There is a certain outdoors oriented magazine that recently did a test on cheap rifles.  They took the most popular rifles that retail for less than 500 bucks, and did a quick and dirty accuracy test.

Weatherby Vanguard
TC Venture
Marlington X7
Savage Axis
Ruger All American

The results were than the Marlin X7 rifle handed it to all the others.  Drastically.  According to this test, the Marlin was much more accurate than all the others, showing a one hole group compared to the other’s patterns.

Okay.  I’ll buy that.  This Marlin X7 was more accurate with the Test Ammo than the others.  But they didn’t test other loads through the other guns.   Generally what happens is that one gun can favor one particular load more than others.  As is this case.  In spite of what this test shows, I’d much rather have a TC Venture or a Vanguard than the Marlin X7.
The Savage is at a disadvantage here.  At 299, it’s the cheapest.  But for a hundred bucks you could drop in a Timney trigger.  But it up to the 400 dollar range, still well within the test price range, and then you would have a very competitive rifle.

I’d like to see this test conducted again, with the Savage trigger swapped, and with a number of different loads tested for a more “Accurate” test result.  Because I’ve personally seen groups from the Vanguard S2 rifles and the TC Ventures that were just amazing.  I’ve also heard reports from more than a few Marlin X7 owners that these rifles are indeed shooters.  I can’t deny that.  One is from a source that I will not question.  I have nothing against the Marlin rifle here… But fact remains that this test was rather shallow and only skimmed the surface.