As a new quilter, I am wondering if there's value in purchasing a sewing machine specifically for quilting? I've seen some rather inexpensive ones, and since I just paid $100 for a Walking Foot for my Husvarna, would a machine dedicated to quilting be a good investment?

You will got many different opinions on this post! I, myself, have a Janome that is not a "quilting machine" but a "sewing machine". I bought this machine because I liked it and never thought about it not being solely a "quilting machine". I don't feel guilty if I buy something for this machine, no matter the cost, if it will make quilting more easy. That's the reason I bought it!!!

I don't have a "quilt" sewing machine and I have been quilting for years. I don't think it makes it less of a quilt because of it.

You can machine quilt on any home sewing machine.
As long as the feed dogs drop or can be covered, you
can do Free Motion Quilting on it. Otherwise you can
just do stitch in the ditch or straight line quilting on
any machine. There are great teachers out there on
the internet.

The only reason to add a quilting machine would be for the additional harp space. This is assuming you like your Viking for all other sewing tasks. Most of the dedicated quilting machines have just a straight-stitch but do it very well. You would still need the decorative stitches and buttonholes that you have on your current machine unless you strictly do quilting and nothing more. I know some of the new models do offer wide harp and a lot of stitches too but I also notice many of those (new) have been trouble-prone. I have an Elna that is like the Janome 6600 and it has the other features, but no free-arm. I think an ss only model + nicely loaded machine is a good solution IF you do many large quilts. Your Viking can probably do fine with up to lap-size.

When I started the first machine I bought was a Viking Mega Quilter. It does straight stitch only and quilts. It worked great for both piecing and quilting. I got tired of having to move it from stitching to quilting whenever I was working on a different project as I move back and forth between things. It also didn't have any decorative stitches I needed for machine applique. So,,, I bought another machine that had the decorative stitches and dedicated the Mega to just quilting. Of course since then I have been bitten by the vintage bug and have added 5 vintage machines to my collection, LOL. But I do use them all.

If you're talking about free motion quilting, any Bernina machine does excellent FMQ. They are expensive machines, but you can get a used one for a reasonable price. I have a big Janome and it doesn't do FMQ very well, which is why I got a Bernina. The Janome gives me loops on the back. The tension can be adjusted to compensate for that, but I'd rather not stitch a few stitches, check and repeat the process when I can just sit at a Bernina and stitch away.

Even a very basic Bernina will have many stitches on it, so you would be getting a machine that does all kinds of stitching and also does excellent FMQ.

Good luck!

I have beeen using my Viking Rose for "everything" since 1996. I just replaced my walking foot this summer by searching Internet for best price. I paid $75.00 with free shipping. I like having just 1 machine to maintain. I still have my 1960's Singer & a Featherweight that I got in the late 1990's but used only once. That's enough back-up for me.

I have a Juki 2010Q that I use just for quilting. It is straight stitch only, (semi industrial), 9 inch harp, auto thread cutter, knee lift, needle threader, adjustable speed control and costs less than a thousand dollars. I could not believe the difference it made in the quality of my FMQ.

I also have a Grace GMQ Pro frame that I will hopefully get set up in the near future to put it on to do frame quilting.

My piecing machine also has a large harp but I only use it for piecing and deco stitches. I've never tried FMQ on it.

Are you asking about a longarm quilting machine or just any old domestic machine that has been labeled "for quilting".. Any sewing machine that makes a stitch can quilt. But a longarm is made especially for quilting.