I just received this impact drive. I have 5 of the makita's, because once you get hooked on impact, you will only use impacts instead of drills. use them for lags, screws etc. This impact driver works great, has great torque, and best of all it has a belt hook attachment that hooks onto the back of your tool belt, holds well and since this tool is light weight you hardly know its their. one great use for this tool is removing old screws especially in door hindges with the straigt slot. the torque loosens up old screws excellently. because you pump the trigger and it torques it out. I highly recommend this tool it is as excellent as the makita except this has the belt hook.

this drill kicks butt, when it's charged. I just built a massive deck, 4 days to lay planks on 40x28 ft deck. The biggest complaint about this drill is the ridiculously weak battery. panasonic is up to 3.5 Amp hrs, these are still at 2 A.Hrs.
br /Also, the battery won't begin to recharge if it's too warm, and when your firing screws all day, in the sun, things tend to heat up. I spent way too much time with my old drill in my hand waiting for these batteries to cool down, then re-charge.
br /i think buying this tool took about 5 hours off my life!
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br /In defense of this tool, it kicks butt at driving a 3" screw into really hard woods!!! and outperformed all the other drills on the jobsite, when it was ready to go.

To start, I have 32 years in the home building trades and purchased this impact driver to fasten approximately 2500 LF of mahogany 5/4 on one of our usual high end jobs. Initialy I found the drill to be exceptional, power was good, comfort of use, # of fasteners installed between charges, but then I noticed the batteries were not lasting as long after only 5 or 6 charges. I was only getting about 32 3 inch screws in per charge about half of what I was getting out of the box. Others on the job use the Makita 14.4 with the 2.6 amp hour batteries and install 2 to 3 times the # of fasteners as my Bosch. The Bosch batteries are the same 2.0 AH that they have had for years and most likely need to upgrade them to Ni-Cad or better if they wish to keep their contractor grade status. As for me, a diehard Bosch man, I'll be returning this and getting the Makita.

Not sure I'd get this again simply because the battery doesn't last, and I got this to make laying decking easier. I'm a journeyman carpenter, so I know what stands up and what doesn't--and others have said the same thing--plus what is written here. Bosch should take this to heart, because they are making some great hardy tools of late.

I used this drill to put timberlocks into engineered lumber, and they died too fast. But I used same type (voltage, hp and etc.) batteries form other Bosch drill, and they died as fast as original ones. So I think batteries are not strong enough for this drill. Bosch needs to come up with so radical ideas here.

I am a professional cabinet installer and I have owned this tool for a little over a year. The trigger has now gone bad on it for the second time. The first one lasted 9 months and the second one lasted six. Bosch will fix it again since it is still under waranty but I need one tomorrow so tonight I bought a Makita hoping it will last longer. The Bosch was my first impact driver and now I can't be without one for even a day. I have several cordless Bosch drills, saws, and planers that I have used them every day for several years and they all work perfectly so the trigger problem seems to be limited to just the impact driver.

I have happily used Bosch tools for several years. I find the tools extremely durable and the couple of times I have had a problem Bosch bent over backwards to correct the problem. Once even replacing a tool out of warrantee. The said it just shouldn't have broken the way it did. I use this impact driver daily and love it's light weight and power. I would have given this a 5 if it functioned as a drill as well.

This is my 4th Bosch 14.4 tool. Very well built, nice features. Could not beat it for the price I paid (130 with free shipping) which included 2 bluecore batteries and a charger. I wanted the extra charger and 2 more batteries helps keep all my tools available with charged batteries.
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br /As for the tool itself, if you haven't used an impact driver before, you don't know what you are missing. Driving long screws into 2x material is a joy. My Bosch drill had plenty of power, but if you don't hold the drill down firmly, it is possible to strip the head of the screw with all the torque. The impact driver applies it in tiny jolts and the result is that the screws seem to sink into the work without much effort at all. Its also very good for removing screws out of decking for the same reason. It comes with a small tiltable led that does a nice job illuminating the area you are working. Battery life is OK, not one of Bosch's stronger points. It has plenty of torque, enough that it will loosen lug nuts on your car wheels. You can buy adapters that will let you attach sockets from 1/4 to 1/2 inch drives.

I have always had a cordless drill and used that as my driver. I don't know why I didn't get one of these earlier. I have used it on a deck, including the 6" lag bolts (pre-drilled holes of course), on cabinet installation, and putting shelving together. The batteries last a long time and it has great power for such a small and light weight tool.

I find this impactor to be a very good and useful tool. I use it often with great results.