I made it several years with a plug in electric show thrower. It actually is great to use up to 6" or so before it's overwhelmed. The consistently bad part is the end of the drive where the plow piles it. For larger storms just have to go out multiple times. My first gas model got messed up because some genius delivered a phone book right before a storm and it embedded itself so well in the snow thrower that I had to hack it out with a reciprocating saw and titanium blade. Never worked right after that. Finally got a larger quality gas model several years go, was well worth it.