This will be a tangential answer, but I can recommend what I bought in October:
Amazon.com : Kinetic Road Machine 2.0 Fluid Trainer
and
inRide Pod
Hmph. Today the combo is about 10% cheaper than what I paid.
This presumes hubby has a modern smart phone (edit: looks like it is iOS only) that can run the inRide app (which is free, but required to get the benefit of the inRide pod).
Anyhow, the inRide app is very good and well supported (i.e. getting better) & the quality of the hardware is top shelf (better than CycleOps imo).
I haven't seen the CycleOps powersynch trainer... that seems like an awful lot of money for a trainer....