I've had a Prusa Mk3s+ for four years. I bought the kit and assembled it. The only problem it's ever had was the result of a mistake I made during assembly, which I was able to correct. Sometimes I use it a whole bunch for a project and it gives me no trouble. Sometimes it sits untouched for six months. The moment I need it, it works.
I did modify a Ikea LACK table to sit it on to reduce vibrations. I also modified it by removing the power supply where it typically sits and placing it beneath the table. I did this because I cover my printer with a pop-up photo tent to keep heat in and enable printing in ABS. It also keeps dust from collecting on my printer.
I have an Elegoo Neptune 2 because it's basically the cheapest decent printer you can get. Main complaints are lack of auto bed leveling, noise, and lack of direct drive filament feeder. Overall I have gotten quite a lot of value from it though. Printed tons of 40k figurines as well as functional stuff, including some stuff like handles and brackets I modeled myself.
Depends on what you want to do with it. For small hobby projects, I like my Ender 3 Pro. There are some better ones with more features, but this one is cheap.
Honestly, it depends on your budget and the features you want. My main workhorse right now is a Sovol SV06, one of the "it girl" printers of 2022. I own the Sovol, an Ender 3 v2, a Mingda Magician X and an AnyCubic Kobra Go. All of these printers work for me now, but that's because I've suffered the frustrating learning curve of 3D printers. For a newer 3D printing hobbyist I would latch onto a brand that offers a 90% or 100% assembled printer -- with a large community for aftermarket add-on buys or prints. Ender, Sovol, AnyCubic, Elegoo -- just look for the brands with massive communities. They tend to keep manufacturers accountable and creative.
So many companies are putting out "out of the box" wonder printers right now that I would just engage in a few weeks of YouTube watching. A printer release could come out tomorrow that completely changes the value proposition of whatever you were looking at. Funny enough, size matters -- if you want to print helmets in one piece, you have to look at larger printers.
You've mentioned this a couple times. I don't have an opinion on the subject, and a random comment doesn't really tell me anything. It would be good to link some solid studies so people can understand the risks. If you don't have those, maybe reconsider your point.
I don't feel the need to do so at this point, but I do feel the moral imperative to spread the alarm on a disastrous industrial process (when precautions are not taken) that many in the maker movement are woefully unaware of, the same way I would if I suddenly became aware of the dangers of asbestos and was on my way to work when I overheard a conversation among hobbyists about spraying asbestos foam around in their bedrooms without much knowledge of it.
Raise the alarm with convincing evidence. Nobody is going to do anything if you don't bring evidence to the table (as you say, makers are woefully unaware of this). If you're just trolling, I highly recommend this defcon talk on how to do it better: https://youtube.com/watch?v=vcAHbvTlpKA
I did modify a Ikea LACK table to sit it on to reduce vibrations. I also modified it by removing the power supply where it typically sits and placing it beneath the table. I did this because I cover my printer with a pop-up photo tent to keep heat in and enable printing in ABS. It also keeps dust from collecting on my printer.