I did not buy them from Amazon. I bought a set of photo studio stuff (including light stands, light sockets, umbrellas, light bulbs, background support, and backdrop) from CowboyStudio directly. But the light bulbs are identical judging from the photos and the descriptions. So I wish to share my experience with others. The light bulbs are the only weakness in the set.

Pro:
Cheap (it is almost impossible to find good photo studio without spending thousands of dollars instead of a couple of hundreds).
Con:
Light is weak and inaccurate.

I use two 105 Watt, 5000 K Fluorescent light bulbs (this item) plus a 45W one, the photos are still relatively dark, not nearly as bright as the built-in flash in my point and shoot, not to mention the built-in flash in T3i. Also the photos look blueish/ghostish - that is with the white backdrop and fluorescent lighting in T3i. I have to adjust the colors in a software afterwards. Otherwise it is too cold/blueish. I would recommend skipping this light bulb.

Summary

Pros:
* Very sturdy and well built;
* Many different exercises;
* The adjustable bench is useful for sit-ups and dumbbells. It is also helpful for my kids to access the pull-up bar.

Cons:
* The push-up handles really should be on the vertical knee raise side so that we do not have to move the bench every time when we want to do push-ups.
* The assembly process was made unnecessarily tedious by putting all the bolts/nuts in one big plastic bag - it would be much easier if the manufacturer separates the five different bolts/nuts into labeled plastic bags, a common practice most manufacturers do. Of course this is only a one time problem when you put it together.

Overall I am extremely happy with the item. I think this will take over the Stamina 50-1690 as the top seller in the category within the next few years, especially if the manufacturer "fixes" the two problems above.

Background

I read through the comments of most of the popular power towers (stand-alone pull-up bars) at Amazon and then decided on this one because of its multi-functionality. I'm a reasonably handy person and have assembled quite some home furniture/equipment (but not handy enough to build my own house).

I usually buy stuff from Amazon. But I bought this item (for a slightly higher price) from a local store in case I wanted to return it if it was not what I had expected - it turns out I do not need that insurance policy after all.

Detailed Comments

The PDF version of the manual is available from the manufacturer web page:
[...]
I encourage you to give it a quick read before your purchase. This will give you a rough idea what to expect.

Stamina 50-1750 is essentially 50-1700 plus the adjustable bench.

The height is about 85 inches. If you have low ceiling, make sure you measure your room. Ideally you want to have at least one head room above the pull-up bar (since your head will stick out above the pull-up bar). This tower takes up more space than Stamina 50-1690. If you live in a small apartment, you may want to buy something smaller.

The adjustable bench is useful to do sit-ups or dumbbells. My kids also use the bench to access the pull-up bar. It wobbles a little when doing sit-ups quickly. I suppose that is not unexpected since the bench is adjustable (so it cannot be completely tied down).

It is solidly built and heavy (a good thing for sturdiness). There are many exercises you can do with it.

In this model you have to move the bench to do push-ups, a major pain. The manufacturer should add two push-up handles on the vertical knee raise side so we do not have to fold the bench every time when we do push-ups. My guess is that this design was inherited from Model 50-1700, in which there is no bench. Adding push-up handles on the VKR side would also give users more head room when doing push-ups so that we do not feel like the our heads will hit the foam support bar because there is a longer distance on the VKR side.

It took me about two or three hours to put it together all by myself (much of the time was wasted on figuring out which bolt was the right one - more on this later). If you have a second person to help you with the extend arms for about five or ten minutes, it helps a lot. But at the time I was by myself and didn't want to wait.

The assembly process was made unnecessarily tedious by putting all the bolts/nuts in one big plastic bag - it would be much easier if the manufacturer separates the five different bolts/nuts into labeled plastic bags, a common practice most manufacturers do. I constantly had to compare different bolts/nuts to make sure I used the corrrect ones - we shouldn't have to do that.

All the after market sunshades are too small (the standard size and jumbo size). This one fits my vehicle perfectly. Couldn't be happier.

Pro: In my 9 days' experience with it, it didn't slow down my computer.
Con: 9 days after installation it failed to update itself and pointed me to its web with directions to manually update the product. So I followed its instructions and updated the product. The update appeared to be successful. But when the computer rebooted, Windows XP complained that it couldn't load the user profile. Then I had to back up my computer and profiles, system restore, ... many many fun things that I like more than drinking beer. Finally I got my profile back and guess what, NIS asked me to update it again and failed, and pointed to its web for manual updates. There must be a conspiracy between MS and Symantec to get users into this endless loop. I promptly uninstalled NIS2008 at the end of the 9th day.

We eat a lot of rice ... When my wife started working we bought this cooker largely because of the timer. We can time the cooker in the morning so that rice is ready when we get home from work.

Taste is wonderful. Easy to clean.

It is a lot of money compared to cheaper walmart rice cookers. but it is well worth the extra money.

(10/2006)
Pro:
1. easy to use.
2. cheap. $5/month
3. can browse backup like a folder.
4. initial backup takes time but updates are fast.
Con:
1. few options to customize. for example, it doesn't back up certain types of files (by extension name) when back up folders. There is no complete list of extension names on company web so I don't know which files are not backed up. For example, about 10% of files in a folder (with many sub folders) were not backed up. But I don't know which files. Of course one could browse the backup and compare the target folder and the source folder. But it would be time consuming and silly). I don't know why the company would not make a clear list of files (or why there is such a list in the first place). I do notice PRG is one of them. I happen to have many files with this extension name (actually these files are very important to me). While one can go in and change each file to backup, it seems silly not allow users to reset document type.

I also noticed that LOG and EXE files are not backed up. Not sure the rationale behind it. But it so happens that I have important LOG files and EXE files (the EXE files are actually executable zipped files) I want to back up. It would be too tedious, and almost impossible to reset them one by one. I give up. (added on 10/23/2006)

2. it is annoying to load it at startup.

overall I think it is a neat idea but not for professional use. If you have only photos and videos it is not bad. If you have serious work you want to back up, look elsewhere. You don't want to get a false sense of security while your files were not backed up at all.

(Updated 03/14/2008) Carbonite now can allow users to set types of files to back up (which removes Con #1 above). Unfortunately I only enjoyed it for a couple of days and have been getting the error message "server is down for maintenance" for the past five days. Called the tech support and a recorded message told me to reinstall software and to hang up because they are too busy. I reinstalled the software and got a message that it cannot connect to the server and asked me to contact tech support. See my comments below for more details. So it seems we are getting a runaround. For a backup service it doesn't have to fancy but it has to be reliable. I have switched to a competitor. If you are a casual user (i.e., even if the back up is ruined, you don't care), Carbonite may be right for you. If you really want a peace of mind, look elsewhere.

Contrary to the claim there is no monthly fee in the description. There is one, except STi calls it the daily fee. Very creative!

Small carriers in telecom tend to go bankrupt or be bought out frequently. I wouldn't buy a large amount of prepaid cards or pay more than $10 for handset.

They shipped only 1/12 of the order, did not respond to email inquiry, and amazon removed my comment (along with many others') from their seller's rating.

Worst software I have ever used. It requires activation - must have learned that technique from Intuit TurboTax. For whatever reason the activation didn't work - system error, asked me to email their support. When I emailed and called their support, they are only interested in charging me $X.XX per incident. Buy this software only if you want to test your patience.