I thought the wire feed on the SIPs was really rubbish. You need constant feed otherwise you get horrible welds. The problem with these is that the low voltage for the motor that drives the feed comes from one of the big welding current transformers, so everytime you strike an arc and the voltage drops, so does the speed of the feed. TBH, I found it unusable compared to the machines I was used to.
I attempted to fix it, with not much luck. Replacement feed units can be picked up from decent welding shops, but I think putting in a seperate power supply and regulator would go a long way.
I think no-gas is better for most home use. Those tiny gas bottles are a pain, and really expensive. Shielding gas also gets blown away with air movement, so for outdoors, no-gas is better.