General rules of thumb, which by the way support what has already been posted...
When to consider Open Transition: Only when the user is too cheap to do it right. It carries no advantage over any other form of reduced voltage starting other than price. In addition, as itsmoked said, the potential problems are typically worse than the cure.
When to consider Closed Transition: Only when the environment will allow its use (see below) and then only when the user is so backwards or afraid of technology as to insist on paying more for it than Solid State will cost. As a rule, even the heavier duty solid state starters are going to cost the same or less than a closed transition Y-D starter now. The move up from Open to Closed transition means adding another contactor, logic and most importantly, the transition resistors. These things all add to the cost and real estate, which takes away the only advantage Y-D starting has over solid state. In addition, the resistors will usually glow red hot during that transition time, making them unsuitable for inclusion into a sealed enclosure. Then if you mount them in an external cage, you must also be concerned as to potential ignition of flammable materials such as dust, lint etc. That's why you almost never see them used in sawmills or factories that work with fabrics, even non-classified areas of coal processing facilities.
Bottom line (exposing my prejudice here), there is no reason to specify either one. Use solid state or even Autotransformer if you must have bang-bang equipment.
As to brand of solid state starter, check with your local trusted sources. Any recommendation from us in this group is going to be biased by what we have experienced locally (or who signs our paychecks). But even if we recommend brand X over brand Y, but you have no local support for brand X, then it was not necessarily a good recommendation. A better way to do it is to see what you have available from trusted sources near you, then ask us for opinions on those choices.
