Thank you all for your advice and opinions! I went to the shop where I purchased my machine today because I needed more fabric (NOT!), and signed up for the first of three classes on my machine and two classes for my embroidery module. I certainly do not think that I could make any kind of decision until after the classes so I am going to try to give this an unbiased try. I think it might be the manual more than anything but I will soon find out. I am keeping the Viking in mind and heard a lot of really positive things about the Brother. Thank you all very much for all the insight
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