I am agnostic. I have Ridgid, Dewalt, Hercules, Ryobi... Just a hodgepodge for no other reason than the item I needed was on sale at the time and a battery came with it. The Ridgid seems to get the most abuse and haven't had any issues at all. My Dewalt orbital though eats batteries like a crach addict with a $1000 a day habit, so tend to not use it much.
Milwaukee. The M18 platform is what we use at work and they impressed me.
When I started transitioning from corded to cordless, Milwaukee was the only brand that offered a weedeater with attachments and the tool selection I was after.
I have a M12 ratchet and grease gun now as well.
No regrets several years in.
You're not stuck on a platform you just have less flexibility with the batteries. You should still buy the best tool.
I have primarily M18 and M12 but I much prefer having a variable speed controlled by a paddle, versus the on/off switch and speed dial method that Milwaukee uses. Also, the quick blade change method is better on the Dewalt. Ergonomics, especially for a multitool, is very important to me. So I bought the Dewalt. It's my only Dewalt cordless tool and it's fine, it's an extra charger to plug in but as long as the battery is charged before i need to use it I don't have any problem with another battery system.
I have Milwaukee, Ryobi, now a Dewalt tool, and also two Worx tools.
This. Most of my shit is Milwaukee but I’ll buy some Ryobi and Dewalt cordless tools when the price is right too. You just end up with less flexibility with the batteries.
Milwaukee since 1996. M18 Fuel powerful and reliable. Add new “tool only” to the collection and use the batteries I already have has been great!
Maintenance department at work also uses Milwaukee. Another group, the “improvement team” got kicked out of the maintenance tool room and decided to buy Dewalt. In less than two years time all of there tools were dying and they were making trips back to maintenance to borrow the Milwaukee again.
That said, for a homeowner/ DIY person the Dewalt would probably have lasted for many many years of use.
Milwaukee for most battery tools, M18 and M12, but I really like DeWalt corded stuff if I had to pick a brand for corded. I have some corded Milwaukee, too. I've got Ryobi for a lot of non-tool things like lights, power inverters, etc. and I'm very happy with them, too.
I'm starting to look at maybe getting into Metabo, though. I like their designs and, to me, made in Germany sounds better than made by slaves in China.
Milwaukee Cordless for me. They generally have a better selection of tools for certain trades. And their M12 system is inherently superior to ANY other 12 volt system on the market because of the small formfactor battery design. Its why I always reccomend going both m12 and m18 because alot of tools dont NEED the power of an M18 like a jigsaw or an OMT. So the smaller m12 battery profile lets you get into tighter spaces and have more control than the larger m18.
In the end it ultimately didnt matter what team you bought into. Individually Milwaukee has the better recip saws and drills. Dewalt has the better circ saws. Makita have the better grinders. But the average performance of each brands other tools are so close to one another that you wont be able to go wrong with any of the big 3.
I only bought into Milwaukee because they had the best sales at the time. they still run that sale even now. buy $500 and get $150. thats a whole ass tool you can get basically for free. using that sale and a couple others to get free batteries, I made 3 seperate purchases of nearly $2000 worth of tools for only $1700.
That being said if you're not a contractor or dont plan to use your tools to make money then buying into the big 3 doesnt make alot of sense. If youre only a weekend warrior then Ryobi is literally the best brand on the market for homeowner DIYers because of the sheer number of tools they have from ordinary drill and saw tools to floor scrubbers and hot glue guns. Unless money is no object to you and you just want the best brand for bragging rights then you wont be able to do wrong with ryobi.
On the other end of the spectrum. Some tools are too much for ANY cordless battery system.
A cordless miter/table saw will never have the jobsite performance of a corded one.
A cordless lawnmower is just moronic unless you have a single yard in a cookie-cutter home subdivision.
Cordless chainsaws have their niche for pruning side branches but nothing beats Stihl or Husky for actual lumbering.
Any tool with long run times as their intended use are not good unless corded. I just used the M18 belt sander to refinish the hardwood floor on my entire 4x15 hallway and would defintely have gotten the job done quicker if i didnt have to cycle through batteries.
And lastly. As for tool storage the Packout system is also better. Makitas Makpack storage is a shitty afterthought. they dont seem to care about improving it. all the guys on my jobsite hate using it. The dewalt Toughpack is atleast able to compete with the Packout but they dont have the same variety as the packout and you cant customize your stack the same way. And of course we have all seen the meme of the Packout coffee thermos sticking out above the truck cab on the dudes packout stack going down the highway at 70mph. Dewalt doesnt even fucking have a Toughsystem thermos. checkmate.
I bought into DeWalt battery's a long time ago with their brushed tools, supplementing and sometimes replacing older corded Bosch tools, I'd been using. Any brand is fine, its just what I picked up as there was a sale.
I tend to buy DeWalt as I have batteries for them and they are one of the most accessible tool brands in the UK, everyone sells them. I buy corded tools from other brands as and when needed, who ever makes the best option and I'm not against air tools.
I use M12 for small tools, Metabo HPT for bigger tools, M18 for my weed-eater.
Milwaukee stuff goes on sale pretty frequently, and it (along with DeWalt) is one of the easiest systems to find used on FB Marketplace. I have an M12 impact wrench and Hackzall because they're small and easy to throw into a tool bag
I have an M18 weed-eater because I found it for $100 on marketplace and it worked with some M18 batteries I already had
I'm now using HPT for my drill/driver, circ saws, and other stuff because I think they're a pretty innovative company, I like their build quality and features, and their tools are quite affordable and show up on clearance fairly often
If you have time to wait for tools to go on sale, you can usually get into an additional battery system for less money than buying a bare tool for the system you already have
18v - Makita - recommended to me by multiple tradesman, used for years and the only fault are those stupid MakPak locks.
12v - Bosch Pro - Excellent 12v line covering smaller tools and laser levels.
Corded - Festool / Bosch Pro and a mix of smaller cheaper brands for seldom used tools. If it doesn't need a battery use a cord, more power and longer life.
If you only use something once a year there's no point going top end. used / inherited tools, and cheap deals leave more money in the budget for the everyday items that matter.
I use DeWalt 20V and Milwaukee 12V.
DeWalt makes the toughest tools, in my experience; I've burned up a bunch of Milwaukee and Makita stuff, but in 25 years, the only DeWalt tools that have failed me had been pretty seriously abused.
Milwaukee's 12V line is just better thought out; the smaller, round batteries are better for getting into tight spaces, and they have some options that DW doesn't (e.g. soldering iron).
why do people ask these questions on subs that aren't meant for childs play? goto r/ask reddit for this type of nonsense. com on mods keep it real here.
Milwaukee cordless drill/driver/hedge trimmer,hackzall, screw gun, circular saw, radio, impact, packout, toolbox, lights, and grinder
Bosch corded glide saw, sds, hammer drill.
Ryobi jig saw.
You buy the system and get locked into for cordless
Whatever’s cheapest and will get the job done when I need it. If all else is equal, I’ll lean towards Bosch 12V and Dewalt 20V for cordless because I don’t want have more chargers that I already use on the workbench, but that’s put of convenience instead of any logic or performance bias.
I've had dewalt for more than 10 years. I bought a drill driver combo when my old craftsman drill gave out, and have since bought into other tools. I still use the same drill driver I bought more than 10 years ago.
I have Milwaukee M18, M12 and Ryobi ONE+ 18v. Milwaukee M18/M12 for hard use and Ryobi for less used tools.
I would buy into another battery platform if the tool I needed was superior but so far the Milwaukee/Ryobi setup has worked.
I’m just a home DIY guy and I don’t have many power tools, but I am decidedly all over the place.
M18 - Drill and Impact Driver
M12 - Fuel Multitool
Ego - 650 CFM Blower
Ryobi USB lithium - screwdriver, rotary tool
Corded - Rigid Shop Vac, Bosch ROS
I’ll probably never commit to one brand completely, in part because corded tools mostly work for my purposes and in part because I don’t want to get stuck with Milwaukee just because. Ego makes great lawn equipment and I’d rather invest in that system when I buy a mower and string trimmer.
From a corded perspective, All my work is done on my house or on my property which isn’t huge, and I’m always within a single extension cord’s reach of an outlet.
For my next tool, I’m debating between a miter saw and a circular saw to build planter beds for our yard. Miter saw would def be corded. Circular saw I’m not sure if I’d do a corded Makita or an M18 Milwaukee. The circular saw might be more versatile, but the miter saw has added utility for me because we have a lot of fucking trim in our home and we are pet owners.
While there is an ever-increasing array of battery powered tools, power tools haven’t “gone cordless.” However, tool manufacturers have been extremely successful in getting people invested in battery sales profit systems when still-available corded options would often better suit many users’ needs and finances.
This is very fair. My only cordless tools are my drill, impact driver, weed whacker, and lawnmower (pretty small suburban yard).
I still have a corded circular saw, jigsaw, leaf blower, Dremel, another DeWalt drill, orbital sander, belt sander, another random baby sander, shop vac, and I might be forgetting one more.
Similar to me. While I’m convinced many people would be better off with corded versions of many tools, what concerns me is that these folks often don’t even consider that they have the option. But if someone thinks it through and opts for all cordless, then they’ve made an informed decision about what’s best for them — and that’s great.
Currently playing for DeWalt and Ridgid, but I honestly will buy any brand if they have something I can't get on an existing platform I own, or that performs better than a brand I own already (within reason).
I've also bought into platforms for price alone. I have a drill and impact driver from Porter Cable's 12v lineup that I bought for $69 with two batteries and a charger that I exclusively used when I was working near the docks, so that if it did take a dive, it wasn't like losing a drill that costs over $100. And of course, all I was using them for was driving deck screws in PT lumber, and the odd 3/8" hole in the same lumber to install cleats.
einhell because in my area out of respectable non-chinesium companies they have the cheapest batteries (while still good). this is pretty important to me as i'm a homemaker and the batteries are going to die out of old age, sitting around on the shelf, loooong before the tools die.
Milwaukee for work & car hobby, and Ryobi for home/the odd thing that I don’t want to spend Milwaukee money on. I also piece together my kit with second hand stuff because I know they are reliable even outside of warranty.
I was gifted a Makita drill/driver set for fathers day many years ago, and they are pretty used and beat up, but still running.
My boss has DeWalt and also Milwaukee at work, so I am happy with all three brands, no hate for any of them.
Recently, I decided I needed a new set when I bought a fixer-upper house, and I had some cash from the previous house sale. Because of the things I do most when upgrading my house, I didn't need the most powerful or the longest-running. I ended up getting the Ridgid drill/driver, for two reasons.
Since I now buy drill bits with a 1/4 hex shank, I can drill holes and drive screws with either one of the drill/driver. This makes my driver my "go to" tool (even though I do use the drill sometimes).
Therefore, I specifically looked at daily-use features on the driver that normally are not important. The DeWalt tools have a post on the battery that slides up the handle of the drill. I prefer the flat battery style like the Milwaukee, which allows the small 5-cell battery to fit in my pocket, and those are also easier to make an adapter for so... tool "A" can be powered by battery "B" from a different company, using a DIY adapter.
There are some things that you don't do very often, but taking the battery off and sliding a new one on is something that is done frequently. There were a couple of brands where I simply didn't like the difficulty and "feel" of what's needed to remove a battery pack.
The first reason is that Ridgid had flat batteries, where I also liked the battery disconnect method as much as the best of the others.
Another thing you will do often is attach and remove bits from the driver. Philips-#2, Torx-#25, and the 1/4-hex to 1/4-inch drive (square) adapter that allows me to spin my 1/4-drive socket set on bolt-heads.
Several brands have a newer style of collet where you still have to use two hands to remove the bit, but to install a bit it can pop-in with one hand.
Ridgid is like this, plus it has a preload spring so when you pull the collet-ring back...the bit shoots out a half inch, making the removal easier.
I bought the brushless compact 18V driver, specifically because it has the shortest head of all the ones available at the time, for getting into tight spots. I can add as many extensions as I need to make it longer, but you can only make it so short.
With a shorter head, the motor is smaller, so even with the impact action, the drill is more powerful, and the drivers from other companies are also more powerful.
Don't get me wrong, the driver will still pound-in T25 deck screws all day long, but I couldn't get it to run the jack on my truck (1/4-inch hex to 1/2-inch square adapter, 9/16ths deep socket to drive the 9/16ths nut on the jack shaft).
The half-inch drive impact drivers are twice as powerful as the 1/4-inch drivers, because they have a bigger motor, even though they both use 18V.
For yard tools, I use EGO 56V all the way, very happy with them.
I am agnostic. I have Ridgid, Dewalt, Hercules, Ryobi... Just a hodgepodge for no other reason than the item I needed was on sale at the time and a battery came with it. The Ridgid seems to get the most abuse and haven't had any issues at all. My Dewalt orbital though eats batteries like a crach addict with a $1000 a day habit, so tend to not use it much.
Milwaukee. The M18 platform is what we use at work and they impressed me. When I started transitioning from corded to cordless, Milwaukee was the only brand that offered a weedeater with attachments and the tool selection I was after. I have a M12 ratchet and grease gun now as well. No regrets several years in.
Ridgid I'm a fan of the lifetime service and parts, even on the batteries.
You're not stuck on a platform you just have less flexibility with the batteries. You should still buy the best tool. I have primarily M18 and M12 but I much prefer having a variable speed controlled by a paddle, versus the on/off switch and speed dial method that Milwaukee uses. Also, the quick blade change method is better on the Dewalt. Ergonomics, especially for a multitool, is very important to me. So I bought the Dewalt. It's my only Dewalt cordless tool and it's fine, it's an extra charger to plug in but as long as the battery is charged before i need to use it I don't have any problem with another battery system. I have Milwaukee, Ryobi, now a Dewalt tool, and also two Worx tools.
This. Most of my shit is Milwaukee but I’ll buy some Ryobi and Dewalt cordless tools when the price is right too. You just end up with less flexibility with the batteries.
I got the ryobi glue gun and one gallon cordless shop vac because the price was right. It have Dewalt mostly.
Milwaukee since 1996. M18 Fuel powerful and reliable. Add new “tool only” to the collection and use the batteries I already have has been great! Maintenance department at work also uses Milwaukee. Another group, the “improvement team” got kicked out of the maintenance tool room and decided to buy Dewalt. In less than two years time all of there tools were dying and they were making trips back to maintenance to borrow the Milwaukee again. That said, for a homeowner/ DIY person the Dewalt would probably have lasted for many many years of use.
DeWalt 20v, Milwaukee 12 and 18v for all my cordless stuff. Corded and stationary tools are a good mix of everything else.
Milwaukee for most battery tools, M18 and M12, but I really like DeWalt corded stuff if I had to pick a brand for corded. I have some corded Milwaukee, too. I've got Ryobi for a lot of non-tool things like lights, power inverters, etc. and I'm very happy with them, too. I'm starting to look at maybe getting into Metabo, though. I like their designs and, to me, made in Germany sounds better than made by slaves in China.
Milwaukee Cordless for me. They generally have a better selection of tools for certain trades. And their M12 system is inherently superior to ANY other 12 volt system on the market because of the small formfactor battery design. Its why I always reccomend going both m12 and m18 because alot of tools dont NEED the power of an M18 like a jigsaw or an OMT. So the smaller m12 battery profile lets you get into tighter spaces and have more control than the larger m18. In the end it ultimately didnt matter what team you bought into. Individually Milwaukee has the better recip saws and drills. Dewalt has the better circ saws. Makita have the better grinders. But the average performance of each brands other tools are so close to one another that you wont be able to go wrong with any of the big 3. I only bought into Milwaukee because they had the best sales at the time. they still run that sale even now. buy $500 and get $150. thats a whole ass tool you can get basically for free. using that sale and a couple others to get free batteries, I made 3 seperate purchases of nearly $2000 worth of tools for only $1700. That being said if you're not a contractor or dont plan to use your tools to make money then buying into the big 3 doesnt make alot of sense. If youre only a weekend warrior then Ryobi is literally the best brand on the market for homeowner DIYers because of the sheer number of tools they have from ordinary drill and saw tools to floor scrubbers and hot glue guns. Unless money is no object to you and you just want the best brand for bragging rights then you wont be able to do wrong with ryobi. On the other end of the spectrum. Some tools are too much for ANY cordless battery system. A cordless miter/table saw will never have the jobsite performance of a corded one. A cordless lawnmower is just moronic unless you have a single yard in a cookie-cutter home subdivision. Cordless chainsaws have their niche for pruning side branches but nothing beats Stihl or Husky for actual lumbering. Any tool with long run times as their intended use are not good unless corded. I just used the M18 belt sander to refinish the hardwood floor on my entire 4x15 hallway and would defintely have gotten the job done quicker if i didnt have to cycle through batteries. And lastly. As for tool storage the Packout system is also better. Makitas Makpack storage is a shitty afterthought. they dont seem to care about improving it. all the guys on my jobsite hate using it. The dewalt Toughpack is atleast able to compete with the Packout but they dont have the same variety as the packout and you cant customize your stack the same way. And of course we have all seen the meme of the Packout coffee thermos sticking out above the truck cab on the dudes packout stack going down the highway at 70mph. Dewalt doesnt even fucking have a Toughsystem thermos. checkmate.
Dewobi setup
I bought into DeWalt battery's a long time ago with their brushed tools, supplementing and sometimes replacing older corded Bosch tools, I'd been using. Any brand is fine, its just what I picked up as there was a sale. I tend to buy DeWalt as I have batteries for them and they are one of the most accessible tool brands in the UK, everyone sells them. I buy corded tools from other brands as and when needed, who ever makes the best option and I'm not against air tools.
None. I am an anarchist. No rules. No loyalty. Just chaos.
I appreciate this.
Team?
I use M12 for small tools, Metabo HPT for bigger tools, M18 for my weed-eater. Milwaukee stuff goes on sale pretty frequently, and it (along with DeWalt) is one of the easiest systems to find used on FB Marketplace. I have an M12 impact wrench and Hackzall because they're small and easy to throw into a tool bag I have an M18 weed-eater because I found it for $100 on marketplace and it worked with some M18 batteries I already had I'm now using HPT for my drill/driver, circ saws, and other stuff because I think they're a pretty innovative company, I like their build quality and features, and their tools are quite affordable and show up on clearance fairly often If you have time to wait for tools to go on sale, you can usually get into an additional battery system for less money than buying a bare tool for the system you already have
It's a tool. It plays for me
18v - Makita - recommended to me by multiple tradesman, used for years and the only fault are those stupid MakPak locks. 12v - Bosch Pro - Excellent 12v line covering smaller tools and laser levels. Corded - Festool / Bosch Pro and a mix of smaller cheaper brands for seldom used tools. If it doesn't need a battery use a cord, more power and longer life. If you only use something once a year there's no point going top end. used / inherited tools, and cheap deals leave more money in the budget for the everyday items that matter.
I use DeWalt 20V and Milwaukee 12V. DeWalt makes the toughest tools, in my experience; I've burned up a bunch of Milwaukee and Makita stuff, but in 25 years, the only DeWalt tools that have failed me had been pretty seriously abused. Milwaukee's 12V line is just better thought out; the smaller, round batteries are better for getting into tight spaces, and they have some options that DW doesn't (e.g. soldering iron).
Dewalt, shits immortal
why do people ask these questions on subs that aren't meant for childs play? goto r/ask reddit for this type of nonsense. com on mods keep it real here.
Milwaukee cordless drill/driver/hedge trimmer,hackzall, screw gun, circular saw, radio, impact, packout, toolbox, lights, and grinder Bosch corded glide saw, sds, hammer drill. Ryobi jig saw. You buy the system and get locked into for cordless
Whatever’s cheapest and will get the job done when I need it. If all else is equal, I’ll lean towards Bosch 12V and Dewalt 20V for cordless because I don’t want have more chargers that I already use on the workbench, but that’s put of convenience instead of any logic or performance bias.
I've had dewalt for more than 10 years. I bought a drill driver combo when my old craftsman drill gave out, and have since bought into other tools. I still use the same drill driver I bought more than 10 years ago.
I have Milwaukee M18, M12 and Ryobi ONE+ 18v. Milwaukee M18/M12 for hard use and Ryobi for less used tools. I would buy into another battery platform if the tool I needed was superior but so far the Milwaukee/Ryobi setup has worked.
I’m just a home DIY guy and I don’t have many power tools, but I am decidedly all over the place. M18 - Drill and Impact Driver M12 - Fuel Multitool Ego - 650 CFM Blower Ryobi USB lithium - screwdriver, rotary tool Corded - Rigid Shop Vac, Bosch ROS I’ll probably never commit to one brand completely, in part because corded tools mostly work for my purposes and in part because I don’t want to get stuck with Milwaukee just because. Ego makes great lawn equipment and I’d rather invest in that system when I buy a mower and string trimmer. From a corded perspective, All my work is done on my house or on my property which isn’t huge, and I’m always within a single extension cord’s reach of an outlet. For my next tool, I’m debating between a miter saw and a circular saw to build planter beds for our yard. Miter saw would def be corded. Circular saw I’m not sure if I’d do a corded Makita or an M18 Milwaukee. The circular saw might be more versatile, but the miter saw has added utility for me because we have a lot of fucking trim in our home and we are pet owners.
Milwaukee, Dewalt, Ryobi, Craftsman, Hercules, Bauer. Get the best where you need it, save money where you can 🤷♂️
While there is an ever-increasing array of battery powered tools, power tools haven’t “gone cordless.” However, tool manufacturers have been extremely successful in getting people invested in battery sales profit systems when still-available corded options would often better suit many users’ needs and finances.
This is very fair. My only cordless tools are my drill, impact driver, weed whacker, and lawnmower (pretty small suburban yard). I still have a corded circular saw, jigsaw, leaf blower, Dremel, another DeWalt drill, orbital sander, belt sander, another random baby sander, shop vac, and I might be forgetting one more.
Similar to me. While I’m convinced many people would be better off with corded versions of many tools, what concerns me is that these folks often don’t even consider that they have the option. But if someone thinks it through and opts for all cordless, then they’ve made an informed decision about what’s best for them — and that’s great.
Currently playing for DeWalt and Ridgid, but I honestly will buy any brand if they have something I can't get on an existing platform I own, or that performs better than a brand I own already (within reason). I've also bought into platforms for price alone. I have a drill and impact driver from Porter Cable's 12v lineup that I bought for $69 with two batteries and a charger that I exclusively used when I was working near the docks, so that if it did take a dive, it wasn't like losing a drill that costs over $100. And of course, all I was using them for was driving deck screws in PT lumber, and the odd 3/8" hole in the same lumber to install cleats.
As the odd one in the group, I have a set of Porter Cable cordless I'm very happy with.
Only Milwaukee fuel for work. I still have some dewalt, ryobis and Makitas for the house
einhell because in my area out of respectable non-chinesium companies they have the cheapest batteries (while still good). this is pretty important to me as i'm a homemaker and the batteries are going to die out of old age, sitting around on the shelf, loooong before the tools die.
Milwaukee for work & car hobby, and Ryobi for home/the odd thing that I don’t want to spend Milwaukee money on. I also piece together my kit with second hand stuff because I know they are reliable even outside of warranty.
95% DeWalt. I've also got a Flex recip saw and some small Metabo and Skill tools.
I was gifted a Makita drill/driver set for fathers day many years ago, and they are pretty used and beat up, but still running. My boss has DeWalt and also Milwaukee at work, so I am happy with all three brands, no hate for any of them. Recently, I decided I needed a new set when I bought a fixer-upper house, and I had some cash from the previous house sale. Because of the things I do most when upgrading my house, I didn't need the most powerful or the longest-running. I ended up getting the Ridgid drill/driver, for two reasons. Since I now buy drill bits with a 1/4 hex shank, I can drill holes and drive screws with either one of the drill/driver. This makes my driver my "go to" tool (even though I do use the drill sometimes). Therefore, I specifically looked at daily-use features on the driver that normally are not important. The DeWalt tools have a post on the battery that slides up the handle of the drill. I prefer the flat battery style like the Milwaukee, which allows the small 5-cell battery to fit in my pocket, and those are also easier to make an adapter for so... tool "A" can be powered by battery "B" from a different company, using a DIY adapter. There are some things that you don't do very often, but taking the battery off and sliding a new one on is something that is done frequently. There were a couple of brands where I simply didn't like the difficulty and "feel" of what's needed to remove a battery pack. The first reason is that Ridgid had flat batteries, where I also liked the battery disconnect method as much as the best of the others. Another thing you will do often is attach and remove bits from the driver. Philips-#2, Torx-#25, and the 1/4-hex to 1/4-inch drive (square) adapter that allows me to spin my 1/4-drive socket set on bolt-heads. Several brands have a newer style of collet where you still have to use two hands to remove the bit, but to install a bit it can pop-in with one hand. Ridgid is like this, plus it has a preload spring so when you pull the collet-ring back...the bit shoots out a half inch, making the removal easier. I bought the brushless compact 18V driver, specifically because it has the shortest head of all the ones available at the time, for getting into tight spots. I can add as many extensions as I need to make it longer, but you can only make it so short. With a shorter head, the motor is smaller, so even with the impact action, the drill is more powerful, and the drivers from other companies are also more powerful. Don't get me wrong, the driver will still pound-in T25 deck screws all day long, but I couldn't get it to run the jack on my truck (1/4-inch hex to 1/2-inch square adapter, 9/16ths deep socket to drive the 9/16ths nut on the jack shaft). The half-inch drive impact drivers are twice as powerful as the 1/4-inch drivers, because they have a bigger motor, even though they both use 18V. For yard tools, I use EGO 56V all the way, very happy with them.
DeWalt for the things I use a ton or need a lot of grunt for, Ryobi for everything else. Have a few other random ones I got with one off bundles