I totally agree that adding a "feature" to a device does not necessarily make it better. It all still comes down to quality of the total product, which includes, components, design and these days, software.
One prime example in the R/C heli world are the electronic speed controllers (ESC) used. Kontronik (based in Germany) has been the hands down leader in this respect for years. Their products just work extremely well with very little tweaking. However, there is a very large price premium. Castle Creations (USA) makes some pretty nice ESCs for about 1/3 the price but they are heavier, larger, and they just don't work nearly as well. Then, there is Align, (Taiwan) who makes some really cheap ESCs and while their products have many of the "features" of the other companies, they just don't work or have a tendency to catch fire.
