Outdoor Power Equipment (Lawn Mowers, Snow Blowers, Chain Saws and more) Discussions

I am choosing/deliberating/agonizing among a few different replacements for my electric trimmer and edger duo.  I desparately want to ditch the cord, and the split-boom (attachment) setups are appealing.  The candidates I'm looking at currently are:

• Echo SRM 210SB
• Echo PAS 230
• Echo PAS 260
• Stihl KM-55R
• Stihl KM-110R

My only concern is that, to the best of my knowledge, all of these are cable drive.  Is this correct?  For "regular" household use, does this matter?  I won't be clearing shrub or anything with it -- just edging sidewalks and trimming around flower beds.  The option to add a light-duty tiller or hedge trimmer is nice, but I'm realistic about the functionality versus the respective dedicated equipment.  I would rather go slightly overkill on my choice and not have problems later.  This would be my first foray into gas-powered edgers/trimmers, and I know of several people with "bargain" units that they were replacing annually.

Any insight would be appreciated.  Local dealer sells both Stihl and Echo, and was basically telling me to forget the Echo line altogether.  Not sure if this is because dealer spiff is better from Stihl...

Thanks!

The Echo split boom will not work with the John Deere attachments.

John Deere and Homelight are the same unit I believe (or they WERE a few years age when homelight was bought by Deere and they filled theire line with the homelight junk)

I would like to buy either the PAS 260 or 265 with pruner as a Christmas gift. I can see little difference between the two.  The person receiving the gift is sixty years old. He likes Echo products very much.  He's a young sixty and not frail by any means, but "out-of-shape."  This equipment reaches a height of approximately 17 feet, and it weighs approximately 26-27 pounds. My thinking is that this equipment could be unwieldy with so much weight at the end of a shaft.  The PAS 230 is too short and the gas tank too small.  We have loads of trees.  Will someone shed some light on this for me? Your insight is very much appreciated.