With the recoil system it seems to like hotter loads than not. Some cheap .357 ammo that we bought at Cabela's last summer would only cycle the action every other round or two.
I've never fired the .50 so I can't offer any comparison with that. Ammo is cheaper. Also, the recoil is very manageable. It's a little difficult for my friend's wife to pull back the slide, so it's limited in its practicality for home defense (for his family). Also, even the .357 is a big pistol, a lot of steel hanging off the end of your hand, so it helps if your glove size is XL.
Here are some two gun pics, one of me shooting a Ruger P-85 and a 1911. The other is my buddy shooting a Mini-14 and a Mossberg 500, and then two DE .357's. These pics are back from 1990, hence our youthful glow!
Note the cartridge casings in the air and the determined look on my face. And, yes, that is a
Big Trouble In Little China shirt.
Shorts, no shirt, and a gunbelt, the height of gun range fashion.
Note that I don't recommend this as a safe practice. We were young and dumb back then, but somehow we survived. :-[