I gotta agree that welding machine selection is a bit less important than learning and understanding the principals of welding, and practicing those skills repeatedly.
No amount of reading is going to teach you how to move around a pool of metal while not even touching it, while wearing thick gloves, and the darkest sunglasses in the world. You're half blind, swaddled up, wearing mittens, and trying to manipulate something dangerous yet delicate using only the forces of electrical fields and gravity while also taking care of the chemical reactions taking place inside your material. It takes some practice.
Probably the biggest thing I'd recommend is pairing up with an experienced welder who can give you some basic pointers on how to avoid the most egregious mistakes. This can be a formal class or just a buddy who's willing to help out.
A good weldor can make just about any machine sing. A poor weldor will be a poor weldor regardless of which machine they're using.
One can understand that most home hobbyists wont want to buy three different welders and invest thousands of dollars into equipment, just to make a few basic welds. Do keep in mind the excellent advice above, though, that with a MIG its easier to make welds that LOOK nice but which are completely inadequate and will fail under load.
mystic_1
