I’m hoping to get an embroidery machine to make patches along the lines of boy scout badges etc. Anyone have any suggestions? Google give me lots of options but I’d feel better if I had some recommendations from experience. Thanks Glowhivemind
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Search the forums. This has come up a couple times. My recollection is a few folks on the forums have Brother embroidery machines.
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Ooooh! That’s a keeper! 
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As John said, there are a few of us who have used Brother sewing/embroidery machines. Here’s a search link that will take you to them: https://community.glowforge.com/search?q=brother%20embroidery
For $300, they are hard to beat and patch blanks are easy to find online. Oddly enough, you many find the biggest hidden expense is the design software that outputs the appropriate file type.
Best of luck and let us know what you find!
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Brother pe-770 is my recommendation, but as stated the design software is the real expense
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I never did spring for the design software because I was really using the embroidery for very few things, but I have the Brother SE400. The photo quality was from an old phone, so excuse it, but I was able to get this out of it for my first project, having never used an embroidery machine before. I did have to break it into 3 different sections, which is why the alignment isn’t perfect, and it was a pain to get it that close.
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Brother is a good brand for embroidery machines. I would avoid Singer at all costs. I bought one of their embroidery/sewing machines. It never worked properly and they never responded to my multiple inquiries with their customer service. I ended up returning it.
There are several software options and many different file types for embroidery data. Make sure you know which file type a machine uses before buying. As was stated before, the software gets really pricey really fast.
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Can anyone who knows expound on the file types these machines use and the pricing of the software that is used to generate them?
I don’t know the exact answer to your question, but I do know that Embrilliance Essentials (for PC and Mac) will convert between most any format and do a bunch of other things besides. My mom has a copy for her various embroidery machines.
Embrilliance Essentials Embroidery Machine Software https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00DYZPGIY/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_tai_w-JPyb91PVET5
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Ditto on the Brother PE-770… that’s what I have and it’s a solid machine that will serve you well. I also use Embrilliance Essentials and highly recommend that versus more expensive software that you may not need.
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Oooh love it!!!
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I have found the PE-Design software to be the most affordable and intuitive. The real trick is to find an older version which you can get pretty cheaply on ebay. I’m still using version 6 of the software and there’s basically nothing I can’t design. Then you download Wilcom Truesizer for free and use that to convert the files types from .pes (which PE Design exports) to any other file type (except .art which bernina uses - Bernina is proprietary; however, you can use .exp with Wilcom in a Bernina).
Brother machines use .pes and PE-Design is a Brother software. There’s no better entry machine than the Brother SE-400. There are several reasons I believe that, not the least of which is affordability. That said, get the warranty. I’ve used it twice on that machine.
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It’s a bit dated, but SewArt for Win32 and Win64 is quite inexpensive at $80. Theyhave a 30-day trial version that was fully functioning-- no watermarks, .pes save enabled, etc…
To see how it works, here’s a short tutorial/demo of how to create a design from a bitmap image:
Btw, if you want to make your own designs, it’s important to get a program that supports full digitization, not just format conversion.
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