Believe me they ARE better. Being able to trust the results is priceless.
Miscounting? For FC, I typically have to count to 10. And let's say for some reason I wasn't able to count to 10 (would have to be a lot of barley pop involved!), if I miss by a drop, so what. So my FC is 4.5 or 5.5 instead of 5. That's not near the margin of error like you are seeing in the example you have pictured.
When colors matter, there is a stark contrast. Pink turns clear. Blue turns red. It isn't red turning pink, or purple turning blue. It isn't subtle like what you are looking at there. You won't have to ask for assistance (this is where you say "touche").
Not shaking enough, well that depends. For pH, you can tell quickly whether or not the dark red dye is integrated through the clear water. For FC, it isn't that big a deal, just stir it around a little. It's the CH test that really needs a good stir. My recommendation is get the SpeedStir and forget about any stirring issues.
It doesn't matter too much in this case, but I can't tell if your CH is 200 or 400, and indeed the next step is 1000. Where is it?
Is your CYA 20? 30? 40? 50? 60? Like Joel said, those little steps make big differences in the real world.
Even if the strips are accurate (and they really aren't), the precision isn't fine enough.