Welcome to SRP Mark. I never tried the Feather straight. Early on a then active and very experienced SRP member mparker762 posted that the Feather was almost too sharp and that he had to be really careful when using it. That and the cost put me off of it. So I cannot speak from experience with one of those but I can from the point of view of Merkur, and other slant DEs with Feather DE blades, among others.

I had to stay with it for a some months before I could begin to equal the shaves I can get with a merkur slant and feather blade but I routinely equal or surpass that with a variety of straight razors new and vintage. So hang in there, it gets better.