In my experience, Ariens and Toro are the two best names in snow blowers, but ANY snow blower will blow snow, so it's mostly just a matter of finding one that fits your budget.
Two things every snow blower needs is an electric start and a light. In my own case, I actually keep my snow blower in my boiler room on the bottom floor of my building. The reason for that is that I don't have any place to keep it outside. But, more importantly, I need a narrow scoop on my snow blower to get between the cars in my parking lot, and so I really can't use anything with a scoop wider than about 24 inches without running the risk of scratching up my tenant's cars. So, I have a 5 HP Ariens with a 20 inch wide scoop. The narrow scoop means it takes me longer to clear the parking lot, but it also means the machine is lighter and easier to pull up the flight of seven steps to get it outside. Since it's warm in my boiler room, I don't have an electric start cuz the thing fires up on the first or second pull every time cuz the engine is already at room temperature when I pull the starter cord.
I'd also get an electric light (which is an accessory on most blowers). It gets dark where I live in the winter at about 3:30 in the afternoon. If you're not coming home from work until 5:00 PM, you can't be without a light to see what you're doing and where you're going. You don't want to hit concrete steps or something with your machine.
No one in here has mentioned three stage snow blowers, which is what MTD's Troy-Bilt and Cub-Cadet brands are most famous for:
30" Three-Stage snow thrower
Three stage snow blowers have:
1. a low speed auger very much like the low speed auger on two stage snow blowers,
2. a medium speed auger that takes the snow from the low speed auger and feeds it into the high speed impeller, and
3. a high speed impeller very much like the high speed impeller on two stage snow blowers.
I don't have a three stage snow blower, but there's a lot of debate as to whether they provide any serious advantage over a two stage blower. My own feeling is that they SHOULD as the second stage compacts the snow being fed into the high speed impeller, so that what's coming out of the chute is denser and travels further without being as much affected by the wind. Three stage snow blowers are touted as being able to blow 50 percent more snow than an equivalently sized two stage blower, but I've never used one and therefore can't speak from experience. If it were me, tho, I'd give them a serious look. The other side of the coin is that if three stage were considerably better than two stage, why doesn't every manufacturer offer a three stage blower? And, my best guess at the answer is the word "patent". For years all the companies that made wrenches generally ignored Snap-On's "flank drive" box end wrenches. Now that Snap-On's 17 year patent has expired on the flank drive design for box end wrenches, everyone and their dog is making flank drive wrenches.
What I really like about the three stage machine cited above is that it has electrically heated hand grips to keep your hands warm, and an electric chute control so you're not continuously cranking or reaching over the machine to change the direction of the snow chute. And, if it wuz me, I'd definitely inquire as to whether a snow cab is available as an accessory for those windy days when the wind blows the snow right back in your face. I wear a balaclava when blowing snow, but the snow still gets onto what little skin is exposed and makes the job a miserable one.
Or, at least, a three stage blower with heated handgrips, electric chute control, a light and a snow cab is what I'd be most interested in checking out if the wide scoop wasn't a problem and I had a place to keep a relatively heavy machine like that outdoors on my property.