Thanks Greggers. Really appreciate such a detailed and thoughtful response.

I wouldn't say that I have a strict budget - it's more that I don't want to be spending more than I have to. That said, I plan on this machine lasting me a long, long time, so I'd rather get something that I'll never outgrow, even if that means spending a bit more.

I'm not really a fan of any of those three machines aesthetically. I think it is coming down to the Profitec 300 or MaraX. I've read both of the reviews you referenced and it sounds great. It does seem to be hard to actually find somewhere selling it, but I suppose that doesn't really matter at the moment anyway - most of the shops are shut due to Covid-19.

The Profitec 600 would seem to tick every box, but I'm not sure I can justify spending that much. But perhaps I'd end up regretting compromising for the sake of £400. I don't know.

The grinder, on the other hand, seems much clearer. It seems hard to beat the Specialita without spending a fair bit more? I know the NZ gets rave reviews, but I'm not going to be single dosing and I'm not a fan of the retro looks or the wood anyway.

The Ceado C6P seems like another good option for me, but I don't know whether there's any point spending more than the Specialita if it's going to do a great job for what I need. I've also seen some good deals on the Zenith 65E, which I've also read good things about and I personally think looks great with the short hopper, but it's probably overkill.

That's very helpful insight on pre-infusion. I only ever use medium to dark roasts, so perhaps I'd be okay without it.

I currently filter my water as I live in a hard water area, but I'll be sure to test before I use whatever new machine I end up buying. As I said, I plan on it lasting me a very long time, so I want to make sure I'm taking good care of it!

With proper maintenance, any prosumer machine should last a long time. The Mara X is quite new and takes the boiler up to a very high pressure (enough to startle another_jim), but it has been in development for a while now, so presumably they have ironed out all the details with that. The only downside with maintaining either of those machines is that any machine with a small footprint is naturally a bit harder to reach inside.

A lot of people come to the realization that they should have spent more on their grinder because it is the most important part of an espresso setup. (See thread "it's the grinder stupid!"). The Mignon is probably a good starting point, but expect that you might want to upgrade that eventually. Also, the larger Eureka grinders can be upgraded with SSP burrs, which some find useful. I personally enjoy my conical grinders very much, so I've never used SSP burrs.