Shindaiwa and Echo basically the same company now. The Shindaiwa T230x appears to be a 2 cycle version so it should have long life as long you don't straight gas it. Going with a straight shaft is also good as curve shafts tend to have problem related to the shaft being curved. The only problem that I see might be in the future is what the governmental environmentalist do as they are trying to kill off 2 cycles.
Echo and Shindaiwa both have good representation for quality products here. Anything is better than the low end consumer grade trimmers on the market.
