I have a question about the benefits of a 700 or 800 controller.
Currently I am using an Aeotech Gen5+ stick. It supports S2 security and I have devices attached with S2. My network is rock solid.
I do see a lot topics about the 700 and 800 controllers. Even thought about buying it myself too, but I start to wonder what the benefits would be. From a battery powered device perspective, I can see the pro’s. However, what would be a big plus to switch from my trusted device to a 700 or 800 version?
Hopefully you guys can tell me. 
ZWAVE 700 & 800 have a better wireless range than the 500, respectively 600m, 1 mile, 1.5 miles
The 800 offers additional security S2+ Secure Vault or just S2 for the 500 & 700
Because of the better range you will get better battery life from your battery only powered deices with the 700 & 800
The best part is you lose FOBO, Fear Of Becoming Obsolete, you would have to worry about your new devices not working because of your old adapter when you upgrade.
Or you can just sit on your old Gen5+, shouldn’t be a problem.
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Something I just learned is that the long range feature is not part of the mesh that you’d be used to using older zwave. I don’t have a good understanding of this yet so I can’t fully explain it, but something to keep in mind if planning for a switch and a lock in that outbuilding or similar.
Thanks for the replies.
So far the range of my Z-Wave network is good enough to reach every area of my house en garden. So long range will not be necessary for me.
I have some 60 Zwave devices with possibly one or two ZW 300, quite a few ZW 500 as well as ZW 700 and ZW 800 devices. I have the Zooz ZW 800 dongle.
My understanding is that I only will have full benefit from ZW 800 if a ZW 800 device communicates directly with the ZW 800 dongle and not through through other devices in the mesh network, and that is unlikely to be the case.
But with some 60 ZW devices, my mesh network is good and decently fast enough.
All new ZW devices that I buy are ZW 800 but by the time I have replaced my older ZW devices, there will probably be a ZW 900 or 1000 dongle, so this is an ongoing issue that I am not really concerned about. I am decided to always get the latest technology even if I don’t get all the benefits.
The main benefit of a 500 series controller is rock solid performance. The 700 and 800 series still have software bugs that while acknowledged by Silicon Labs have not been fixed, which lead to daily or hourly locks up for some users.
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@PeteRage I know that you are right about some having issues with latest dongles, especially if they updated to latest firmware. With my Zooz ZW 800 dongle, maybe once every 3 or 4 months I have to power cycle my HA Yellow Box if Zwave stops working, but other than that my mesh network has been rock solid.
I have not updated firmware and won’t do that until I see better reports on new firmware.
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Good to hear. May be worth while posting that firmware version here, new sticks usually come with new firmware, which as you indicate is faulty.
In that case I will wait with upgrading. 
The network is solid now.
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I believe that it is 7.19.3 but can not find confirmation.
I did not do any upgrade since acquiring the dongle more than a year ago.
As mentioned it is basically rock solid, other than sometimes having to power cycle the Yellow Box.