Hi SoCal Leigh! I am wondering who your contractor was as I had the same issues. They looked good from a distance (as yours do in the pic) but upclose they were horrible. I ended up terminating my relationship with my contractor for this and a wide variety of other reasons. I am now in the process of looking for another contractor so if you wouldn't mind sharing who you went with you can email me via my link. But back to your question, I don't think any of what you are describing is acceptable. I, like you, expected some of that down the road, and caused by me. At installation they should be pretty perfect IMHO.

Ours are poplar painted in BM Aura and are fine, but definitely not perfect after 2.5 years. (Caveat: we also have a toddler and a giant dog, so...) We have some weird problems with discoloration on a couple of doors painted white that I need to call the cabinetmaker to get fixed, but just haven't had a moment to do. Half of our cabinets are gray and those are doing well, though. Otherwise, the finish is fine but chipped in a few places. Not enough to bother us or motivate us to get the touchup paint out yet, though. And honestly, I'm not sure it would be much different with factory finishes--our cabinets get rammed with toy wagons and push toys regularly, run into by humans and canines, etc.--so we're not exactly gentle on them. On balance we're quite happy with them, though if we were doing a painted kitchen today, I might experiment with some of the newer products (e.g., BM Advance, which had just hit the market when we were choosing paint). We have Aura throughout our house and I adore it for walls in flat/matte/eggshell, but am less thrilled with it in satin for trim and cabinetry.

We painted our cabinets about 6 years ago. My husband did his research and really did a great job. After six years and a few small children, they are getting a bit shabby. Small knicks stand out to me, and certain areas really collect dirt (around handles). I scrub the dirt, but it comes back quickly and seems to adhere to the paint. As for the knicks, I don't think they are large enough to bother others, but I notice them and it bothers me. Of course I could touch them up every once in a while, but overall they aren't looking as nice as my 15 year old oak cabinets did in my last house. This is the primary reason I'm going to go with stain this time. The other reason is that paint expands with weather changes and the lines on the borders bothers me as well. I think someone took pictures of their new cabinets showing expansion "cracks." Having said all of that, if you are only looking to live in the house a few years and want to keep your renovation costs down - I would highly recommend it. We were able to completely change the look of our kitchen with very minimal cost, and it bridged the gap until we were able to do our larger renovation. Good Luck.

Lacquer is definitely a stronger finish than paint. I have cabinets in my family room that were lacquered about 6 years ago? Not a scratch on them. I've had all the trim and doors in the new house lacquered, too. Cabinet doors are often made up of multiple pieces of wood. The wood shrinks and expands. Everywhere there's a join, there's a potential for paint to crack. Even if it doesn't shrink, if there's a little gap, it can look like a crack. So you should have these gaps filled with caulk before painting. Or, go with flat slabs. Or MDF that will shrink less. Your walls have been filled, and the drywall doesn't shrink (as much) as wood. Drywall also absorbs the paint better than wood. That's why the walls hold up better. But even walls get nicks and chips if they're abused (kids rooms, entry ways, etc).