I bought the Bernina 580, but had taken a class on the 880. Everyone I talked to has said that the 880 really does have a lot of features...but everything has to be just "right." It is "sensitive" machine (which I interpret as picky)." In the class they showed how to use a lot of things like painting on china and of course, and you need to purchase the different feet you need to take full advantage of the things it is capable of. Most of what they showed were features I'd never use. And it is heavy. I needed a machine that I could lift and carry and actually use.
So I picked the 580 that had everything I needed and I could carry it by myself. Unfortunately, I was very unhappy with it. I ended up returning it and bought a Babylock Journey. The problems with the 580 were both machine problems...like the motor started clacking the first week and when I finally returned it it would not center in the hoop...and problems of what I was doing wrong. It is very computer based and you have to scroll through a number of windows to get to where you need to go. Some icons appear on more than one screen, but do different functions. The hoops are a weird size. For example, to stitch a 5x7 design you have to use the 5.7x10 hoop which results in a lot of wasted stabilizer. The user manual is not as helpful as it should have been.
Having said that, people who do own the 580 seem to love the machine and when I took the 580 class, and the people in the 880 class either loved it or were frustated. Frankly, Iloved the 580 machine's stitch, but not enough to overlook the hassle of flipping through all those screens and the headaches it gave me. So I exchanged it for the Babylock. It is much more user friendly and it has this threading system to die for.