The part about skipping the ladder setup is what really sells it for me. On a storm cleanup job the clock is everything, since you usually have a line of people waiting and every house you finish means another one you can get to before dark. Setting up and moving a ladder eats 15 to 20 minutes each time if you're being safe about it, and that adds up fast when you've got 11 jobs in one week. The saw basically turns a two man ladder job into a one man ground job, which is huge when you're working alone or your ground guy is busy dragging brush. My guess is that $340 looked like a lot up front, but if it saved you even a day of labor across those calls, it already came out ahead. Tools that kill setup time are almost always worth more than tools that just cut faster in my experience, but your mileage may vary depending on what kind of work you're doing.