I had a Traeger Junior. My first smoker of any kind, bought on a Costco whim for $299.
1. Low smoke profile. I dumped the traeger pellets right away, then tried lumberjack and cookinpellets. While I liked those better, never got the right smoke flavor. Tried the Amazen Tube...still not enough smoke flavor. Now, the meat was cooked well, nice ring, tender, juicy...and still better than the flavor from my propane gasser...but just not enough. I would go out for BBQ and cringe when I could taste the smoke better than mine.
2. Design issues - my traeger had an issue with the pellets feeding the auger. It would hold over 6 hours of pellets at 250-275. But after about 2 hours the pellets would feed in the middle, directly over the auger opening...but fail to feed from the sides. This would eventually create an empty cone of air in the pellets, the auger would keep turning but would feed no pellets and the fire would go out. Tried different things, weights on top, spraying the sides of the hopper with pam to make them slick...started looking into one off hacks to fix it, but never trusted it after a nice Costco Prime brisket that i threw out in the morning when I found the smoker at ambient temp after trying to get 6 hours of sleep overnight.
3. Electric chit breaks...and needs electricity. Had two slabs of ribs and salmon prepped, rubbed and ready to go on...go flip the switch...nothing...turns out it was a bad induction fan blowing fuses. Traeger sent me a new one under warranty, took a week or so...by then the ribs and salmon werent good anymore. Then it happened again...this time it was the controller blowing fuses. This time it was a pair of pork tenderloin that ended up in the trash....
So did the Traeger. Launched it off my deck and dragged it to the curb. Ordered a PBC, and never looked back.