I do have a Vitamix 5200 and it pretty much does liquify the things I make but "sand free?" That may depend on what you blend. For me, the big deal has been that, with other blenders. I had to run my pureed soups through a fine mesh strainer to be sure they were properly silky and smooth. Have not had to use strainer since I got my Vitamix. "Sand free" is a pretty good way to put it. On the subject of plastics and BPA, your source seems to have been misinformed. The containers are made from polycarbonate (a co-polyester), not polyvinyl chloride (PVC). FWIW, the current BPA-free polycarbonate products (Eastman Company's "Tritan") are most certainly "up to current standards." I used "FWIW" because your question got me thinking about how hard it can be to provide any reassurance about anything and how easy it is to find vehement arguments that "current standards" (on anything) are a conspiracy of lies and cover-ups. The concern about older kinds of polycarbonates -- the ones used before Tritan --- was that they were made with Bisphenol-A (BPA). Such products, when heated to boiling temps or left to store foods for weeks or months, could leach detectable amounts of pthlates into foods. How dangerous those levels were was not clear but they were enough to be of concern. Plus, it was not so much blender jars as it was plastic containers used for heated applications (e.g., baby bottles) and long term storage (e.g. bottled water containers and linings in soup cans) that seemed to give rise to the biggest BPA concerns. That said, the replacement polycarbonate for blenders (the Eastman company's "Tritan") which is made without BPA can still leach pthalates if heated excessively. Accordingly, the recommendations are that you not put your Vitamix containers in microwave ovens and that you not store food in them. Never occurred to me to do either, but those are the warnings and accordingly give some folks pause about using Tritan, at all. Other folks take that as conclusive proof that the companies are behaving like big tobacco. (I'm thinking that I've seen a Mother Jones article somewhere that tried to make this point as a scientific case of conspiracy and big-money bribery ala "big Tobacco." As I'm sure you've found from trying to research this subject, every debate becomes shrill and politicized. Depending on who you read, it will be reminiscent of big-Tobacco tactics, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, reminiscent of the blind faith screeds against vaccinations because of Thimersol's purported link to autism, a link that turned out to be based entirely on self-promoting, falsified research. Seems to me that, whatever techheads and scientists might know, there is always somebody somewhere who asserts scientific proof of the contrary and argues that the truth is being covered up. For example, there was a recent thread on Chowhound.com where a poster was looking for "non-toxic cookware" because he or she had become "concerned" after reading "somewhere" that that stainless steel and cast-iron pans were leaching toxic heavy metals into any food cooked in them. I found that interesting for a lot of reasons but among them because I had just run across a petition to Vitamix demanding that the company return to using stainless steel containers and provide users with replacements for the current "dangerous" polycarbonate ones. Elsewhere, I ran across a comment claiming that some studies showed that ten million Pyrex baking dishes had exploded because they were made of tempered soda lime glass from Chinese factories instead of the old American made ones that used borosilicate lab glass. (FWIW, the Pyrex baking dishes are mostly made in America). Somebody else then commented that other studies had found detectable levels of lead when the soda lime glass fragments were melted, so the Chinese products were likely to cause lead poisoning. Somebody else added that they had read other studies claiming that borosilicate lab glass would be even more "unsafe" because it "leaked" boron which is supposedly known to be teratogenic in some undetermined dosage. (This seems basically impluasible, but I mention it because of some advocacy that I seen that argues blender containers should be made of lab glass.) Heck, I just ran into somebody preaching that root canals cause organ cancers. This apparently was based on some iffy study in the 1920s that was conclusively disproven over the following decades. The anti-root-canal preachers were convinced that the subsequent research was all a cover-up and a conspiracy to discredit a "real" scientist from long ago So, you might not get much reassurance if us "techheads and scientists" opine about Eastman's Tritan product meeting "current standards." This post was edited by JWVideo on Fri, Dec 5, 14 at 0:11

I bought a tall jar 5200 model from Costco six years ago. I've been using it mainly for juicing and and for pureeing soups and sauces. It gets used around four to five times a week. That model has been replaced at Costco with the 5300. The 5300 has the shorter, squatter jar (aka "low profile" jar. ) Being larger in diameter, the low profile jar has larger diameter blades than the 5200 does. Some friends bought a 5300 recently to replace a busted Ninja. Near as we have been able to tell, the 5200 and 5300 perform about the same and are equally noisy. Also, the 5300 has a pulse function in place of the high-low switch on the 5200. My friends like the pulse function on their blender. I'm indifferent to it on a blender, probably because I also have a food processor. YMMV. FWIW, Costco's regular price on the 5300 is $399 but there are intermittent coupon sales. IIRC, my friends got their 5300 for something closer to $300. Our local Costco also intermittently has Blendtecs. Last time I recall seeing them, the Blendtecs were also $399. IIRC, they came with an 8-year warranty, one year longer than Vitamix. You can save $40 over the regular Costco price by purchasing a "reconditioned" 5300 directly from Vitamix. Here is a link in case you are interested in checking it out further. Near as I can tell, the reconditioned models are "like new" except that the warranty is five years rather than seven. Also, the 5200 is still offered direct from Vitamix with reconditioned units going for $299.

linnea, we have a local "on-line auction". This week they have in excess of 2,000 items available for viewing on line. Like eBay, they have a week for people to make bids, on Thursday night the auction is over. If you win an item you drive to their warehouse to pay for your items and pick them up. You can visit at any time to see what's available or if you find an item on line that you're interested in you can go to the warehouse to see if. They sell everything from cars to furniture to guns to coins to canning jars. Anyone that has something to sell takes it to the warehouse, fills out a form and it's put into the auction. It costs $2 to list an item for sale. No clothes, used bedding, stuffed toys, I don't remember what else. We've sold some furniture as well as buying things. My local auction is JNJ Online Auction in Fremont, Michigan. I know other communities have similar organizations. They do not ship, you have to go pick your stuff up yourself, but you can actually see it in advance, so that's a benefit. You might want to check on line and see if there's one close to you, but it's an addiction, just be warned! (grin) Annie

Yes, the base is heavy. And that's generally a good thing. These blenders are quite powerful. Don't want them to start walking off your countertop. But I agree, if you have to pull it out of storage each time you use it, then the extra weight is a handicap. My Blendtec isn't any better than the Vitamix with regards to weight. But it easily tucks away in the corner on the countertop. And because it doesn't need a tamper, I can easily operate it without having to move it out of its corner. Some of the Vitamix jars work fine without tamper, but many of their jars work better with one. So, that could be a consideration when deciding on a specific model. It really depends on how frequently you use your blender. If it's once every two months, then I'd question why you even need a big blender. If it's multiple times per week, then find a place where you can permanently store and operate it.