I personally love the 1033 and think it's the best transformer Lionel ever made - at least for my train preferences. But it is worth noting that Lionel has redesigned the electronics of the CW80 and it is expected to arrive stateside in August. Dave Olson talks about, and demonstrates it here...
PS: I tried to "time stamp" the link, but it didn't work. Scroll ahead about 2 minutes to begin the video. He talks about the CW first.