You got a great buy! I have the same machine and enjoy using it. I purchase the PED-Basic for $130 at walmart and have purchased design cds on ebay. I have also downloaded free designs from brother website, Ann the Gran, and search4designs.Have fun and Enjoy your new machine. Nancy

Great deal on your machine, I have the same one and you will love it!! I have became an embroidery junkie since I have had it. I bought the ultimate box to go with mine and it is so easy, I download designs almost daily. Just be sure to open a new folder for each site you go to, after awhile you will have so many you won't remember where you got them all from. Some of the things I have learned since I got my machine are... never buy thread or stabilizer unless you get it on sale. Can't tell you how much I have spent in just a few short months buying these. I recently bought the precut 8x8 peel and stick sheets from Allstitch and I highly recommend them if you are going to do any hoopless embroidery. You can get thread on sale for 1.65 at some of the on-line stores now compared to almost 4.00 at Hancocks. You will be surprised at the colors you will need. Oh yeah, great designs at JuJu's if your into kiddie designs and they stitch out great too. I'm be glad to help answer any more questions if you have. Have fun!!

I think that the Ultimate box would cost you less especially if you get it on ebay. I have hundreds of free embroidery designs in my computer. There are also some online groups that share free designs. Yahoo has one called only free designs. Have fun with your new machine. You got a great price Colleen

I have a PE-150 and love the machine.

First thing when you get it out of the box is read the instruction manual several times...the first time it reads like mud. The manual will tell you many things and Brother is usually pretty good about giving you several sheets of stabilizer and bobbin thread to start with...regular sewing thread you can't use, although I do on the top with bobbin thread on the bottom. Practice page by painful page as this will pay dividends when you have to do something/take care of a problem and you know what you are doing because you prepared yourself for any wrench thrown in your way.

The reader writer you want to get sounds like a good plan--you read the manual, it explains everything. Also have plenty of cd-rw to download designs to as it's not a good idea to keep designs on the computer should your computer crash and you will lose purchased designs from the web with them...storing that much also bogs your computer down.

Many of the manufacturer sites for needles and stabilizers have reference charts for what type of stabilizer to use with what fabric. Your book should have a reference chart for that also.

Thank you all for your suggestions and advice! I've been looking at some of the free patterns available online and was wondering if it is okay to save the pattern with a new name on the computer? I'm pretty sure it would be okay to do this, but just wanted to make sure that it wouldn't cause a problem. I'm trying to come up with a system to store the pes file, a picture of the image, and the other info (size, thread count, color stop charts, etc. organized).

I found a really cute free design of a unicorn and was shocked to see it takes 20 colors! I would hate to have to buy 20 colors to make one design! If a pattern calls for 4 different shades of one color, can you cheat and just use 1 or 2 shades instead.

And one final question--- how do you buy bobbin thread? Do you wind your own bobbins? Is there a better brand or thread count, etc? Does the thread you use depend on the thickness of the fabric you're going to embroider?
Oops! Make that 4 question! LOL

Thanks!

Please read your manual more thoroughly...the manual explains bobbin thread and types of thread to use...I do wind my own bobbins although some people will buy pre-wound bobbins, I prefer to wind my own since I have enough bobbins to do 5 at a time and the bobbin thread lasts a long time.

Sometimes you can cheat, other times you can't because there are underlieing stitches that is part of the the whole design including shading.

Yes you can change the name of the design on your pc, I do it all the time so I know what I have when I go looking for a design. I also put designs in their own directory or folder according to categories I collect. I finally trained the new computer to download directly to the cd-rw so I don't have to do the transfer from desktop to cd route..one step saved...old computer did it without a quibble.

How sad, lots of responses but not one answer to the original question.

I have the Se 270D machine and love it! But I bought the PED-BASIC CARD and can't figure out how to get designs from computer to card

Hi Lorene--if you want to PM me, I will walk you thru transfer of designs. I have the Basic setup--also PE Design 5, which also uses card for transfer. It's really very simple..

hello i do realize this form is crazy old but i just came across it cause i am looking into getting a rewrite able memory card for my brother se270d .. i haven't use this machine much at all but at the moment since our state is under settle in place i would like to learn how to do stuff with it. do you have to have the ultimate box or can you download the designs to computer and re write directly to the card ?

thanks in advance

Wanda

Wanda, if you haven't already, I would ck ebay or walmart on line for the Brother PED Basic card reader/writer and card. I've seen it there for less than, and much less than $100. You cannot send designs from your computer directly to a card--you must have the reader/writer box. The card will hold many designs, but each time you want to put a new design on it, all previous designs are erased. However, you still have those designs in your computer. The emb card is specific for .pes format.

I just got this machine for free can someone help me learn how to use it?

When I got mine loooonnnggg ago, I purchased "cards" with additional Disney designs..Wondering if anyone knows if they are still available...Also...I did not know that you can get something to download images to then use with my machine...am I reading that right?...Thank you!..(I have no idea what I'm doing and not good with written directions...haha..:)

Yes Mary, you are reading right. There are several softwares that allow you to download free or purchased designs from the internet to your computer. Then you transfer from computer to the 'cardwriting box/card' for using in your machine. The most popular is the Brother PED Basic that I mentioned above. It only writes .pes format, which is what the 270 uses, and can be bought...sometimes used, from ebay. Normally, you can find new there, as well as Walmart on line, Allbrands.com, and other sites. You may pay from $50to $100+. Then you can download a free software to change other design formats to .pes for your machine to use. There are many many free designs available and a good place to start is to join Sewforum.com. It is a forum for embroiderers, where you can ask questions, request someone create a design for you free or for fee. It is not very active now as the site is also on Facebook, but still, there are thousands of free designs still there. I hope I have explained-helped you. Good luck!