Between 5 station Load Master and 3 station Pro 1000, I think the primary difference is whether you plan to reload long rifle cartridges as Pro 1000 is essentially a high volume pistol caliber progressive press that can also do short rifle cartridges like .223/5.56, 7.62x39, .300 BLK etc.
If you want to seat and crimp in separate steps, you can do that on the Pro 1000 by resizing and priming separately and then using station 1 for case flare/powder drop, station 2 for bullet seating and station 3 for crimping. Like Walkalong, I used resized and hand primed cases for match shooting as using resized cases causes less shell plate tilt/deflection for more consistent OAL/COL on progressive presses, especially 5 station presses with larger shell plates (think greater mechanical leverage
).
As to priming issues, particularly SP primers which most voice issus with, Pro 1000 priming system was designed for domestic primers like CCI/Winchester etc. with SAE inch sizing. If you use non-domestic primers like Wolf/Tula/Fiocchi etc. with Metric millimeter cup sizing that is slightly larger, it will be more difficult to align the primers and take greater effort to seat the primers. When reloaders new to Pro 1000 complain about the priming issues, switching primers to CCI/Winchester has resolved the problem. BTW, Magtech primers have been the easiest SP primers to feed on the Pro 1000 (perhaps they used the SAE inch sizing instead of Metric mm sizing being on the same continent
).
For those interested in the Pro 1000 press, ljnowell PMed me and agreed to be the "Never used Pro 1000 before" test subject and we outlined the experience he went through from unboxing to loading the first 1000 rounds in this thread -
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=761231
I summarized the initial set up steps and tips for reliable Pro 1000 operations on this post along with my QC checks -
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?p=9614888#post9614888
This is the THR Pro 1000 support thread and this post covers priming attachment issues and solutions in detail -
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?p=7877744#post7877744