laithmeister, in my experience, the 27xx switches have problems with the management interface crashing/locking up, which means that it becomes unreachable and unusable until you power cycle. I don't think these ever got fully fixed. In a business environment, that makes them unusable.
I don't remember that state causing the switch to stop learning and STP. But if it does, that's completely fatal/fail in terms of usability even in a home environment. If it's just the web management interface, that's just really annoying in a home environment.
Unfortunately, I've heard reports of the same problem with the Netgear "smart" switches and other vendors'. It seems to go with the territory.