Searching for something else I stumbled upon this free software, some of you just starting might give it a go and try it before buying some more expensive piece of CAM.
It looks really capable, having 2.5D (3d) milling, pocketing and profiling. Also it works in both Linux and Windows. So EMC2 users might be more tempted to try it.
Here it is
PyCAM
also lots of nice information here in the blog
http://fab.senselab.org/en
Windows users should download Windows installer + Requirement installer in the download section, I tried standalone but it looks like it simulates somehow the lack of gtk and opengl. So its slow.