Personally, I perfer the Janome...But when I first started out in the early 90's, I didn't cheap out...The lady who inspired me into quilting said that buying a cheaper machine in the beginning seemed a bit crazy...She pointed out that since I already enjoyed quilting, why would I buy a lower end machine. Ok I thought true in a way, then I started thinking, I really do like quilting and just like being a new quilter had lots to learn, why don't I just buy the higher end machine and learn right along...no different really...and if I discovered quilting wasn't for me, I could easily sell it. So that is what I did...glad I did that for sure, because I would have wanted to upgrade within a couple of years anyways and of course I did upgrade again but not until this past spring so had my machine for 15yrs....Unless it's a concern financially, I would go up one step and purchase like a Janome 6600p..most are sold with the table for a reasonable price if you shop around.