William,
I started with a 008 Smokette about 4 1/2 years ago and loved it (still do).
As time went buy I started wondering about pellets and pellet grill/smokers after waiting a while for the new FE grill I went with a CS-570. My hope was that I could a buy one cooker that would do it all.
I worked with the CS-570 for about a year and learned that I love pellet cooking but here in the hills of Colorado I can not count on one cooker to do it all as the CS-570 is uninsulated.
By now I also wanted a slightly larger smoker than the 008, so to make a long story short I thought long and hard, and asked a lot of questions, to reach the decision to sell the two units and order a FEC-100.
Bottom line was I wanted pellet cooking, a wider temperature range than the 008, an insulated box (all weather cooking), a bit more space, and Cookshack quality.
Today I'm cooking anything below 400 deg. on the FEC and a anything above 400 deg on a gasser. I could go on and on about how wonderful the FEC is but that is covered in the forum section below (by many people).
As to advice you can't beat Cookshack but as to pellets some like them and some don't. As others have said it's best if you can find someone cooking on one (possibly at a contest) and have a look and taste.
I'd love to go to the December class as well but that's a whole different subject.
