Quilter's Creative Touch is an extra purchase. It came with a different carriage, software (the computerized workings), everything to work except the computer. You need a tablet or computer using Windows, mounted onto the top of the machine and the software that makes the machine move runs on the tablet. There is a free trial on the Grace Company's website that you can download and see how it works. Even though I have the full version of the software downstairs on my frame, I take a lot of my patterns into the trial version while I'm watching TV upstairs and see how I want to do something, write down my notes and then I can go downstairs and set my machine up to do what I want. It's a learning process but there are a lot of good you tube videos (especially by Angela Huffman) that have helped me, plus I had the manual that is on the software CD printed out. I'm getting more comfortable with that--I've learned a lot about fixing mistakes!