kansascats wrote:
Any thoughts on which to buy?

I got the single speed - 20K oscillations -- last week for $20 and
added $20 in accessories.

This week, the variable speed version is $40 with about those same $20
in accessories, so the price is a wash.

The single speed one is pretty decent IMO. Old reviews talk about
it's "boxy" feel, but it's been redesigned and now is 20,000
oscillations vs 10K, so does a decent job. For $20, hard to beat.
But now with the variable speed one coming in at basically the same
price with the extra accessories, should I swap them out?

Personally, I don't really see the advantage of the multi speed version. It's
not like the one speed cuts way too fast. The whole pricipal of these things is
that they vibrate the teeth very fast to cut clowly but accurately through
things. slowing it down isn't going to be much advantage.

Does anyone that has the multi speed version ever use the lower speed(s)?

That is generally my opinion of multi-speed as well -- other than a
drill press, when is anything other than "fast" used? But when I was
cutting a small piece of weather stripping, I thought maybe slowing it
down a tad would give me a bit more accuracy.

I went to HF this eve -- came home with the same one I already had.

While there -- I was looking over the "blue" var-speed version.
Everything about it just seemed less polished. The off/on switch, the
enclosure, etc. As noted earlier, with the accessories (scraper, 2
wood blades, and sanding pad) it would seem a good deal. But my 5
year old noticed a plug-in nearby and "daddy" wasted no time. When I
plugged in the var-speed one, it seemed to hesitate.. then come up to
speed after a few secs. Well, maybe that is a "soft-start" feature,
or just a bad luck of the draw, but it seemed to indicate lesser
quality than the "red", uni-speed, version I had just used
yesterday. The uni-speed one seems perhaps to be the latest design,
it "feels" a little better and at least in my case, ran better. For
$20, I guess I'll stay with it for now.. unless I can come across a
Dremel for $55 or so (overstock is out of stock at $79). It not
already, check-out fitzallblades.com I've not ordered any yet, but
their prices are 35% below even HF prices.