[wswartzwel]

I have both a 220 volt 15" cabinet planer that is big and heavy and turns lots of rough sawn lumber into nice usable wood, and leaves almost no snipe at the beginning and end of the cut, and a Dewalt bench top, that leaves a very nice finish as well but not really suited to running lots of long boards through it, and it will leave some snipe at the end of a cut. If you have the space and money, a cabinet style planer is better able to deal with lot of lumber. If you only need it for this one project you might check for a local mill to surface your wood for you. Also a cabinet/floor mount planer seems to do better with dust collection systems, I get almost zero mess on the floor when using the cabinet planer.