HOT PRODUCT TODAY Brother SE400 Combination Computerized Sewing and 4x4 Embroidery Machine With 67 Built-in Stitches, 70 Built-in Designs, 5 Lettering Fonts
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1231 of 1249 people found the following review helpful.
Regarding the Brother SE-400 sewing & embroidery machine
By Alexandra Athanassiou
I just purchased a Brother SE-400 computarized sewing and embroidery machine from Ken's Sewing and Vacuum Center via Amazon.com. It arrived within three days. So far, I am VERY pleased with this machine.Loving embroidery, I decided to purchase the Brother SE-400, as it had all the features I wanted and it was within my price range. Prior to my purchase, I read all the web reviews I could find on the SE-350, as there are barely any reviews yet for the SE-400 (new on the market). Noteworthy is the fact that the SE-350 and the SE-400 are the exact same machines except for the additional computer connectivity that the SE-400 possesses. The SE-400 has a port for computer connectivity and comes with a USB cable which helps connect directly the sewing machine to your computer. This is an advantage over the SE-350 as this feature allows you to upload embroidery designs directly from the web(or your computer) to your machine, and update your machine's operational software from Brother whenever updates occur.The SE-400 is compact enough, comes with a handle at the top, which makes it truly portable. Even though it is relatively lightweight (compared to my good 40-year old "all metal" Kenmore), the SE-400 feels sturdy while sewing and it is a very easy machine to operate. The manuals that came with the machine are very well written and the diagrams easy to follow. It took me only a few minutes to figure out how this machine operates. I love the self threading feature of the machine, as well as the built-in thread cutter, bobbin sensors, and drop in lower bobbin.I was also delighted to find out that the embroidery part of the machine has the following built in features: You can reflect an embroidery design; and rotate the design 1 degree, 10 degrees, or 90 degrees at a time.I appreciated all the enclosed accessories that came with my SE-400. I wished though that it came with an additional large embroidery hoop too, besides the medium hoop. I guess I will have to buy a large hoop sooner or later, if I am to become more involved with machine embroidery.The SE-400 is a good choice for a home sewer. I give it a 5-star.One more note. If you are looking for a hard carrying case for this machine, I highly recommend the Brother 5300 universal hard carrying case. It is the perfect fit for it.
490 of 501 people found the following review helpful.
Great for a newbie...
By Camera addict
I bought this at a local big box store because I was worried I wouldn't use it, wouldn't like it, or wouldn't be able to figure it out. Let me tell you about me, so you understand why those were my concerns...I'm about as crafty as a sock, my only sewing experience was sewing little bags with yarn closures as a kid, and I have NO PATIENCE. I don't like manuals too much, which doesn't help.For whatever reason, I got it in my head that I wanted to try this. Not sure why... but anyway, I'm a gadget junkie, so maybe that was part of it.I bought it, the little sample pack of thread at the same store, and stiched out one of the included patterns. It was AWFUL, but recognizable for what it was... Santa with some trailing letters. But the bobbin thread came up so much, most of the pattern was white... it was pretty bad. I thought "other people can do this... let me google it". So I googled it, re-looked at my machine, and I had my bobbin threaded wrong (I missed the little lip it has to go under). Tried again, did a free "mouse in a stocking" pattern I found at emblibrary, and it was AWESOME! Super, duper cute... an inch away from perfect! The challenge there was I relied on the machine to tell me what color to put in, rather than the color change chart from the designer (FYI: apparently a common rookie move). So my mouse had pink feet and ear edges, instead of grey, but besides that... PERFECT!So I did the next thing, and it was GREAT. Here's my lessons learned:1) Polyester (what comes in that sample pack) stretches a lot... so if you have a dense design, it will cause pucker. There's probably ways to avoid it, but I avoid it by using rayon :).2) If it's acting funny, it's because it's threaded wrong... most commonly for me, it's the "lip" thing in the bobbin case. Then you get too much white. If it dies after a color change and about 8 stitches, says "recheck upper thread", really, just rethread it, even if it looks fine.3) REALLY try to not stretch the fabric when you're hooping it. Causes some scary puckering.4) There is a difference between different vendors of designs. Some are super good, some not so much. So try a sample or two from a site before you go hog-wild there. They may look cute on the screen, but when you try to stitch it out, they have 5 layers superimposed, which causes some issues, the margins are too thin, or the color changes are really poorly defined.5) You're likely going to want some software. Many people apparently use Embird, so I wanted to like it, but I don't like their business model... I may be missing something, but my understanding is that it's a chunk of change for the base model, that much again if you want to make your own, that much again if you want to use letters, etc. It's not nickel-and-diming, but hundred-and-hundred-and-fifty-dollaring. Same concept, different scale. They let you try it out, but it's truly crippleware... you can't save images you've built (like what that's supposed to tell you, I don't know... how can I know if this is ok if I can't stitch it???). But I suggest you try it out... for whatever reason, it's very popular. I found Stitch Era Universal, which is freeware that requires a constant internet connection, has ads, and is really free and useful. There are some things that are less useful than Embird (harder to see where your edges should be is my only concern right now), but I can take a design, add some text, save it to the file format I need, etc. I even got fancy and made part of a P-51 red so that I could do a pattern for the Tuskegee Airmen. Took me a while (~1.5 hours) to figure out how to do it, because I had to split objects, insert color changes, etc, but I did it. You can also digitize, but I'm guessing that's hard. :) Both of these have active yahoo groups. There are other software products, but I don't know them, so can't comment effectively.6) Don't pay full price for any design unless you LOVE it and HAVE to have it now. There's going to be a sale, you're going to get a coupon, or something. That may just be at the sites I'm at, but so far, the sales make it super tempting to get those really neat designs. Put it in your wishlist, wait for a sale or coupon. YMMV.7) Get the free stuff! Sign up for the club, see what they offer free. Emblibrary has a great Christmas club, and a super nice selection of low cost designs that changes weekly. Bunnycup has a REALLY great selection of free retired sets (the ghosts are super cute!), great designs from a technical perspective, and frequent additions to the "new sets" page. It tends to be "cutsier" than I would love, but if you're looking for cutesy, that's a great start (lot of applique, too, and good instructional stuff).8) Get most of your non-thread stuff on amazon... it's just cheaper and convenient. The things that I wouldn't trade for the world are my pre-cut stabilizer sheets (Tearaway Embroidery Stabilizer, 8x8, 200 Precut Sheets for Embroidery Machines, pre-wound bobbins (144 Prewound Bobbins for Brother Embroidery Machine Size A (156), aweseome weird looking scissors (Havel's Ulti-Mates Angled Machine Embroidery Scissors, and any curved forceps for finishing the threading process (unless your fingers are more agile than mine). I got mine at a local craft store in the jewelery making section for $3. Yes, I'm lazy, and I trade money for time... you can probably get roll stabilizer way cheaper, wind your own bobbins, use any old pointy scissors, and finish the threading with fingers. But for me, being able to grab a sheet, have a really full bobbin with exactly the right tension without having to learn how to use my bobbin winder-thingie, and cut stray threads without contortion are so worth it. (Note: I'm likely going to have to learn bobbin-winder-thingie at some point, since sometimes you want bobbin and upper threads to match, like for applique, but I'm not beating feet to it :) )9) Shop around. The prices for the exact same thread varies from $2.85 to $5.99, with everything in between, with similar variation in other stuff I've seen. brothermall2 and allthreads are relatively good sites, although the user interface is clunky at the first, and it has a limited selection, but prices are great (especially for the easy glow-in-the-dark thread, and fast shipping.10) If you can afford it, you like madeira thread, and you think you're going to do this a while, get the set. It's expensive, but you get the drawers that go with it, pre-filled and with little stickers for where the spools go back to, and a cross-reference by number (it's sorted by color sheet order). For about 10x what I spend on 30 threads, I got 356 threads, nice wooden drawers with spool-hugging plastic inserts (to avoid rolling) I'll use forever, and not having to worry about getting a particular color for a special pattern. It solved two of my biggest concerns: storage and inventory. How do I know what I have, find what I have, and store what I have? Now I can easily see what has a hole, find anything, and not be flipping through boxes of spools to find stuff. This set was SOOOO worth it for me. I bought several spools of that brand at a cheap thread site, tried it on a pattern or two, and took the plunge early.11) This is shockingly fun so far. I can make a neat pattern in a short time... I put Mario's gold flower on my son's pajamas, a glow-in-the-dark ghost on my daughter's blanket, and am working on a state quilt. So for non-crafty, non-creative me, this is something that I look forward to doing... it's almost funny. My kids like watching it stitch out, I like the "set and forget" and good results (with a few setbacks for learning issues), and I am so impressed with what I can make.12) Research stuff before you buy it. I almost got the "hard" glow in the dark thread, which apparently glows longer, but requires special handling, instead of the "easy" glow in the dark, which you use, launder, etc, just like regular thread. And I almost spent $6 for thread, and I avoided spending $600 on modular software. I bought metallics, which are beyond my skill set, because I violated this guidance...13) Keep the manual close... my first several times threading, I had the book open next to me. As someone who had literally never threaded before, it took me a couple of times (probably 5) to figure it out. It's clearly labeled on the machine, and you'll be doing it in your sleep pretty quickly, but you have to hit all the marks or it just doesn't work. I also watched the first video, and looked in the manual for repeating a color or stitch (they call it "re-sewing", if you want to look it up in the manual) when I had threading issues. So I flipped through it, and refer to it (despite my anti-manual leanings). I also read other people saying you have to read the manual cover to cover, and I won't say they're wrong. I may have had fewer threading issues if I would have complied :)So, this a long review, I know, but if someone else is thinking they may be interested, that's the path I took, and my results!
635 of 652 people found the following review helpful.
great machine, usb Mac techie review.
By Truth
I agree with the rave reviews for the se-350 now se-400.... for sewing, it's a dream of an upgrade from my battered but still working brother xr-40 bought from costco @ 10-ish years ago.for embroidery it's limited as the max hoop size is not very large,and an extra purchase, but fun to play with. I give it 4 stars... it's a great intermediate sewing and beginner embroidery machine.i purchased this machine (shipped promptly from J&R via Amazon) last month after a lot of research. what i found was.... the brother se-350 was pretty much identical to the brother project runway 6700 machine. the 6700 was recently updated to the 6800, adding 1 usb port, as was the se 350 was upgraded to the se-400 w/ usb port. the project runway machines come w/ a roller case, the se models ship w/ vinyl case. se-400 is 100 bucks cheaper than the PR 6800. the se 350 is still shipping for same price as se-400. I advise purchasing the se-400 even if you don't plan on using it w/ your computer currently as brother will be offering system upgrades you will need usb port for.most software for embroidery sewing/embroidery machines is not Mac compatible so i assumed the usb port would be useless for a while.. Wrong!connect the se 400 via included usb cable to your Mac, it'll show up as an external hard drive, mine was named 'unknown', I do not advise changing this. then add PES files from your computer by dropping them on the sewing machine/external drive. do not add folders of designs on machine, they must be added one at a time to be recognized. (mac will display pes designs in finder as an image...but I've yet to find any software to edit them...)Oh, & remember, it only holds 512 kb of data in memory so you can't load all your designs, unless you have a compatible memory card to load in machines slot. and the designs MUST be 4" by 4" or smaller or machine will not recognize them. (You can buy a larger hoop size to fit more than one 4 x 4 designs on fabric.)And have fun!
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Jury's still out, but not everything I'd hoped for.
Allbrands only offers store credit
