Yeah that jump in price will make anyones heart skip a beat. But once i bit the bullet and upgraded i have not looked back. Upgrading to 4.5 for me doesnt make sense. 3.5 does everything that i want. With aspire it is easier to control the depth of cut of a project. 3-d is time consuming. my longest finishing cut was around 20 hours. with aspire you can also blend individual pieces of artwork together to cut as one. This was my first project in 3-d and i blended about 6 pieces of art together. Its got one flaw in it but i wont point that out, but it was a learning curve for me.
I thought that i knew computers when i started with this but the truth is i didnt. I have learned a lot from people on here.