I got an Ender 3 for Christmas, it was great - but it's limited if you don't get a bunch of upgrades. But I did learn a lot about how 3D printing works.

I recently got a Prusa Mk4, and I'm very happy with it. Prints like a dream, is much faster than the Ender 3, and is much quieter as well. Time will tell if long term reliability is as good as I've heard, but short term it's been very reliable.

I've heard a lot of people suggest Bambu for the same price - but honestly I'm pretty skeptical of how they run their business. For some reason, they encrypt log files. Their support staff gave Grant of 3D Musketeers a terrible support experience when he had problems with his printer. Recently they had a cloud outage that resulted in printers starting up unexpectedly and starting to print automatically, which in some cases resulted in physical damage to the printer when there was a previous print on the bed. I would wait at least a year for them to sort out their business.