3d
March 3, 2025 6:49 PM Subscribe
Thinking about buying a 3d printer. Hobbyist, not Professional...
I've worked with 3d printers now at a couple makerspaces and am fairly proficient. I've worked mostly with Prusa. This Prusa would be very familiar to me. I've never used a Bambu, but apparently its a hot brand. Like maybe this one.
What can you tell me? Do you prefer one brand or the other?
Or another brand you prefer over these 2?
I've worked with 3d printers now at a couple makerspaces and am fairly proficient. I've worked mostly with Prusa. This Prusa would be very familiar to me. I've never used a Bambu, but apparently its a hot brand. Like maybe this one.
What can you tell me? Do you prefer one brand or the other?
Or another brand you prefer over these 2?
I'm a long-time 3d printer fan, to the point where my first one was a kit-based Makerbot. I have....6 printers currently in my workshop, ranging from a small resin printer to a handful of FDM printers from Lulzbot to a delta-style that I built. Which is a long way to say:
I just recently got a Bambu A1 and it's the most fun I've had with a printer in a long time. The prints are beautiful, it's fun to work with, the software Just Works in a way that so much of the 3d printer world doesn't. If you're wanting to tinker and have to really tune the printer, it's not for you...but if you want an appliance-style thing that works more or less well out of the box, I'm a big fan.
posted by griffey at 7:48 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]
I just recently got a Bambu A1 and it's the most fun I've had with a printer in a long time. The prints are beautiful, it's fun to work with, the software Just Works in a way that so much of the 3d printer world doesn't. If you're wanting to tinker and have to really tune the printer, it's not for you...but if you want an appliance-style thing that works more or less well out of the box, I'm a big fan.
posted by griffey at 7:48 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]
Response by poster: @Runes: Thanks for the note about Bambu. That rules them out for me.
posted by falsedmitri at 9:28 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]
posted by falsedmitri at 9:28 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]
I have a Bambu X1C (my first printer). It's often recommended for "I want a tool not a project" and largely accomplishes that. I haven't spent much time tinkering with the hardware, though there is still some settings tuning required to get great prints.
Prusa's new CORE One is a direct response to the X1C and by all accounts sounds like it stacks up fairly evenly. The cheaper models have some disadvantages (slower and no enclosure are the big ones I think) but I know people who are happy with theirs (mostly the MK4 series). Grain of salt - I've only used my printer - but my read is that anything from Prusa or Bambu is going to work out of the box pretty well. Especially if you have some knowledge going in.
Prusa is also just a rare cool company - open and community minded. It's in contrast to Bambu's recent behavior - not just a reason to run from Bambu but to Prusa. Also made in the EU if you care about that kind of thing.
posted by davidest at 10:02 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
Prusa's new CORE One is a direct response to the X1C and by all accounts sounds like it stacks up fairly evenly. The cheaper models have some disadvantages (slower and no enclosure are the big ones I think) but I know people who are happy with theirs (mostly the MK4 series). Grain of salt - I've only used my printer - but my read is that anything from Prusa or Bambu is going to work out of the box pretty well. Especially if you have some knowledge going in.
Prusa is also just a rare cool company - open and community minded. It's in contrast to Bambu's recent behavior - not just a reason to run from Bambu but to Prusa. Also made in the EU if you care about that kind of thing.
posted by davidest at 10:02 PM on March 3 [2 favorites]
I have a Bambu P1S, bought it before the firmware fiasco. It really does just work. The ecosystem is really slick. I’ve printed a lot of stuff and failures are quite rare. My only other experience was with Prusa Mk3 and Mk4 at the local library, and my impression was that Prusa needs more handholding to avoid adhesion and calibration issues. It’s a real bummer about the firmware, and I think that might have led me to consider my choice differently.
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 10:57 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 10:57 PM on March 3 [1 favorite]
I have a Bambu P1S and it has only given me a pain in the hole so far. Changing nozzles is a faff, it's giving me random errors, very soft/firmware driven in my mind. I prefer my fixes yo be hardware. I've been an Ultimaker baby all my life, they're a bit shit now that they are MakerBot but you can often find a rescue 2+ for cheap-compared-to-release but very expensive-compsred-to-bambu. Then your nozzles will be a buck a piece and screw straight in, no leads to break, no grease to apply. It's 2.85 so s little less choice when it comes to filament, and it's not as fast as Bambu or as pretty without working on your profiles, but it's a reliable workhorse, so depending on what your priorities are I think it's worth looking at. Big community of long time, pretty professional users with deep understanding of the machine.
posted by Iteki at 11:15 PM on March 3
posted by Iteki at 11:15 PM on March 3
I have an Ender 3 v2. It's a few years old now, and there's a v3 version that looks totally different.
What most appealed to me was being able to add a Raspberry Pi to and install OctoPrint, which is a massive upgrade on the printer's built-in software. I've also been able to upgrade some of the parts to better versions.
While I'm not suggesting you buy an old-model printer, I know that if I was looking to replace my Ender 3, support for upgrades and customisation would be very high on my list.
posted by pipeski at 4:36 AM on March 4
What most appealed to me was being able to add a Raspberry Pi to and install OctoPrint, which is a massive upgrade on the printer's built-in software. I've also been able to upgrade some of the parts to better versions.
While I'm not suggesting you buy an old-model printer, I know that if I was looking to replace my Ender 3, support for upgrades and customisation would be very high on my list.
posted by pipeski at 4:36 AM on March 4
Happy with my Prusa mk4s, but they are expensive.
mk3s before then was very reliable, but they don't have wifi so you have to transfer things using an SD card like a caveman (there is a way to add a pi zero and octoprint).
posted by samj at 5:11 AM on March 4
mk3s before then was very reliable, but they don't have wifi so you have to transfer things using an SD card like a caveman (there is a way to add a pi zero and octoprint).
posted by samj at 5:11 AM on March 4
I've been very happy with a Prusa (MK3s) that I got in (I think) 2020. I bought mine fully assembled, and it has needed very little tinkering. There's a learning curve for learning to change nozzles and clearing jams, though.
Unlike in the MK3s era, Prusa's printers are no longer "open hardware" in the sense of being submitted to the Open Source Hardware certification process as well as in the sense of not having full 3D printable models or full PCB schematics available, though they do seem to retain a level of openness better than Bambu.
The enclosed printer designs are better if you want to print "technical materials" that need more controlled conditions. However, if you're just going to print PLA or PETG, this is not super important and I'd skip it.
If multimaterial is important, I'm not sure which system is better. The key is reliability across thousands of filament changes, but from internet anecdotes it's hard to know which system is actually more reliable. I don't have the MMU for my Prusa, but I do think about getting one sometimes.
posted by the antecedent of that pronoun at 6:42 AM on March 4
Unlike in the MK3s era, Prusa's printers are no longer "open hardware" in the sense of being submitted to the Open Source Hardware certification process as well as in the sense of not having full 3D printable models or full PCB schematics available, though they do seem to retain a level of openness better than Bambu.
The enclosed printer designs are better if you want to print "technical materials" that need more controlled conditions. However, if you're just going to print PLA or PETG, this is not super important and I'd skip it.
If multimaterial is important, I'm not sure which system is better. The key is reliability across thousands of filament changes, but from internet anecdotes it's hard to know which system is actually more reliable. I don't have the MMU for my Prusa, but I do think about getting one sometimes.
posted by the antecedent of that pronoun at 6:42 AM on March 4
Response by poster: Thanks for all the comments.
I think @davidest sums it up very nicely with "Prusa is just rare cool company ...
posted by falsedmitri at 7:31 AM on March 4 [3 favorites]
I think @davidest sums it up very nicely with "Prusa is just rare cool company ...
posted by falsedmitri at 7:31 AM on March 4 [3 favorites]
Having an enclosure is really important in my opinion: Do you have kids or pets? Some filaments give off dangerous fumes. Some filaments require a really tight temperature control. Having a printer inside an enclosure can make a big difference.
posted by soylent00FF00 at 7:42 AM on March 4
posted by soylent00FF00 at 7:42 AM on March 4
Yeah would love to know more about what your hopes are for the printing, like if you are into art objects or like dungeons and dragons jumping straight to resin is a financially feasible option these days.
posted by Iteki at 8:43 AM on March 4
posted by Iteki at 8:43 AM on March 4
FlSun Q5 here, a Delta. Found it at a thrift store, assembled but unused, and the demo item that was on the accompanying USB stick came out fine without any tweaking. Since then used it intermittently, using Cura and octoprint, most of the time without error, but something's now gotten askew on the treadle and it starts skipping after a few meters of filament. Haven't gotten at the source of that problem yet, but I haven't put much time into it anyway. Marginal cooling (which is a bit of a weak point on this model) combined with a wonky stepper driver would be my first guess.
If you're space-constrained it's definitely worth looking at a Delta, but maybe not this one.
posted by Stoneshop at 10:22 AM on March 4
If you're space-constrained it's definitely worth looking at a Delta, but maybe not this one.
posted by Stoneshop at 10:22 AM on March 4
I've had an older Prusa i3 and a couple Enders, and I have built several printers from scratch, and I still have and use my latest "printer of Theseus" that I seem to always be modifying. About a month ago, I got a Bambu X1C based on a friend's recommendation, and from the start it has been an absolute joy to use. Unpacking and setup was easy, it ran its own calibration & self test which took about 30 minutes or so, and then it was ready to print. Very first print came out flawless. And I don't meen "good enough", I mean flawless.
Yeah, they are doing some shady things with their firmware, which they have walked back a bit, but this isn't presented as a hackable hobbyist printer. It's a printer for people who just want a printer that works every time, and Bambu does that incredibly well. The software makes a lot of sense, and the "basic" slicer options are enough for most people to get great results with most projects. Tick on the "advanced" options, and pages and pages of tweaks are still availble, if you really want to get into it.
The AMS works great; it is not a mixing printer and will not combine CMYK to blend colors. It is a single-color single-extruder printer with automated filament changing. When printing with dedicated support material, it's of course not nearly as fast as a true dual-extruder printer, but it automatically switches between support filament and your primary filament, cleanly and precisely. I swapped out the standard 0.4mm for a 0.2mm nozzle, and have been printing board game components and minis, and I gotta say, I never thought a FDM printer could produce small details with such precision and repeatability.
With my homebrew printers, I've struggled a bit with ABS and ASA filaments; even with good enclosures and regulated chamber and bed temps, my experience with these materials has been decidedly mid. One of the reasons I went with the X1C was its ability to use the more exotic filaments, and so far it has worked beautifully. No fiddling, no tweaking, just load the filament and start the print, and it just plain works.
Yeah, it'll never be a "real" (ugh) hobbyist printer ripe for tinkering and modding, but really, I honestly don't know what I would add or change anyway. I've gone through the process several times of modifying the firmware on my other printers, adding a bltouch, a second extruder, a wipe/purge station, etc. but the X1C already has all of this and more. If you want a hackable printer, Bambu is not it. But if you don't care about that and just want a printer that works, I really haven't used any other printer that delivers consistently pristine results with such little effort the way the Bambu X1C does.
posted by xedrik at 12:02 PM on March 4 [3 favorites]
Yeah, they are doing some shady things with their firmware, which they have walked back a bit, but this isn't presented as a hackable hobbyist printer. It's a printer for people who just want a printer that works every time, and Bambu does that incredibly well. The software makes a lot of sense, and the "basic" slicer options are enough for most people to get great results with most projects. Tick on the "advanced" options, and pages and pages of tweaks are still availble, if you really want to get into it.
The AMS works great; it is not a mixing printer and will not combine CMYK to blend colors. It is a single-color single-extruder printer with automated filament changing. When printing with dedicated support material, it's of course not nearly as fast as a true dual-extruder printer, but it automatically switches between support filament and your primary filament, cleanly and precisely. I swapped out the standard 0.4mm for a 0.2mm nozzle, and have been printing board game components and minis, and I gotta say, I never thought a FDM printer could produce small details with such precision and repeatability.
With my homebrew printers, I've struggled a bit with ABS and ASA filaments; even with good enclosures and regulated chamber and bed temps, my experience with these materials has been decidedly mid. One of the reasons I went with the X1C was its ability to use the more exotic filaments, and so far it has worked beautifully. No fiddling, no tweaking, just load the filament and start the print, and it just plain works.
Yeah, it'll never be a "real" (ugh) hobbyist printer ripe for tinkering and modding, but really, I honestly don't know what I would add or change anyway. I've gone through the process several times of modifying the firmware on my other printers, adding a bltouch, a second extruder, a wipe/purge station, etc. but the X1C already has all of this and more. If you want a hackable printer, Bambu is not it. But if you don't care about that and just want a printer that works, I really haven't used any other printer that delivers consistently pristine results with such little effort the way the Bambu X1C does.
posted by xedrik at 12:02 PM on March 4 [3 favorites]
I've been looking at the Elegoo Centauri Carbon, which looks like it will be aiming to compete with Bambu for $300 (uh, that's pre-tariff pricing). However, it does not presently have an AMS (although given the design features, one is expected).
posted by aramaic at 1:42 PM on March 4 [1 favorite]
posted by aramaic at 1:42 PM on March 4 [1 favorite]
I have a Bambu and had thought the firmware change would break third party slicers, but it appears not. I'm using OrcaSlicer for 80% of my prints without issue.
In terms of day to day functionality, I think the top end Prusa is on par with the top end Bambu printer. Prusa has a slightly smaller build volume, and back in January, cost a bit more if ordered assembled. If you're in the US, tariffs on Chinese goods may have changed this.
The Prusa company by all accounts is excellent and fosters makers. Their model sharing site Printables is better than Bambu's too. You can use it whether or not you buy a Prusa.
posted by zippy at 8:03 PM on March 5 [1 favorite]
In terms of day to day functionality, I think the top end Prusa is on par with the top end Bambu printer. Prusa has a slightly smaller build volume, and back in January, cost a bit more if ordered assembled. If you're in the US, tariffs on Chinese goods may have changed this.
The Prusa company by all accounts is excellent and fosters makers. Their model sharing site Printables is better than Bambu's too. You can use it whether or not you buy a Prusa.
posted by zippy at 8:03 PM on March 5 [1 favorite]
I bought a used Prusa Mk3S off Facebook Marketplace and it's been great. There seem to be quite a few on the secondary market (at least in my area) as Prusa fans have upgraded to the Core and other newer models. I only paid $200 for mine, which seemed to be about the going price for a 3S non-Plus.
The availability of spare/replacement parts for the Prusa was a big part of my decision to pick up one used. My workplace has a Dremel branded printer—which on paper is a better machine than my Prusa (fully enclosed, bigger print volume, etc.)—but it is no longer in production and was even spun off to a third party for support, so replacement parts are starting to become a concern.
posted by Kadin2048 at 7:12 PM on March 6
The availability of spare/replacement parts for the Prusa was a big part of my decision to pick up one used. My workplace has a Dremel branded printer—which on paper is a better machine than my Prusa (fully enclosed, bigger print volume, etc.)—but it is no longer in production and was even spun off to a third party for support, so replacement parts are starting to become a concern.
posted by Kadin2048 at 7:12 PM on March 6
Update: Bambu's firmware update a few days ago now limits Orca Slicer's ability to communicate directly with printers through Bambu's servers. So my previous comment about Orca needs an update: if you want to use Orca Slicer on Bambu printers, be prepared for some inconvenience.
posted by zippy at 9:39 AM on March 25
posted by zippy at 9:39 AM on March 25
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Bambu is indeed the new hotness, but they recently alienated a bunch of people by locking down their firmware. This may or may not affect you, depending on how you want to communicate with the printer and what your preferred slicer is.
posted by Runes at 7:28 PM on March 3 [3 favorites]