It doesn't have to be in a fancy cabinet, but it makes a HUGE, (well at least to me) difference that the machine bed is level with the surrounding table/surface. It might seem a little different at first, but you soon adjust, and realise how much easier it is to sew on the same level as what is surrounding your machine. If you can't afford a cabinet, then a sewezi table is a reasonable price, or just buy the plastic insert available from the cabinet manufacturers or the sewezi people, that fits around your machine, and get a handyman to cut a hole in a cheap table and fix a shelf below it at the right height for your machine.