Many years ago I purchased a Boye electric winder. Loved it! However last winter it just wouldn't work any longer. Hubby took it apart to try and fix it, but the gears inside were just too worn out. So I did a little research and asked on FB what everyone else was using, and ended up buying the smaller Stanwood winder on Amazon.
The electric winder was great however I did have to help it a bit by pulling the yarn out of the skein, it didn't have enough power to do it alone most of the time. And you have to watch for knots or tangles! Yikes! They can stop the winder and that is hard on the gears as well. It has adjustable speeds which was nice, but be prepared to stop it quickly if there is an issue with tangles. It worked amazing when I used my swift!
The Stanwood manual winder is working well. I thought I would get tired of the winding by hand but it actually goes quite quickly. Would love to talk to the person who designed it and find out how they figured out it needed to wobble and be on an angle to make a ball of yarn. Yesterday I was winding some black yarn and actually had the ball spin right off the winder and go flying! I have no idea how that happened lol. It didn't happen again, so I think it might have been because I hadn't attached the yarn properly when I started winding.
Below is a photo of yarn that I wound. For the ball on the left I used the electric winder, and for the one on the right I used the manual winder. I much prefer the ball the manual winder makes. It's tighter, holds together better, and the balls stack nicely. With the electric winder I always had to be careful I didn't move the balls of yarn to often or they would get all loosey goosey. So far the manual wound balls are staying together nicely even after moving to different containers/totes.
So..... if you are looking for a yarn winder I would highly recommend the Stanwood yarn winder. It comes in 2 sizes, a 4 oz ball or a 10 oz ball. Because of the price I have the 4 oz. It's big enough to wind scraps and the hanks that I purchase.
Hope this was helpful!
Happy winding!