Midas vs Allen and heath, its like a F1 racer vs a volvo.
Midas are very expensive compared to allen and heath. Allen and Heath consoles are very functional and have all the key features for live sound without the 6 digit price tag. Midas prices start at the top of allen and heath and go way up.
Crest fall right in between the two. Slightly higher quality than allen and heath and offer some neat features.
Peavey is considered to be down with the MI gear, targeted at musicians and not techs and engineers.
Durability vs quailty, usually to make something tougher and more fool proof you have to take a big hit in sound quality. Yorkville and peavey both do this alot. Its a trade off. Usually if your going for quailty sound you will baby your gear, but if your just going at it on the weekends, half asleep or drunk your going to want your gear tough and simple.
Then there is just cheap, like behringer. They make gear that sounds just ok and its not very tough. They trade off sound quality and toughness just to make their products cheap.
As a sound tech(I'm not a musician), sound quailty is #1 then comes duablity. Being a student price also comes into it. But here is the way I look at it. Yes I could go do gigs with crap gear and get an ok sound. Or I could turn those down and only take gigs with budget for great gear and get great sound. Thus improving my image as a sound guy. Yes I could go out and buy a cheap system and grab every little crappy gig I can get to pay it off. Or I can take a few gigs here and there with the budget to rent quality gear. At the same time I'm building up my own rig, buying quality gear as I go. So far I have mics, DI's, cables, a snake, a reverb unit, 4 channels of compression and a cheap little board(which is the only thing I wish I didn't buy).