Is a $300 CoreXY printer really as good as a $1,000 one?

Specialist-subreddit reviewers of the ELEGOO Centauri Carbon repeatedly claim its print quality rivals machines costing far more, but the same threads flag firmware bugs and a 4.2 Amazon average versus the polish and support ecosystem of Bambu and Prusa. The budget machines win on raw value; the premium machines win on reliability, support, and refinement.