bean and I like CReality; we feel the price/performance ratio is off the hook. I've bought & built a couple Creality clones; a Tevo Tornado (CR10 clone) & a Longer LK4 Pro/Diggro Alpha 3 (Ender 3 Clone).
I like the Ender 3 well enough that I've recommended it to many people; particularly as a first build because they are available as a 98% assembled kit that literally takes minutes to have up & printing. It is an amazing value; with models from ~US$200-350 that all share the same simple, durable DNA. That DNA is good enough that even my cheaper clones were similarly easy to build and get printing right out of the box; everyone I know who has bought an E3 has loved it for the same reason.
That said... right now I think the
CReality CR6-SE is the best thing since sliced bread; it has a ton of next-gen features, and it is designed from the ground up to be a 5-minute build specifically aimed at the first-time builder. I like the feature set enough that is is the first genuine CReality printer I have seen that I was willing to pay full price for at ~US$360 delivered from the Kickstarter.
From the *ahem* conversation in here, it appears Scram and Monkeh prefer to recommend the Prusa line. While not as attractive a build, they have a good support network (as does the E3) and people will help you get it running and teach you how to tweak it for excellent results.
IMO, the differences boil down to two factors: Initial build is not as "Lego Easy" with the Prusas as it is with the Ender 3. It requires some tweaking to get it printing well; this means many first-time builders will get frustrated. I know I did on several that I helped others build. But... there is a tradeoff.
The E3 is easy, and solidly built, and will print usable, even good quality prints out of the box with little or no tweaking. However, it uses less precise polyurethane-covered rollers riding on v-slot extrusion. You can only get so much precision out of that, so there is a limit to just how fine a print you can make. Period.
With Prusa, the road from first build to usable quality prints is longer, the learning curve is steeper right out of the box, and every build does require tweaking to get to "usable" quality prints, which you get just by bolting an E3 together. HOWEVER... because the Prusa uses ground rods & linear bearings which are inherently more precise, you CAN tweak it to get better precision and better looking prints than the E3 can yield. But THAT requires getting a fair bit deeper into the nut & volts of how a 3DP works than I feel is reasonable for a first machine.
All sniping and personality conflicts set aside; this is the most concise and impartial recommendation I can make:
There are a number of good printers out there; I've recommended the E3 to many happy users. But the CR6-SE is the first I've seen that was designed to make the first-time builder's experience Lego-easy, and I believe it is worth the ~US$350 pricetag just for that and the slightly larger 235x235x250 build volume. I feel the next-gen upgrades (including Touchscreen UI, pre-configured mesh auto-leveling, Trinamic silent steppers and clone Ultrabase build plate) that come built-in make it worthwhile for the more experienced builder, just for the decreased hassle-factor. I believe in it enough that I bought one.
mnem
*putting on muh flame-proof jammies*