Yeh, I was looking at those, too. Since I have a gas saw, my main use is in cutting down overgrown shrubs & bushes with the ≤ 3" trunks. I'm impressed that your little saw went through cedar.
One of my daughter-in-laws has one of those and she loves hers too. I chose the large saw as I use it for more than just trimming. I have 16-inch, 18-inch and 24-inch gas-powered saws for the bigger stuff.
Yeah, I have a couple of electric 16” and a gas 18” and normally wouldn’t have dreamed of using the hand held jobby on large stuff but like everything else I have, I decided to test the limits of it and was happy with the results.
It’s a given that no matter how powerful a saw is, if the chain isn’t sharp then there’s no amount of power that will help. The one caveat the hand held has is that there’s no port for oil and the directions do not even indicate that oil is needed. Surprisingly though, I just spray some WD-silicone on the chain and the thing gets where it needs to go.
I'm still looking. Makita does not make a hand held chainsaw. They used to make a 4 1/2" regular format chainsaw, but it's been discontinued. EBay has them for $200. I need to take a walk around the yard and define my need versus what my gas saw will be used for. I also have a small (12"?) gas chain saw that has sat around for a very long time I may try to get running, if I can find the motivation. I do know that I want a battery saw of some format to cut back bushes and trim tree branches.
I ordered the 6" version of this. The nearest Makita equivalents were too expensive and they are 12v versus my existing 18v, so there would be no battery compatibility benefit to sticking with that brand. Thanks for the review I can trust