This will be an extremely interesting thread to follow for those of us that repair our own boards.

I own a PACE ST75 desoldering station.... www.paceworldwide.com/product/view/id/1685.html ....which I purchased from Kevin at Upton Australia here in Victoria... www.uptonaustralia.com.au/  .  I can't remember what I paid for the unit as I've had it a good 8 years or so now.

I've used this PACE unit on numerous board repairs and just recently reworked two complete sets of Bally boards for my EBD & Xenon.  I've found the unit to be extremely robust and very easy to use.  Removed IC sockets, transistors, resistors, capacitors, 0.056" header pins and many other components without an issue. 

One small gripe I have is when the tube starts to block up.  Solder accumulates at the other end of tube section of the tip, before it goes into the collection chamber.  It does take some time for this to happen, but when it does, it usually means switching off the unit and cleaning the tube section out.  I'm very interested to know if these other units like the Hakko or the Aoyue have any issues during operation.