Franklindixie,
Brothers are great machines for the price. I had one that broke after it was dropped by DH (an accident). It was an $89 machine that held up very well to 6 years of not-gentle use by me.
I replaced it with a Brother SE350, which has embroidery and regular sewing capability. It was reasonably priced, and I love it. Haven't used the embroidery yet, but you never know...
Recently bought another Brother to use in our garage when my HQ16/pcquilter are busy quilting. It's a nice machine, too. So far my only complaint is that it doesn't have an automatic thread cutter. Other than that, it's a nice, smooth running machine.
One other thing I can say about the Brother machines - the manuals are well written, understandable and very useful. They actually explain the feet, the needles, etc. My HQ16 manual is about 8 pages long and is very short on information. No doubt the more expensive machines have good manuals, too, but for the price I paid for the Brothers', I got way more than I expected in the manuals.
By the way, I do have an older New Home 'mechanical' that I bought at Goodwill for $12. Cleaned it up, oiled it and it works just fine. It was replaced because it is so heavy; I sew in the dining room and have to put it away now and then. I can't do heavy as well as I used to. It's now a backup machine. It hasn't been used since last December, but I can't get myself to part with it, so it will be with me for a long time.