Could you fit four Brothers with automated loading in the same footprint and price?

I'd love to have those to play around with, but being a small-batch prototyper I can't justify it.

Your machine may or may not revert "G1" to "G01" on loading though.

The "Pocket" algorithm dates from the 80's I believe. There are the "Parallel Spiral, Clean Corners" and "Constant Overlap Spiral" methods which may help. As said above, "2D Dynamic" is the modern way of doing it.

^^^^ What he said.

I wonder how much of the purchase price is that fancy bodywork on the enclosure...

It's all about whether the move exceeds the bearing spacing or not. If not, it can push all the lube out of the way and have dry metal-on-metal rolling, causing false brinelling. I learned about this the hard way cutting .020" wide slots with a .010" endmill. 12 slots per part (indexed on a rotary so they're all in the exact same Y position), 1/2" long each, 12 parts, ruined my thrust bearings on the Y axis. Got them replaced, then next time I had to make the parts I'd cut a third of a slot, pick up, move 3" diagonal and back, then cut another third, etc. No damage since. So in my opinion, if you're dynamic milling around a part in different places, you should be fine. It's the long narrow slots along one axis that'll kill it.

Download all the programs (including 8000's and 9000's) into a folder, then use Super Finder XT or similar to search within all of them for the strings "#8" and "#9". I use it to find programs that contain a certain tool.

I've used OSG, Kennametal, Redline, Harvey, and a few others. For me the deciding factor is usually which drill I can get first, and it usually only has to make a few parts. They've all met my needs.

I don't think someone slapping together their first budget CADCAM computer will be working at that level.

Attach your file and we'll take a look at it.

I've occasionally added a spindle reverse to thrown chips off a drill. I've also seen, but not done, having a wire brush mounted somewhere in the machine to run the tool backwards against while pulling up.

I noticed they were taking really light "roughing" cuts with a really small tool too. Is that all the balls that machine has?

Aside from the slots this part could be made faster and more accurately in 3 axis. The finished part shows a lot of surface imperfections due to interpolation error; it seems Haas isn't that great at live 5 yet.

I've used GeForce cards many times in the past. As long as your models aren't very large and complicated they work fine. And when I say "very", I mean "very, very". Some people here (above) do work of that complexity, but it isn't that common. You'll be fine.