I bought 1 of those cheap Singers from JoAnns 3 years ago to give as a gift to my sewing student. It was total trash. Barely stitched and made birds nests instead of sewing. AFter many trips to local sewing machine repair store to find out what was wrong, we gave it to a local charity and replaced it with a Janome Gem Gold which does a fantastic job. I'll probably never even consider a Singer again, unless it's one of the old ones - and I would definitely consider a Featherweight.