My experience with these two planes, although minimal: I'm the training coordinator for our club, and have been providing instruction this year. We had two new students. One had the Nexstar, and the other had the Alpha 40. While the Nextar performed quite adequately for a trainer, once we got the extra gadgets off, the Alpha trainer was a dream. I got to maiden the alpha trainer for the student, and it required almost no trim adjustments on its maiden flight. Landings were very smooth and easily controlled. The plane responded extremely well during approach to both elevator and throttle inputs, with no bad habits to balloon or float. The Nexstar was a little touchier for landings, and was a little more difficult to trim. We never did really trim out the tendency of the Nexstar to want to climb with power (not necessarily a bad tendency), but the Alpha was rock solid on heading through all throttle settings.

Bottom Line: If I were purchasing a trainer for the Club, I'd probably recommend the Alpha.

Brad