Wizard,
Carbide has come a long way in the last few years and the inserts have become highly specialized.
Very true.
Unfortunately NOT for model engineers.
What has happened, tooling manufacturers for model engineering have chosen a range of tips that they think we can use, then made holders to fit our machines.
Tips are designed for industrial purposes, not for model engineers, where a couple of dozen tips might be used each day on one machine, where one tip will usually last us for months.
They are developed to allow faster machining, either deeper cuts or faster machine speeds and feeds, and it is a minefield if you want to try to get the latest designs as some change qualities and designs almost daily.
We are most probably at least 2 years behind tip development in our world, maybe more, so there may be a few specialised ones that will start to appear over time, like ground tungsten tips for aluminium, which have raised their heads over the last couple of years. These have really allowed the small machine user to take advantage of replaceable carbide tipped tools as they act very similar to HSS, but of course, because they are a new type, more expensive, rather than the cheaper old hat 'moulded' tips which require more power to get them to perform correctly, and so are not really recommended for low power machines, even though the holder manufacturers make toolholders for even tiny machines, basically making small machine owners think that they are OK to use, but in fact, they most probably aren't.
If a small machine user really wants to try carbide tooling, then the really cheap brazed tip variety would be perfect, but they do need to be set up and used correctly, in fact, they are the only ones I use for single point internal and external threading, and by choosing the correct grade, I can get them for about a couple of pounds (3 bucks) each, mainly because they are very rarely used now, and I can easily resharpen them at least 3 or 4 times.
Don't forget that also there are ground HSS tips to fit a lot of these tungsten tipped holders. That is another bonus for small machine users.
John