Hi. I've never paid for a script, so you must be looking for me.
Your first example looks crappy. I wouldn't even consider it. The second one (Linx) is very good for free. It has much of the basic features you'll need and it's owner seems like a decent guy. If you know how to play with PHP at all, you could dick with it to add some stuff, if need be.
I've stumbled on this one pretty recently -
http://www.phplinkdirectory.com/ It has a lot of nice features. I think it even has a built in tools, such as a recip link checker and broken link bot type thing. It's source code is more difficult for the layman, in my opinion, but if you aren't one to screw with things you won't care about that. I dick with things.
There's a free version of of WSN Links here -
http://wsnlinks.giannaros.org/basic/ which is a dumbed-down version of it's namesake. I don't have any experience with that one.
There's nothing wrong with starting off with a free script. I've worked with free scripts so long, the paid versions don't even impress me anymore.