[PowderedH2O]

If and when I buy graded cards (95% of my collection is raw) it is usually cards from the 1933-1952 era where I have a harder time finding raw examples. I have sets on the registry from those time periods. They are not in competition at all. They simply serve as checklists. Why should I be in competition? I am a school teacher. I have maybe $3-5k a year that I can sink into cards, and sometimes less than that. There are guys making $250k a year that can wake up tomorrow and decide they want to start a card collection and have a better collection than me in less than 48 hours. When I see the Donald Spences of the world, I am happy for them, but they and I are not in competition. My Roberto Clemente rookie would look silly in Spence's 1955 set. Same with my Aaron rookie and my Rose rookie. I am only in competition with myself to see what I can do with my own collection. You realize that with the right amount of money, a wealthy person could go onto ebay and nearly complete full runs of Topps and Bowman in high grade in less than a month, right? So, why sweat it? Just enjoy what you can afford and don't worry about what others get.
That being said, I prefer SGC in every way except for their registry. As I like to use it for a checklist, it is brutal to work with. If they fixed that, I'd lean towards sticking with them entirely.