I don't know why people continue to bash Made in China stuff. Just look around you, almost everything's made in China these days. Even my $1500 Apple MacBook Pro is assembled in China, and I've had absolutely no problems with it. You pay for what you get regardless of where an item's made. Someone mentioned preferring to have a German-made Weller WHA900. Well, I would too. Except the WHA900 costs $650 vs. $70 for this thing. I'm sure if the China version sold for a few hundred dollars instead of $70, it would be higher quality.
It's certainly true that most anything electronic is made in China. But depending on the brand, it may have been designed elsewhere, and only manufactured in China with a proper QC system in place to catch any defective units prior to them ending up in customers hands. For products that are fully originated in China (design to packaging), there tends to be a lot more compromises to squeeze out every cent possible. So corners that shouldn't be cut happen anyway, which is why we see things such as poor performance, bad user interfaces, dangerous electrical faults, and a much higher defect rate.
This isn't to say a Chinese company can't do a far better job, but as you suspect, it increases the price tag.
Personally, frequency of use played a huge role in my decision making process. As I use my irons most of all, I ended up buying a Weller setup (WD1 + WSP80 iron + WMP iron + WDH20 stand + WDH20T switched stand). It was expensive, but the irons work well and the handles don't get hot, even after hours of use. The ergonomics are also important for something frequently used, and the Weller holds it's own here as well (as do other top tier soldering equipment manufacturers). It also offered cheap tips (plated copper), which was important to me as most cartridge tips were selling for ~$30 per at the time (FX-951 wasn't out yet).
Since I don't use hot air as frequently and I had no intention of buying a Hakko FR-810 or better (no way I was paying $700+), I went with a
Quick 861DW (paid ~$225 shipped; they go for $235 now). It's a Chinese brand, but it's built a lot better than any other Chinese brand I've ever seen internally (in person or photos). But unlike most of it's home-grown competition, the wiring is safe, the UI is actually very nice (intuitive), has a decent feature set, and it's performance is what I expect from a 1kW station. FWIW, there are those that use it professionally and haven't had any issues @ 40+ hrs./wk. usage (861DS = EU version, 861DA = UK version). It even uses quick-change nozzles (friction fit, no screw clamp to mess with).
For a hot air preheater, I went cheap and bought a
Tenma 21-10135 from MCM Electronics. FWIW, Tenma is a brand name owned by Farnell, who also owns MCM and Newark/Element14 (as well as CPC in the UK and all of the Farnell sites). And as expected, I got what I paid for; every corner they could cut, was. Amazingly, the wiring was correct. Internally however, it's a total rat's nest inside, and the heating element assy. isn't even square (tubing is welded together, and there's nothing close to a right angle where required). It leaned so bad out of the box, I had to stack 3 washers to shim one side to get it even close to straight. The tilt can't be fixed, but my shimming at least got it to where it's useable. But as it's rarely used, it's sufficient for my purposes.
Please note, I use my equipment as a hobbyist, not a professional. If that ever changes, some of it will be replaced with gear that can handle that kind of duty (namely the preheater, as the 861DW is capable of professional use IME). For desoldering, I just do it manually with good quality supplies.
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