It would be nice to have a CNC mill but I do so very few jobs that a CNC
would shine that I just can't justify it. Besides, doesn't a CNC setup make
it difficult to use the mill in manual mode?

Not necessarily. I set my CNC up with handwheels. you can just turn
the servo off and turning by hand, the servo encoder still works so
you have a DRO.

I must say for several years i haven't used this feature. I have a
great manual mill that uses the same tooling. Its even more rigid than
my CNC with power feed on all axis. There are a lot of jobs that are
easier on a manual mill.

Karl