I was looking at the Frontier landplane. It was about $1400. Worked with the dealer and ended up with this 7' landplane for $1K.
I already had a 6' box blade with rippers/scarifiers on it, so I didn't need rippers in a land plane. It might be nice, but if frugality dictates one or the other, I'd rather have the rippers on the box blade. If piggy bank size dictates a box blade or land plane (not both), and if I didn't have any big grading projects where I needed to move a lot of dirt, I'd go for the landplane with rippers. This thing is great for gravel driveways, and Much easier to use than a box blade in that application. You could still rip with the landplane and use the FEL to move dirt if you had to. Gets back to how much volume grading do you plan on doing. Note that for routine gravel driveway maintenance, you don't use the rippers.
What I gave up with this "cheapie" landplane is adjustable height of the cutting blades, adjustable angle, and the overall length is a bit short. Slightly angled blades tend to build up a crown (good for roads, not so good for lawns but you can make it work). People who have built their own (like Jenkinsph) build them longer which makes for a more level experience. He built his with non angled blades since he does more lawn prep work than gravel driveway maintenance. I've heard of some landplanes with a "tailgate" which would let you move some dirt around. If you can fabricate/weld stuff, you might be able to make a hinged on. I don't have a welder so that's not an option for me. Normally, the dirt/gravel just "flow" over the tops of the blades. So between the cutting action on the bottom of the blades, and the material flowing over the top, it's a leveling device not a moving device.
Finally, keep in mind that will all the 3PT dirt movers, a hydraulic top link (good) or Top 'n Tilt (best) make a world of difference. So (for example) if I had to choose between a "boxblade and landplane" vs. a "landplane with TnT", I'd take the landplane with TnT. The TnT cost about the same as an implement, but makes all these grading tools much more productive. The TnT lets me compensate for the fixed blade depth and angle.
As with many implement decisions, there is a tug of war between "now" and "5 years from now"...
So many implements, so little time and money :empathy:.
Pete