Timothy Murphy wrote:

Any views on the merits of wood vs pellet burning stoves?
The old-fashioned wood-burning stoves look much nicer,
to my eyes, but are they much more trouble?

Or likely to be more expensive?

Umm woodburners are cheaper than pellet stoves and pellet stoves are
rubbish. There's no real difficulty in making a decision betweent he
two. Pellet stoves appeal to people of a certain age who have never
lived with open fires/stove before. They appear to offer the convenience
of oil/gas boilers and promise eco-weenie credentials.

The fuel is expensive, low density and hence you need to keep filling up
the hopper. You also need a source of supply that will deliver on a
regular basis. And you're tied to fuel in pellet form.

If what you want is unattended running for central heating then IMO you
need the bigger and uglier boilers that run on chipped wood rather than
pellets. You also need a wood chipper, somewhere to dry and store the
chips and, preferably, a large outbuilding close to the house to install
boiler, chipper, storage etc in. Workable on a farm or large rural
property - difficult to impossible in suburbia.