I have been on both epilim and tegretol for about 30 years (lifelong epilepsy). They are very different drugs and personally I prefer epilim, but then I don't seem to have weight gain problems with it.
Tegretol (carbamazepine) has a lot more side effects in terms of drowsiness etc, and I have never been able to take more than 600mg of it (200 am, 400pm). If I was able to tolerate more of the tegretol, then I wouldn't have to take epilim and I would just be on one AED. But, carbamazepine is really useful in terms of controlling my seizures, which is why I remain on this smaller dose.
So, I prefer epilim, but then we are all different so you may find that you prefer tegretol.
best of luck with is - it is a very old drug and has been around forever, so doctors tend to be very familiar with it.
cheers
Raglet
oh btw, if you are on warfarin/coumadin, monitor your inr very closely when you make the switch as carbamazepine is a hepatic enzyme inhibitor which means that you will very likely need to increase your warfarin/coumadin to maintain a stable inr. If you are not on coumadin, please ignore this.