Electronic tuners start at about $10, so the cost is no reason not to get one. The Korg CA-30 is a good tuner (chromatic) and very cheap. For a couple of bucks less you can get a guitar-specific version which only tunes E,A,D,G and B, but for $15 you might as well get the proper one.

Tip: forget about saving up for a hard-shell case. So long as no-one you know is planning on attacking your guitar with a hammer, a soft case is cheaper. :-) More useful would be to have a tuner. Next most useful would be to have new strings. Even classical guitar strings only last about 6 months at most; steel strings go much quicker (maybe 2 months of average playing). If you're wondering why you can't get good tone out of the guitar, the strings could esily be the cause.

How are you learning to play? Are you learning from a course-book or something? Every course-book for beginners that I've seen has started with "Step 1: How to tune your guitar" (after the obligatory introduction of "Congratulations on buying the Joe Nonentity course-book. Joe has been playing for 20 years and has released songs which you've never heard of and went nowhere in the charts. After a lawsuit with his manager he is now stony broke, which is why he's touting this book." ;-)

Graham.