Table saw help

Ridgid, craftsman or grizzly sell pretty good saws in your price range. Heck, the ridgid is $499. You can use the extra $100 for a couple nice blades.

Have to say I’ve been pretty happy with my ridgid 3650 with the cast iron top. Though I thought I saw in Home Depot once they were making them with granite tops, which seems like it would be nice and smooth and solid and stable and…wrong, somehow. Dunno what that was about, but their website is showing the current model as cast iron again.

-- Anyone who wants an excuse can find one. Don't bother telling me yours; I have enough of my own to fight off.

I’ve never owned or used a granite topped machine before, and I doubt I ever will. Ive grown too fond of magnetic acessories, especially my featherboards. I also like using a magnetic base for my dial indicator when making adjustments to the saw.
In my mind, granite tops are the answer to a question that was never asked.

the ridgid granite topped saw was the 4511. the 3650 and 3660 were, of course, CI tops. to the OP, the 4512 gets good reviews, aside from an arbor alignment issue that has apparently been addressed, based on the reduction of posts on this and other forums concerning continued problems with that issue. if you can find a HD that honors harbor freight’s “20% off any single item” coupon, you’re out the door for $400 pretax. that’s a lot of saw for $400. and it qualifies for registration with ridgid’s life time service agreement (LSA):

http://www.ridgid.com/tools/power-tool-warranty

just stay away from new jet and powermatic. overpriced tools, IMHO, that are long on promise, short on delivery, expensive and appeal primarily to uniformed tool snobs.

-- there's a solution to every problem.......you just have to be willing to find it.