I'm biased. My very first locomotive was brought by Santa Claus, at Christmas, 1951 (when I was three). It was a four-car freight set, pulled by a Korean-War version 2026.
I still have that locomotive, all its cars, its original track and 1033 transformer. The only thing I've ever had to fix on the 2026 was the smoke unit, which eventually became clogged full of incompletely-melted smoke pellets that my preschool self dropped relentlessly into its stack. Some years ago, I replaced the smoke unit's innards, and it's been smoking happily ever since.
My personal history aside, another factor to consider, for those who are choosing, is that the early version (at least all the ones I've seen) uses contact shoes instead of rollers. Whether you consider that a drawback or not is up to you.
