Pros:
+ power to do almost all real-world tasks
+ quality is high
+ circular saw is best cordless ever
+ battery life is good and meter is useful even for contractors
+ bag is *much* better than one of those formed cases

Cons:
- pricey compared to 18-volt
- cold performance is poor, especially disappointing due to marketing claims
- easy to switch drill to hammer mode when adjusting clutch
- drill is great, but heavy

I’ve been using this tool set for more than a year now in a residential construction job. Though I am an HVAC contractor, I do lots of wood carpentry as part of the job. I bought the V28 set primarily after searching for the best cordless circular saw. Well, this is it. I haven’t plugged in a circular saw since I’ve had the V28! I use all of these tools on a daily basis and they do everything I ask them to do. There’s only one job where I even notice that I have a cordless tool in my hands: ripping treated or other hard lumber. Ripping is a hard job and I’ve melted the bearings/bushings our of corded saws while doing it. The V28 never gives the impression that the saw is being harmed, but it does bog down when ripping difficult woods. In such situations, a corded saw would be more powerful, but I like the V28 saw so much I don’t bother with cords. I’ve yet to find anything that the drill or sawzall won’t do. From hole saws to ship augers, the drill just goes through anything until the battery dies. You pay for this power in weight, though, as this is the heaviest cordless drill I’ve used.

I’ve found one Achilles heel with my V28 tools and it’s cold-weather performance. I leave my tools on my van as it’s inconvenient to take them home with me , so they sit out all night in the cold weather. When the batteries are stored below freezing, you will notice the difference come morning. The tools just won’t have much power at all until the batteries warm up. Milwaukee claims that you can simply use the batteries for a few minutes and they will “warm themselves up” and operate normally, but any battery will warm up during use, so this is not a novel feature. What happens with the V28 batteries is that they will indeed warm up if you use them enough, but by the time by the time they are warm enough, they will be out of juice. This is rather confusing, because I know that lithium-ion batteries generally work better in the cold than NiMH. I’ve had lots of experience with NiMH cordless tools, though, and am convinced that the V28′s are noticeably worse in the cold than my old NiMH tools, which were much, much cheaper. I am willing to put up with this poor cold performance in light of how good the tools are in every other respect, but I don’t care for Milwaukee’s marketing claims that their lithium-ion batteries offer cold-weather performance superior to the standard NiCd/NiMH types. I beg to differ. My V28 batteries spend a *lot* of time in the charger during the winter. An electrician that I work with liked my V28 tools and bought his own set and he has independently experienced the same cold-weather disappointments that I have.

In short, these tools are good enough to satisfy almost any contractor-grade user out there. They only leave you grumbling during the winter, though I typically manage to avoid the extension cord even then. Corded tools are still much cheaper and should provide a longer life than even the best cordless tools, but the convenience is worth it for me considering the way I use power tools. If you do framing or other major carpentry in one place, you’ll prefer to run a cord and use cheaper, more powerful, corded tools. If you move around the job a lot and do many smaller, but still demanding jobs, you will probably be quite happy with the Milwaukee V28. Unless you only need one specialized tool, I highly recommend this 4-tool set, since the individual tool/battery combos are outrageously priced. With the V28, you are mostly paying for the batteries, so you might as well get the tools all together.

*** UPDATE May 5, 2010 ***
The batteries in my V28 system suffered a very poor lifespan when compared with Milwaukee’s warranty coverage. My batteries each show about 800 charges at the time of this writing. Though they are covered by a 5-year warranty (2-year full replacement, next 3 years prorated), I noted serious drops in performance after only one year. After another year of use and further degradation (2008), I had the batteries tested by my local Milwaukee repair center. All cells checked out at normal voltage (4V), so they could not help me as they only measure unloaded voltage in order to detect dead or shorted cells. Long-term observation shows that overall capacity and voltage under load are definitely reduced in these batteries, however. When new, I could do hard work with these tools for hours before…

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http://www.constructicon.net/best-buy-the-rumford-gardener-mini-indoor-garden-set-with-molded-case-hpc3010-lowest-price-usa.html#comment-4098 Susan Wed, 31 Aug 2011 02:10:53 +0000 http://www.constructicon.net/best-buy-the-rumford-gardener-mini-indoor-garden-set-with-molded-case-hpc3010-lowest-price-usa.html#comment-4098 <div style="margin-left:0.5em;"> <div style="margin-bottom:0.5em;"> 5 of 5 people found the following review helpful: </div> <div style="margin-bottom:0.5em;"> <span style="margin-left: -5px;"><img src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/common/customer-reviews/stars-4-0._V192240704_.gif" width="64" alt="4.0 out of 5 stars" title="4.0 out of 5 stars" height="12" border="0"/></span> <b>Great gift for the college gardener!</b>, <nobr>February 3, 2007</nobr></div> <div style="margin-bottom:0.5em;"> <div><div style="float:left;">By </div><div style="float:left;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A1H9J8RUDLQ1TG/ref=cm_cr_if_pdp/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&tag=sale00317-20&linkCode=xm2" target="_top"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Susan</span></a> (Pennsylvania) - <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A1H9J8RUDLQ1TG/ref=cm_cr_if_auth_rev/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&tag=sale00317-20&linkCode=xm2&sort_by=MostRecentReview" target="_top"></a></div></div><div style="clear:both;"/> </div> <div class="tiny" style="margin-bottom:0.5em;"> <b><span class="h3color tiny">This review is from: </span>The Rumford Gardener Mini Indoor Garden Set with Molded Case HPC3010 (Lawn & Patio)</b> </div> I gave this as a gift to my daughter who is going to college and it was an instant hit. She clipped all the plants in my house, transplanted a few with the trowels, then stored all the tools back in the molded case to travel to school. There she is growing a variety of seedlings and caring for her roommates plants. I choose the molded case version over the tote bag because I thought that with all the moves she will face in the next few years the case would keep everything together. The clippers are sharp and the tools sturdy enough for an amateur indoor gardener. I combined this gift with a house plant book and it was a success. The trowels would not be sturdy enough to use in hard outdoor soil but that is not the intented use of this product. <div style="padding-top: 10px; clear: both; width: 100%;"> <div style="float:left; padding-right:15px; border-right:1px solid #CCCCCC"><div style="padding-bottom:5px;"><b class="tiny" style="color:#666666;white-space:nowrap;">Help other customers find the most helpful reviews</b> </div><div style="width:300px;"> <a name="RX9V2W8KUHYAG.2115.Helpful.Reviews" style="font-size:1px;"> </a><span><span class="votingPrompt">Was this review helpful to you? </span><a rel="nofollow" class="votingButtonReviews" href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/voting/cast/Reviews/2115/RX9V2W8KUHYAG/Helpful/1/ref=cm_cr_ifvoteyn/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&token=44445A237188BC18961C03DE83605ED03D65358F&target=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5hbWF6b24uY29tL3Byb2R1Y3QtcmV2aWV3cy9CMDAwMVEyVzVFL3JlZj1jbV9jcl9pZnZvdGVyZHIvMTc4LTgxMzcwNzEtMDkzNDE0Mz9fZW5jb2Rpbmc9VVRGOCZzdW1tYXJ5PTAmYWxpbmtDb2RlPXhtMiZ0YWc9c2FsZTAwMzE3LTIwJnY9MiZsaW5rQ29kZT14bTImYXNpbj1CMDAwMVEyVzVFJnRydW5jYXRlPTUwMDAmYWtpZD1BS0lBSVBDSTNGSFA2T0wyQTM1QSZzaWc9djRCcDFSN0tBZkFjOHlHd2NodjUzdGdZU2VmZkpDUCUyQndYRkZkTE9CdHQ4JTNEJmV4cD0yMDExLTA5LTAxVDA5JTNBMzMlM0ExMFomYXRhZz1zYWxlMDAzMTctMjA&voteAnchorName=RX9V2W8KUHYAG.2115.Helpful.Reviews&voteSessionID=178-8137071-0934143"><img src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/reviews/btn-yes-sec-md._V192249951_.gif" width="35" alt="Yes" style="vertical-align:middle;" height="18" border="0"/></a> <a rel="nofollow" class="votingButtonReviews" href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/voting/cast/Reviews/2115/RX9V2W8KUHYAG/Helpful/-1/ref=cm_cr_ifvoteyn/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&token=FB6F8A5177DC0D8965D5112AD6FCDAD834C3578F&target=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5hbWF6b24uY29tL3Byb2R1Y3QtcmV2aWV3cy9CMDAwMVEyVzVFL3JlZj1jbV9jcl9pZnZvdGVyZHIvMTc4LTgxMzcwNzEtMDkzNDE0Mz9fZW5jb2Rpbmc9VVRGOCZzdW1tYXJ5PTAmYWxpbmtDb2RlPXhtMiZ0YWc9c2FsZTAwMzE3LTIwJnY9MiZsaW5rQ29kZT14bTImYXNpbj1CMDAwMVEyVzVFJnRydW5jYXRlPTUwMDAmYWtpZD1BS0lBSVBDSTNGSFA2T0wyQTM1QSZzaWc9djRCcDFSN0tBZkFjOHlHd2NodjUzdGdZU2VmZkpDUCUyQndYRkZkTE9CdHQ4JTNEJmV4cD0yMDExLTA5LTAxVDA5JTNBMzMlM0ExMFomYXRhZz1zYWxlMDAzMTctMjA&voteAnchorName=RX9V2W8KUHYAG.2115.Helpful.Reviews&voteSessionID=178-8137071-0934143"><img src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/reviews/btn-no-sec-md._V192249949_.gif" width="35" alt="No" style="vertical-align:middle;" height="18" border="0"/></a> <span class="votingMessage"/></span> </div></div><div style="float:left;"><div style="padding-left:15px;"><div style="white-space:nowrap;"><span class="tiny"> <a name="RX9V2W8KUHYAG.2115.Inappropriate.Reviews" style="font-size:1px;"> </a><span class="reportingButton"><nobr><a rel="nofollow" class="reportingButton" href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/voting/cast/Reviews/2115/RX9V2W8KUHYAG/Inappropriate/1/ref=cm_cr_ifvoteyn/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&token=44A1FC50DDB1684EDBBEBD93D12B519C79D8E08E&target=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5hbWF6b24uY29tL3Byb2R1Y3QtcmV2aWV3cy9CMDAwMVEyVzVFL3JlZj1jbV9jcl9pZnZvdGVyZHIvMTc4LTgxMzcwNzEtMDkzNDE0Mz9fZW5jb2Rpbmc9VVRGOCZzdW1tYXJ5PTAmYWxpbmtDb2RlPXhtMiZ0YWc9c2FsZTAwMzE3LTIwJnY9MiZsaW5rQ29kZT14bTImYXNpbj1CMDAwMVEyVzVFJnRydW5jYXRlPTUwMDAmYWtpZD1BS0lBSVBDSTNGSFA2T0wyQTM1QSZzaWc9djRCcDFSN0tBZkFjOHlHd2NodjUzdGdZU2VmZkpDUCUyQndYRkZkTE9CdHQ4JTNEJmV4cD0yMDExLTA5LTAxVDA5JTNBMzMlM0ExMFomYXRhZz1zYWxlMDAzMTctMjA&voteAnchorName=RX9V2W8KUHYAG.2115.Inappropriate.Reviews&voteSessionID=178-8137071-0934143"></a></nobr></span> </span> <span style="color:#CCCCCC;">|</span> <span class="tiny"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/review/RX9V2W8KUHYAG/ref=cm_cr_if_perm/?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0001Q2W5E&nodeID=&tag=sale00317-20&linkCode=xm2" target="_top"></a></span></div><div style="white-space:nowrap;padding-left:-5px;padding-top:5px;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/review/RX9V2W8KUHYAG/ref=cm_cr_if_cmt/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0001Q2W5E&nodeID=&tag=sale00317-20&linkCode=xm2#wasThisHelpful" target="_top"><img src="http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/x-locale/communities/discussion_boards/comment-sm._V192250344_.gif" width="16" alt="Comment" hspace="3" align="absmiddle" height="16" border="0"/></a> <a href="http://www.amazon.com/review/RX9V2W8KUHYAG/ref=cm_cr_if_cmt/178-8137071-0934143?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0001Q2W5E&nodeID=&tag=sale00317-20&linkCode=xm2#wasThisHelpful" target="_top">Comment</a></div></div></div><div style="clear:both;"/> </div> <br/></div>

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

Great gift for the college gardener!, February 3, 2007

By 

Susan (Pennsylvania) –

This review is from: The Rumford Gardener Mini Indoor Garden Set with Molded Case HPC3010 (Lawn & Patio)

I gave this as a gift to my daughter who is going to college and it was an instant hit. She clipped all the plants in my house, transplanted a few with the trowels, then stored all the tools back in the molded case to travel to school. There she is growing a variety of seedlings and caring for her roommates plants. I choose the molded case version over the tote bag because I thought that with all the moves she will face in the next few years the case would keep everything together. The clippers are sharp and the tools sturdy enough for an amateur indoor gardener. I combined this gift with a house plant book and it was a success. The trowels would not be sturdy enough to use in hard outdoor soil but that is not the intented use of this product.

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