OK, I fought for years having a real lawn, I love a real lawn but with the cost of water in CA, dogs that pee kills the lawn and the extreme summer heat I had to replace the lawn a few times plus seed, fertilizer and constantly be maintaining it. If I skipped a week it would takes months to get it back to normal. I figured it cost me about 500 bucks to replace each time and then about a hundred bucks a month in the summer to keep it alive with water and others. Then I had to mow it and edge and all that goodness.
I pulled it out along with the sprinkler system and put down recycled road base from the local concrete company. Then I put down some fake turf, I went with closer to the higher end stuff. I goes in pretty easy, about the same as laying carpet in a room only heavier. It has been in about a year now and it still looks as good as day one. The yard is beautiful at all times with no maintenance. I am extremely happy with it for that.
The absolutely only downfalls are that it gets hot. I believe I checked it on about a 100 degree day and the concrete was about 130 degrees and the grass was about 170. Too hot to step on. Now I tested it a bunch and it only gets this hot at noontime when the sun is directly above it and it is already a 100 degree day. After complaining about it to myself I found out it is really only too hot to touch when it is too hot to go outside. I used the media that they give you for filler and cushion but after I put it down and found out if you use straight sand for filler it keeps the heat down quite a bit.
Over all I am glad I put it in. My daughter loves it and there is no dirt to make mud or to clean up.