I've been in the lucky circumstance that I did not have the money to buy studio flash for years. In these about 5 years I was able to compare everything, power packs, symmetric asymmetric, monoblocs, top-brands, cheap brands, etc. I finally decided for 2 Bowens Esprit 500 monoblocs. Main reason: the possibility to bring the light source down from 1/1 to 1/32, which is about 5 stops continuously. It's big value for money (but I'm not a heavy user) and it's 'asymmetric' for a reasonable price.(posted 9155 days ago)