This is a great, powerful, quiet hand mixer - doing the job efficiently and well.  I do wish the arms of the beaters were just a tad longer to accommodate my largest mixing bowl but really, it isn't a big deal.  This mixer is a work horse and gets a lot of use making cake batter & double and triple batches of cookies.  I can't emphasize enough how quiet it is and the strength of it's motor.  While I've never tested the higher priced models, I would say that this mixer is definitely worth upgrading from the low-end mixers (which for me broke after 1 year). [This review was collected as part of a promotion.]