, given the choice between the two controllers I would always pick the x-plorer and the reason has been noted by others: the connection bewteen the neck of the guitar and the body is incredibly unreliable and… more »

I did things the reverse way - I bought Guitar hero 3 before 2 and with it came the Les Paul wireless controller. After completing Guitar Hero 3 (and I do mean complete) I bought the second game and decided to buy it with the wired x-plorer controller so that I had two for co-op play. Now I have both the 2nd and 3rd game and an x-plorer guitar controller as well as a Les Paul. First off the Les Paul looks and feels fantastic - much more realisic and easier to use than the x-plorer and of course battery life depends on the regularity of play. There's no denying that it feels like more like a guitar than the wired controller and looks a helluva lot cooler and gives a greater ease of play as you can jump around like an idiot all you want and not have to worry about a wire. However, given the choice between the two controllers I would always pick the x-plorer and the reason has been noted by others: the connection bewteen the neck of the guitar and the body is incredibly unreliable and is a huge design flaw, it will work fine for half an hour to an hour at the start of play and then fret buttons will start to cut out and not register (most likely green or red) - you will find that at first this won't happen but eventually, sooner or later, it will and chances are the first time, you'll think that it is because of batteries and change them.
This is incredibly frustrating, you find yourself taking the neck out and putting it back in, turning the game off and leaving it for half an hour but at the end of the day it's an incredible shame that something so innovative could be so flawed and otherwise it would get the full 5 stars.
Of course people will still buy it over the x-plorer - like i have said, when it works it's untouchable (and I have played Rock band and used that guitar and it's terrible - feels so cheap) and people have said that theirs work fine but chances are they are still relatively new and the problem I have mentioned will happen at some stage.
Overall, I would never advise against buying the Les Paul (i mean - look at it!) but make sure that you have an x-plorer as a back up and do what i do: if in the middle of playing, the auld Les Paul starts to become unresponsive then change to the x-plorer. There's nothing worse than almost completing Dragonforce 'Through the Fire and Flames' on expert and then your green button stops working.