I bought a Panasonic bread machine almost two years ago after reading Amazon reviews. It is wonderful, quiet and kneads like a champ. The bread pan is the most solid out of the three machines I've owned and fits perfectly into the machine without using side clips that can fail. It twists into place so the pan never pops out of place during kneading. A great basic machine that is well built.

You may also consider reading up on making bread. There are a number of excellent books (also with Amazon reviews!) for making what they call "no-knead" bread. Basically, you mix the dough, wait 8 hours in the fridge for gluten development, then shape, and bake it off in your oven, sometimes in a dutch oven. The texture and crust is stupendous. I have a friend whose husband is addicted to baking bread this way. I've done it myself and it works wonderfully. So you may not need a bread machine at all, depending on what you want to accomplish. A machine is great for high water content dough which is difficult to knead. Mark Bittman in his "How to Cook Everything" cook book emphatically states that you don't need a bread machine to bake bread. He uses a food processor, or the "no kneed" method.

Good luck with your choice and have fun!

Lenvt