I allways buy the one-but cheapest model of a mainstream brand like Hitachi.
Buying the cheapest you get what you pay for. buying expensive, you get crap like soft-start (i dont intend waiting on the grinder to accelerate, it annoys me) or fancy looking handles.
lets start with a 50 dollar grinder: when you add 20 bucks and buy the one but cheapest for 70 bucks, you get a tool with double the lifetime. When you add another 20 bucks on top of that, you get gizmos but maybe a 10% longer lifespan over the 70 bucks grinder. In other words, the one-but-cheapest is the most bang for the buck, IMHO.
For drills, you cant get them strong enough. I burned my 500w drill while drilling 10mm in steel, which is (within) the limit for this drill, as written on the label. Right now i bought an 800W with hi and low speed: with lower revs, drills dont get burned blue, and with the gear reduction, the motor does neither.
With the welder we had a 180A hobby MIG for 700 euro. It was used quite a bit and every 1.5 year it needed a 350 euro repair when spools burned: that happened twice, so the cost of the machine over 4 years was 1400 euro. Then i bought a semi-pro 350A machine for 1400 euro, which should be able to hold up at least 10 years without repair: So more fun, and cheaper in the long run.