My brother went through a few years of unemployment and was doing some home repair business and I would help him on occasion. He bought several Harbor Freight nailers of various angles / types and they all worked perfectly. You could sink a stud into the wood but I think that's air pressure not the gun. He has a Porter Cable compressor. Granted there's a refinement of manufacturing with good tools but for the price and as you say for the non-contractor they work fine. Matter of fact, a lot of contractors are buying HF stuff and you just throw it away if it breaks since it's 1/4 the price.