I in advance compared several smaller (mobile) tripods and am - although I wanted to buy equipment without brand names this time - but ended up with Manfrotto. The stand is well made, stable, set up quickly & easily and (even if it weight, can not keep up with the competition from the prohibitively expensive fiber-bearing) reasonably portable. Changing of tripod heads is indeed quite a fiddly job (= three, solve difficult to reach screws) and requires additional. But tool that is the only reason why the rating only 4 out of 5 stars identifies.
