The Oral-B Pulsonic Sonic Rechargeable Electric Toothbrush is a great product at a pretty good price, but that doesn't mean it's perfect.
I've been using an Oral-B Professional rechargeable toothbrush for about 4 years now and I really like it. The Oral-B Professionals have the circular brush head and work differently than the Pulsonic or Philips's Sonicare toothbrushes. Even though I love my old Professional model, I think I'm going to stick with the Pulsonic, for several reasons.
The Pulsonic is a surprisingly very light and skinny rechargeable toothbrush that has similar dimensions to a $3 manual toothbrush. It's a lot easier to hold and manipulate than the Professional model and probably the bulky Philips model, too. The brush head of the Pulsonic is a breeze to take on and off; you slide it onto the unit and then give it a quarter-twist. The brush head locks into place. I hate how the brush head gets stuck on my Professional model, so this is a big advantage of the Pulsonic. The operation of the toothbrush is basically the same, there's one button that you press to cycle between On, Sensitive, and Off. When it's in the On mode, the Pulsonic vibrates in 4, 30 second intervals with a short stutter in between to let you know to switch to a different quadrant of your mouth for a complete 2 minute cleaning.
The brush head of the Pulsonic is shaped much like a regular toothbrush, and is different than the Professional's circular head. The Pulsonic assists in cleaning by sending out sonic pulses, similar to a jewelry sonication cleaner. This is used to blast off debris and break up bacteria biofilms that are populating your teeth and gums. The Professional uses a fast sweeping motion of its circular head to clean your teeth. Here's where I feel is the key difference that should determine which type of toothbrush you should get. I actually think the Professional cleans my teeth a little better and with less effort on my part because you just sort of place the brush head on top of each tooth. The Pulsonic requires you to make tiny circular motions over your teeth and assists your cleaning with the sonic vibrations. The Pulsonic still does a great job cleaning your teeth, don't get me wrong, it's much better than a manual toothbrush. But where the Pulsonic wins is with my gums. I've never had a cavity, but the dentist always complains that my gums are a little too puffy or too red. After using the Pulsonic for 3 weeks, my gums seem to be a much healthier shade of pink, with reduced puffiness. I don't get that kind of effect with the Professional model.
The other thing I'll mention about the Pulsonic is the base. The base has a small footprint size and the Pulsonic simply rests in a small hole in the base. It's a bit wobbly, but it works alright. The problem I have, however, is that there are only two spots for brush heads. The unit comes with one brush head and one precision tip for cleaning tight spots or around dental work (works pretty well, too). So really, this is just a one person toothbrush based on the spots for brush head storage. If you have 2 or more people in the house that want to share the toothbrush and have their own brush head(s) it's an annoying inconvenience.
So I think the choice is up to your specific needs. If you are looking for a rechargeable toothbrush and commonly have cavity problems, then maybe you want to go with one of the high-end Oral-B models that have a circular head. If you want a toothbrush that does a better job keeping your gums in top shape, then I'd recommend the Pulsonic. I'm not a dentist, so that's just my opinion. For my needs, though, I'll be sticking with the Pulsonic.
UPDATE:
I went to the dentist recently for my standard 6-month check-up. I've never had cavity problems before, but the dentist had always warned me that my gums and gum pockets were borderline beginning to show problems. Well, on this trip the dentist said my teeth were immaculate and my gums and pockets were all within normal, healthy scoring ranges on the scale they use to rate gum disease progression. While the hygienist was cleaning my teeth she asked, "do you use an electric toothbrush?" When I replied yes, she said, "yeah, I can tell." So, there ya go. I had been using the Pulsonic for maybe 6-7 weeks prior to the dentist visit and my gums are in the best shape they've been in in years. With that, I'll repeat my recommendation that people who have slightly inflamed gums, or gums teetering towards developing gum disease may get some valuable help from this toothbrush.