Agreed on getting something bigger to begin with. It's a lot easier to just machine small parts on a mill with larger travels than needed than needing to machine something larger than your travels. Although the x2 might seem enough for your 2.5" parts, you will quickly realize the 3.5-4" y travel is not enough. I started with an x2 and right away banged my head on it for not doing more research to find atleast an sx2 or something with more travel.

If you don't have the room for anything but an x2 sized mill then its understandable to go with that or if it's simply not in your budget to get anything bigger.

So minimum I would say sx2, which you can extend the travels easily later on. A G0704 is a great compromise and seems like the best overall package for size, travels, cost.

I do think that an x2 is a great little mill to get started with. After you work out all the kinks amd get it milling how you want it, you will have learned great skills to work on your next larger mill. I started with an x2 and have been upgrading little by little for the past year and a half up to the point where it now has more travels than a stock sx2 both in the x,y,z. I'm using sx2 saddle, base, and table, with extended travels. It would've been great to have had the knowledge and skills I do now when I was ready to buy my first mill, but I wouldn't have had it without struggling with the x2 mill to begin with. I happy with how things turned out either way, I found that its been a great stepping stone into the milling and cnc world.

So long story short, if you have the money for it, the space for it, get the largest mill you can get and want because you will easily want to mill parts 2-3 times larger than you initially intended once you get bitten by the cnc bug.

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