Hudy is supposedly the best. I have a Hudy tire lathe that I got used for really cheap and I'm happy with it. Ofna makes a fully automatic one that is almost a direct replica of the Hudy for about $250. You can barely get a manual Hudy for that much. Also Integy just came out with a new tire lathe and it looks pretty good. Very affordable. Manual operation but if it works well and is cheap, who cares.
As for comm lathes, definitely get carbide v-blocks. I have the Integy Xipp lathe and it works great and cheaper than Hudy.