Aurora AU1580MA Professional Grade Paper Shredder with SL16 Synthetic Shredder Oil - Heavy Duty Office Document Destruction for Confidential Files & Home Security

If you're trying to shred volumes of letter size paper, this is your shredder. I wanted to get rid of a file cabinet full of old financial documents, plus boxes in the garage and this saved me tons of money I would have spent if I'd taken everything to a professional shredder (or called a shredding company truck) and tons of time if I'd used a regular shredder. Plus it shreds everything into smaller sized, more secure confetti, which in turn takes up less space in your trash/recycling and is less of a mess than cross-cut shredded strips.This shredder is designed for you to open the lid, place several hundred sheets of letter size paper into the bin, close the lid, and walk away. You get other things done while it shreds. Amazing. Come back when it's done and load more. Also, all of these shredders that you can compare it to - they all have "run times" which means how long can it run for before it gets hot and needs to take a break. This has one of the longest run times, so it will shred way longer than the others before you need to stop. Which means more boxes of files done sooner. Awesome.Does it have any drawbacks? Yes.If you want to shred paper that isn't letter size, you won't do well using the letter bin. You need to hand feed through the top. The top feed does not accept a heavy load. You can't put very much down it at a time. If you like to hand feed a lot at a time, this isn't the shredder for you. Also, in the letter bin, paper that isn't normal paper (different weight - too light, too heavy, has folds in it) sometimes it doesn't pull through and the whole batch waits while it spins its gears and you have to pop the lid open and pull the paper on the bottom out and reset the stack.So I shredded probably 20 boxes worth, sold my file cabinet, and took it to my office and kept going.Ok, so then - about the customer service that I mention in my review title: I did have a problem. It's been 3 months... and the entire shredder broke. The main gear system just destroyed itself. Total mechanical failure. (All internal - nothing dangerous.) I was worried that I was going to be one of those 1 star reviews. "Oh why didn't I believe those reviewers?" (But every single shredder you read has some.) So I searched online for Aurora, found their website, emailed customer service and got a response immediately. Not days or hours - minutes. (Yes, it was during business hours.) They had me reply and send photos of the damage / failure plus proof of purchase. They basically said, ok, no problem, you're covered, give us your address so we can ship you a new one. (I did not need to return the old one.) They were so easy to deal with and no hassles - and yes, they spoke English.PROS:FastQuietExcels with letter size paperProduces micro-cut particlesShreds on its ownLengthy run timeGreat customer serviceDoes not require continuous (expensive) oilingCONS:Not as good with hand fed shreddingCan stall on letter size if abnormalDid break after 3 months (but was quickly replaced for free)Final Comment: At this price point, and with their service backing their 1 year warranty, if you have a lot of letter size shredding to do in the near future, it's awfully hard to justify picking a competitor.