> And one less set of electronics to fail. In my experience, cranks are relatively complicated mechanical linkages, failed quite regularly and were sometimes

> And one less set of electronics to fail. In my experience, cranks are relatively complicated mechanical linkages, failed quite regularly and were sometimes not easy to repair. OTOH, I've never seen an electronic opener fail since the 80's. Yes, sometimes they don't have the torque to open a window when it's iced closed, but that's an advantage, not a disadvantage -- the ability to put a lot of torque on a manual opener was the cause of many failures. A couple of articles on the Slate have also pointed out that electric openers are cheaper than manual ones.