My friends and I use a potluck collection of knives, including hunting, Old Hickory and Chicago Cutlery knives. One of us is a professional chef, with $$$ knives to use, and he is perfectly happy using whatever we have. The key is to keep the knives for the task at hand and keep them sharp.I use my ancient Western 4" fixed blade for 70 % of my work, and the Chicago Cutlery chefs knife for most of my slicing. Dont worry about spending $ for prestige names, use what works.And keep em sharp (we hone constantly - every 5-10 minutes).