I bought a 27 ton Troy Built log splitter from Lowes about ten years ago for around $1,200. The reason for buying this was because of the Honda engine. In my opinion, the only thing that matters when buying something with a small engine is that it's a Honda engine. Everything else sucks. After ten years, it still starts easy and runs great!!!
Hooking up stuff to the tractor is always a pain. I don't think you could run it enough to matter on the hours, it's just a pain to unhook what's on the tractor, then hook up a splitter, then have to take it off again. I like to leave the attachment on the tractor for as long as possible. First time you do it, I'm sure it wont be an issue, but in five years, it will be something that you dread having to deal with.
Renting works for one time use, and for a lot of things, it's the smart way to go.
For me, I burn a cord of wood a year to heat the house and another cord sitting on our porch, just relaxing in the evening. Two cords isn't a lot by most standards, but it still takes time to cut, split and stack. I also work full time and I have a long list of things I'm working on, along with chores that need to be done every day. It is very hard to dedicate a full day to splitting wood. It's also a lot of work to do in one day. I tend to split according to how much gasoline I have. One tank of gas is a quick day, two tanks of gas is about my limit. It takes longer to stack it then it does to split it, and two tanks of gas is a lot of wood to stack. Doing it this way takes a few days, or even weeks, depending on what else I'm doing. Renting isn't an option. I just leave the splitter out until I have my rack full of wood.
I've also learned that for me, it's easiest to cut up the tree where it falls, into 10 to 15 foot lengths, and carry those logs to where I keep my log splitter. I cut them into rounds there, and then carry the rounds to my splitter. My splitter is right in front of where I stack my wood, so it hits the ground once, then I pick it up and stack it. For me, this seems to be the least amount of work to get the job done.
I don't mess around with big rounds. If I can't pick up a round, I don't want to mess with it. Ideally, I focus on the 12 to 18 inch branches with a few that will go bigger. There is so much wood on a tree that I can be picky and get what I want, and not kill myself messing with something so heavy that I might hurt myself. Sadly, I have so many oak trees that fall over every year from our Spring thunderstorms, that most end up rotting on the ground before I can get them to the burn pile.