I mentioned this elsewhere before but...
For years, I was unable to do any strenuous work in the garden, so my compost consisted of nothing more than a black plastic compost bin filled with kitchen scraps and occasional weeds. To minimize work involved in taking out the kitchen scraps, they were collected in brown paper bags. Starting with a lunch bag, then when full/nearly full, put in next size brown paper bag (may be from a deli or hardware store), and so on until they were in a double layer of grocery bags with handles. That's when the whole thing went out to the compost bin without any other processing. (I might have stabbed at them a couple of times with garden forks to poke holes in the bags.) Occasional weeds and wind drift of brown leaves on the patio were only other additions. My "pile" tended to be too dry, and it was never turned, but it still yielded black compost from the bottom access every spring. I'd say approx. 1/2 the bin was usable compost.
So, from someone who's "been there," let me assure you it's possible to make compost with minimal work. If you can maintain the moisture level by soaking each layered bundle, I think it would work better. I think there must be plenty of "natural" air pockets inside/between the layers of brown bags and that's why I didn't need to turn them. Oh, my dh used to dump his left over fishing worms in there too.
Now, getting back to your original question, I tried the tumbling composter (end-to-end kind) ages ago. It tended to dry out a lot, and larger pieces didn't break down very easily. Enthusiasts recommended that you pre-chop anything you put in it into small pieces. I found it to be a lot of work, especially when I didn't have the energy to go outside very often. So it's still a question of just how much work you are able to do.
I let a bunch of neighborhood kids use the tumbler one spring for their Earthday science project. They were studying about compost so they came to *me*. I offered them the tumbler, gave them a brief lesson on what to do, and contributed a good shovel-ful from my compost pile to help things along. The kids brought kitchen scraps, brown leaves, shredded newspapers, grass, weeds, guinea pig bedding, etc. and took turns turning it -- one kid pulling down, another lifting up -- (a little too much I thought, but they were enthusiastic and were fighting each other for a turn

) It was a chilly spring and they had less than a month, so I told them not to expect a completely finished compost, but assured them that composting process WAS taking place. On Earth Day, the parents came to collect the tumbler for the Science Fair. When they brought it back, they said that the project was a great success BUT ANTS, ANT EGGS, AND
WORMS TUMBLED OUT when they opened it

I was amazed that some of the other parents expressed
WONDER that most of the things the kids put in the compost tumbler had become UNRECOGNIZABLE and that everything had TURNED BLACK
