I currently run a Voxelab Aquila I got for $120 three years ago. It largely replaced a Monoprice Mini, and the Aquila’s done some surprisingly good work for me, but I may look for something new to put on the ol’ birthday list. I would like a flat bed and some modern QoL improvements built in (he said, side-eyeing the BLTouch clone he never installed), but I’m still looking to play in the shallow-end, price-wise, and anyway Bambu just has “future enshittification” written all over it. I don’t do anything time-sensitive, and I’m not afraid to put the whole thing together, so who are the current leaders in the value space? Recent machines from Creality?
I have an Anycubic Kobra 2 that is pretty OK. Only mods I’ve done are print a new fan duct for better cooling and flash klipper on it, other than that it’s original HW. It obviously requires some tuning for best possible results, but the printing with just Anycubics setup guide OOTB were decent.