After having used the traditional blender for many years, this new style blender is great. With a family of foor, our old 64 oz blender was just too small and we always had to prepare an additional jar. This one has a very large 80 oz capacity and a little tap to serve drinks without taking it off the base (very handy). Blending goes very well. Rapid and smooth.We had a Hamilton blender (the traditional one) before, and at the end of its life, the drive mechanism (where the motor base and the jar connect) ate up the little plastic wheel, especially if one was not careful to place it correctly on the base.. The new one has the same drive mechanism (2 of them). But the jar sits very solidly in the base, and I cannot imagine having the same problem with this model.Cleaning is a tad more work as you need to take of two rotating bases and the tap. But that's 20 seconds additional.The jar is plastic. Glass might have been nicer, but the weight would most probably have been prohibitive (it is a big jar!).Overall, we could not have been happier with this addition in our kitchen. It gets used on average 4 times per week.