[sybren]

I got a 430EX as my first flash. Then I wanted to go off-camera and bought a ST-E2. After that I bought a 580EX-II when I saw it rather cheap in Thailand. After I got both the ST-E2 and 580EX-II I could compare the two as master, and the latter is way, way better. I went back to the photo store where I got the ST-E2 and traded it for a 430EX-II.

The 430EX-II is fine when you want to stick it onto your camera and flash people straight in the face. When you want to go remote, you can either go for cheap manual strobes with optical slaves or get the 580EX-II as the master unit. Most of the time I shoot with my strobes in manual mode anyway, so I could use the cheap slaves. However, that would make you walk up to them if you want to change a setting, whereas with the all-Canon system I can change the slave's power output on the master. This is quite useful when the other strobe is hanging on a fence a few meters into the water, or somewhere up a tree!