I was a die-hard Janome gal until I took a class last year where a LQS provided Bernina 440 machines. We did FMQ in class. Oh my goodness, what beautiful stitches Bernina does! I checked with the store after class to see if they offer used machines at a discount and they did, but only $200 off their price of $3,300. This was in Burlington, VT.
I LOVE my Janome Memory Craft 9000 sewing machine for everything but FMQ. I get loops on the back on that machine. I know sometimes loops are user error or the tension needing adjusting, but I didn't have to adjust a single thing on the Bernina machine and the stitches were beautiful.
Check out Rachelcb80's thread. She did great research on machines and there are 5 pages of comments on machines.
http://www.quiltingboard.com/t-33831-1.htm
Good luck on your search!