I left my Pfaff 1473 in the UK for my daughter and bought a new Pfaff Creaive 4.0, have to say I notice no difference in the quality of the machine or the sewing at all, but this one of course has the embroidery part as well as all the old standard embroidery stitches, plus being computerised. I used to work in a Pfaff/Bernina sewing machine shop and always stuck with Pfaff. I think we stay with what we are comfortable with unless we find out from personal experience that things are not as good as they were? :)
I agree, there is always the chance of a lemon no matter what make.