what's everyone use and the good/bad of it? looking at the harbor freight 12" slider.

You get what you pay for. A lot depends on how you are going to use it. HF might be fine for occasional use. I have a Craftsman and it's definitely not a constant use or hard use tool.

I have an older DeWalt 12" Dual Compound Slider. It's seen almost daily use for fifteen-plus years. It's extremely accurate and durable. Dust collection sucks. I bought a Rousseau 5000 hood for it and dust collection problems went away.

When it comes time for a new one I will look at the DeWalts first.

^^^^^^^this one

I have owned and used 2 10" Makita sliding compound saws for the last 17 years. Never any issues with either. I like the soft start feature and they are highly accurate. I'm down to 1 now and it is used in my shop now. In the field I have a M-18 Milwaukee sliding compound that is very nice with a 5 HA battery or bigger, especially not having to hunt for an outlet on the job site.

As for the Harbor Freight 12" sliding compound saw. If it is the Hercules brand I'd say buy it. I almost picked it up for my shop but opted to use my Makita and buy the Milwaukee for on the job.. I'd say it is as good as the 12" Dewalts out there. I say this because when my Hitachi job site table saw gave up the ghost a couple months ago, after almost 15 years of daily use on the job site, I bought the Hercules table saw at HF and have not been disappointed. If the Hercules miter saw is as accurate out of the box as this table saw was and is as strong as this table saw, I'd say you will be happy with it.

I have a Dewalt 12" non-slider. It's a great saw but if I had to do it again I would go with the 10" slider for better accuracy and longer cut width.

I really like the dewalt slider.

Dewalt 12" sliding compound saw.
Watch for a sale at Home Depot...when I got mine it was 30% off plus free stand plus free blade

Ryobi from Home Depot. I like Harbor Freight but would not buy any power tool there if you will use it much.

Following I need to replace my Delta 10" non slider since it was stolen along with all other tools.
That saw was awesome and will be hard to beat.

X2

Lol...a friend of mine bought an angle grinder from Harbor Freight for about $15. He had gotten this metal tool cart thingie for free that was used as a painter's cart for years. It was covered in layers of paint. He took the angle grinder to it with a wire wheel to remove the paint. After 5-10mins of working at it , the tool overheated and shut off. He sat in a chair for about 10mins till it cooled off then went back at it until it overheated again. Sat in chair again. Cooled off , worked again , overheated again. Sat in chair again. Again and again. Lots of wasted time. Plus it had a odd metric sized thread on the spindle. Needed to get accessories at Harbor Freight because normal thread sizes that would fit Milwaukee/Dewalt/Ryobi etc would not fit. He ended up buying a kinda pricey conversion adapter for it so he could use commonly threaded accessories that were better quality/longer lasting than the ones Harbor Freight sold.
He regretted buying it , he told me he wished he had dropped the $75-$100 for a real tool that would have probably lasted 20+ years without any issues.

We have the Admiral brand from Harbor Freight and we're not disappointed.

I have a cheap compound saw. Only use it once or twice per year. Does now cut true angles. Even the backstop is not straight. Came from Sears.

I borrowed a dewalt 12” compound with rolling stand and liked it used it weekly on cabin build. Gave it back and just bought dewalt dual bevel 12” slider as I’m putting up knotty pine and needs slider, it came with a free stand that is way nicer than the Rolling stand but you do have to lug the saw off the stand to move around. Pricey at $500 (I think) with a free $200 stand but it’s a awesome tool!

It depends on what you're planning to do..I have a 12" DeWalt and it's a good saw, I also have a Bosch Dual Bevel Glide and it's a great saw. I use the DeWalt for weekend warrior projects, deck building framing, etc. and the Bosch for cabinet making and precision cuts- the Bosch saw, albeit a higher quality saw, has the worst dust collection system on the market- I had to build a shroud with separate dust collection from my main system and alter the blade exhaust, I heard they have improved this deficiency.

When I bought my DeWalt 12" slider it was rated the most accurate miter saw in current production. the did octagon tests and the DeWalt beat them all. That was fifteen-plus years ago though. I'd do that kind f comparison shopping and research again oif I have to buy another. But I love Bosch anything. I just bought one of their big rotary hammers, that thing is a beast!

What shroud did you buy? As mentioned above, I use the Rousseau 5000. When hooked to my Porter-Cable shop Vac on job sites it greatly improves dust collection. When hooked to my Laguna C Flux Cyclone in the shop I have to be careful it doesn't suck me in there! LOL

No dust gets out alive.

The Ryobi from Home Depot is Great!

Lugnut- I just cobbled up my own shroud, this saw is portable but pretty much stays put in the shop, I took a piece of rubber and reformed the blade exhaust and that helped a lot.

Nice^^

I have two DeWalt 12" one of them is a slider. Both are great saws and I've never had any problem with them. Both have plenty of power The only thing they don't have that I would like is a laser line. I'm sure you can probably get one aftermarket. Stop over my shop and try them out if you want. PM me if you would like to.