Portable Table Saws

Portable table saws, or benchtop saws, are smaller and lighter

For use on jobsites or for easier storage, portable table saws (also called benchtop saws) are either light enough to carry or come with a rolling stand. Their small tables make it trickier to cut plywood, however.

Reviews recommend Bosch table saws more than any other brand of portable table saw - especially for safety, but also for performance and ease of use - with soft start motors and excellent capacity. All the Bosch table saws come with a true riving knife to prevent kickback, plus a blade guard that flips out of the way easily - the two safety features that experts say make the most difference. The Bosch 4100 table saw series (*est. $535 to $820) adds an improved blade guard that the Popular Woodworking reviewer calls "the most user-friendly system I have seen."

The new blade guard can be removed or replaced in seconds, and the Bosch 4100 table saws include anti-kickback pawls as well as a riving knife that can be locked at three different heights (to make it easier to cut rabbets or dadoes). Reviews say dust collection is excellent - another important safety feature.

The older Bosch 4000-09 (*est. $550) gets good reviews and has a riving knife but not the newer, improved blade guard. The newer Bosch 4100DG-09 (*est. $820) table saw has the better blade guard, metric measurements as an option, plus a rip fence with digital LCD readout (which Bosch says is accurate within 1/64-inch). The Bosch 4100-09 table saw (*est. $600) lacks only the digital rip fence; all three saws come with the Gravity-Rise stand that unfolds easily. The stand - which earned the Bosch 4000-09 so much praise - lets you roll the saw around both in its folded and unfolded form, so it's very convenient for jobsites and small workshops. The only drawback is that it puts the saw table at 38 inches, which could be too high for some users. The Bosch 4100 (*est. $535) comes without the stand so you can use it on any bench.

The less expensive Ridgid TS2410LS (*est. $450) portable table saw is noisier and lacks the safety features of the Bosch - but the Ridgid table saw cuts a bit faster and carries a lifetime warranty. It comes with a foldable wheeled stand that sets its height at 35 inches, which may be more comfortable for shorter users. The Ridgid portable saw earns second place in a review by Fine Woodworking, as well as among users surveyed by Fine Woodworking's publishers. Editors say the Ridgid portable saw has the best fence adjustment of all portable table saws tested, and comparison tests elsewhere like the Ridgid's speed. However, the Bosch portable saw is safer. The Ridgid on-off switch is harder to reach in an emergency, and since the Ridgid saw lacks a riving knife, it's more apt to kick back -- which could startle the user enough to let a hand slip into the blade. Though the Ridgid blade guard is easy to remove and replace, it doesn't ride up and down with the blade as do those on the Bosch portable saws.

The DeWalt DW745 jobsite saw (*est. $370) is small and light, with a 2.5-inch dust port that fits most shop vacs. Protected by a roll cage, the DeWalt comes without a stand and weighs just 45 pounds, so it's easy to transport and can even be hung on the wall to save space. (The Bosch by comparison weighs 56 pounds -- 109.5 pounds mounted on its stand -- and the Ridgid is even heavier at 122 pounds.) Editors at Taunton's 2008 Tool Guide like the safety switch on the DeWalt DW745, and find the depth and bevel adjustments easy, saying the saw has plenty of power - as long as the blade is replaced with a better one. DeWalt now uses the same improved blade guard found on the Bosch 4100 series, but it is noisier and has other drawbacks. For example, there's no soft-start motor or electronic brake, and no dado capacity or out-feed extensions. The similar DeWalt DW744X (*est. $500) comes with a simple folding stand.

Reviews recommend the 75.8-pound Ryobi as the best budget portable table saw; the current model is the Ryobi BTS21 (*est. $250). It has a large rip capacity of 30 inches and accepts a wide dado blade, plus it has a back table extension that adds stability. The main tradeoffs for the lower price are accuracy, especially on rip cuts (cutting boards along the grain), and safety. The Ryobi comes with a folding stand, but lacks a riving knife. The 15-amp Craftsman 21806 (*est. $270), which looks almost identical and is probably made by Ryobi, gets reasonably good ratings from owners reviewing it at Sears.com.