Might as well go Uston APC with ace side count. If you have the skillz to do it accurately why waste it? You would have to switch to a balanced count so maybe that is a skill set problem. Advising someone to use HILO without knowing what types of games they intend to play is not wise. If he attacks primarily or exclusively pitch games HILO is not the best choice but neither is Uston SS. Sorry but I tried to find the indices and only found out there weren't many without getting any. Like HILO, Uston SS has a very low PE but no as low as HILO. The count is harder but has a huge BC (much better than HILO) and is unbalanced so no true count conversions. HILO's terrible IC is better than Uston SS. I would put them as comparable counts in strength and utility but I bet HILO significantly out produces Uston SS in most situations at the same ROR but Uston SS may be slightly better at the same high spread but at lower spreads HILO significantly out produces Uston SS. These predictions are for shoe games as neither are great counts for pitch games so not much point to which of the bottom of the barrel is better. Of course other choices of counts would blow away both. The advantage in these "better" counts are simply making more conditions playable not so much the increase in EV; although, the increase in EV is nice.