| ▲ | whalesalad 6 hours ago |
| Somewhat related I am thinking of picking up a Bambu A1 as my first foray into 3d printing ... seems to be a really solid move can anyone comment? |
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| ▲ | CobrastanJorji 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| Bambu and Prusa are the two default picks. They're both very common choices for first 3D printers, they're both about as high quality as you'll find without spending substantially more money, and they're both about as idiot-proof as 3D printers gets. I personally prefer Prusa as a bit more open and good for hacking on, but Bambus target end users a bit better and have their own advantages. You can't really go wrong either way. I will say that the answer may change a bit depending on what you're hoping to print. If your goal is, for example, high detail miniatures for tabletop gaming, you may want to be looking into something like SLA printers. Or if you need a specific exotic material, or if you anticipate needing multiple filaments, the answer similarly changes. |
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| ▲ | ninju 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | The Creality line of printers is also another line of 3D printers to look at. They've got some entry models are quite good (and cheap) to start with |
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| ▲ | pavel_lishin 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I upgraded from my buggy, annoying Ender 3 Pro to a Bambu A1, and it's been pretty wonderful so far. I haven't had any need to "babysit" it, and I can trust it to just start a print, and finish it when I get back. It self-levels the bed, etc. I got the most basic model - a single feed for filament, etc. I recommend it. People are right that you shouldn't spend too much money, but don't spend too little, either. If you think to yourself, "Well, $300 is a lot for a 3D printer, I'll just get an Ender 3 for $200, or a used Ender 3 for $100", you'll end up getting significantly more frustrated if all you want to do is 3D print things. |
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| ▲ | jacquesm 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | For $300 you can get an A1 mini and it's a pretty solidly engineered printer. We're running them until they break. But they don't break... | | |
| ▲ | xrd 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I second this. Occasionally the head will jam, but it is easy to clean them out. But, the A1 mini is the first device that really just works. It's so much fun. Do not be an idiot like I was and try to print in an outdoor atrium to avoid fumes. That's really not an issue these days and humidity will kill your filament. For many reasons related to humidity control, it is useful to invest in a humidity monitoring filament holder. | |
| ▲ | pavel_lishin 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I got the A1 - I knew I would want to print bigger things eventually, and spending an extra ~$100 seemed like a no-brainer. I also always get the bigger disk on phones, etc. |
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| ▲ | bb88 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Go for it, don't spend a lot of money though on the first one. If you enjoy it then figure out the next one to spend the money on. The big issue for me right now is that a lot of the smaller bed printers can't really do some of the larger projects I want to do like wall hanging systems or drawer organization systems. Also Bambu the company mostly is fine, but there's some worry that they'll eventually lock people into using only their filament, but doesn't seem to have happened yet. So buyer beware. |
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| ▲ | xoxxala 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > Also Bambu the company mostly is fine, but there's some worry that they'll eventually lock people into using only their filament, but doesn't seem to have happened yet. So buyer beware. I'm not sure how Bambu could actually do that. They use RFID tags to identify their filament type/color. I taped a tag from a used roll to some prusa filament and the printer couldn't tell the difference. Just in case, my Bambus are LAN only and don't get updated. I use Orca Slicer instead of the Bambu slicer. | | | |
| ▲ | rblatz 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Bambu can't even keep their filament in stock, plus they ship the printers with multiple preloaded profiles for other filament vendors. I don't foresee them making that change any time soon. |
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| ▲ | pawelduda 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Good choice, keep in mind that you'll probably spend more on filament rolls if you get hooked |
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| ▲ | mmmlinux 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| The new X2c just came out. Consider buying a used X1c someone is selling to upgrade. |
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| ▲ | jacquesm 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Get an old Prusa MKIII and stick a Revo in there, then learn everything there is to know about 3D printing without spending a fortune or getting locked in. Once you have processed a couple of rolls of filament you'll be much wiser about your needs and that would be the moment to pull the trigger on a 'proper' printer. Bambu AI is a very good printer (we have 10's of them, and 10's of Prusas as well), but the Bambu eco-system is not ideal and they push really hard to get you to use their cloud connect, the printers have cameras and send footage to servers in China if you get them connected to the point that they are usable. In contrast, there are many open source solutions that will connect a Prusa to your LAN and allow various degrees of remote management (Octoprint, for instance). Prusa's are extremely hackable, I've adapted them to do all kinds of stuff they were never meant for (1x1x.25 meter for instance, or standard width and height but 65 cm tall). Bambu's are quite closed, though in theory you could hack on their slicer but it's infuriatingly bad compared to the alternatives. |
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| ▲ | mholm 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I think I'd largely disagree with your recommendation, unless they specifically wanted to get into 3D printing (the hobby) rather than 3D Printing (the tool). I got my printer wanting to make things, and didn't enjoy the tinkering with my mk3 at all. It was a great printer for the time! But I swapped to a P2S and never looked back. I hear Prusa is competitive these days, though not perhaps in price at the low end. | | |
| ▲ | jacquesm 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | I print a couple of tons every year and I would not be able to do that without the knowledge required to operate a farm reliably and productively. Yes, they're tools, but like all tools it helps to know what you're doing. If I hand you a machining center you won't be able to learn much without a lot of breakage and expense. If you get a lathe to learn and play with, to build up an intuition for feeds & speeds and how materials handle and chip then you will be able to use that machining center to the maximum of its abilities. Tools require knowledge. 3D printers are no different in that respect and to toss $100 on a printer just to learn is money very well spent. And those old Prusa's excel at precision work, we can do stuff on those that we can not touch with any of the others. | | |
| ▲ | somehnguy 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Most people don't intend to print tons every year nor desire to manage a print farm. Most people interested in creating object rather than managing printers will have an infinitely better experience getting a Bambu that is ready to crank out amazing prints right out of the box. Other than basic troubleshooting (which they have documentation on) there isn't really a need to take a deep dive into how exactly each piece works. I say this as someone who started printing many years ago with an i3 clone and has replaced nearly every piece of multiple printers (control board, bearings, hotend, extruder, etc!) over the years for better performance. I moved away from wanting to tinker with the printers and haven't touched them since getting a P1S years ago. | |
| ▲ | wildzzz 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I mean, it's kind of like comparing a tuner car with a new EV. Both will take you from A to B but one requires a lot more work to take you from A to B in a very specific manner while the other just turns on and goes. The tuner car has a tremendous amount of power and is really good at driving fast and accurately but it also requires a lot of work and custom parts to get it to perform like that. The most amount of work in maintaining the EV is that it may need new tires eventually, otherwise it just works. Most people just want something that just works out of the box using models they downloaded from the internet. It's great that you want to have a 3D printer that performs at the absolute limit of the hardware but that requires work. | | |
| ▲ | jacquesm 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Gah and here I was thinking I'm on hackernews rather than 'appliances are us'. Sorry, I got the audience mixed up ;) |
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| ▲ | CobrastanJorji 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Not the MK3. I love that printer to death, but asking somebody new to 3D printing to do Z leveling manually is a tall order unless they're in it for the hobby. The MK4, with its load cell, eliminates this requirement and is therefore a way better choice for someone new to 3D printing. |
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| ▲ | ajsnigrutin 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| bambus are great in the "just print stuff" market (no modding needed, everything comes properly configured, the calibration is done automatically, profiles are tested, etc.) There are some controversies about them locking their printers to their own software and some other issues though. |
