I have never used a multi-thousand dollars printer. I own a CR-10 and a Prusa i3 MK3S+ though. The CR-10 is fun to tinker with. When everything is in place and

I have never used a multi-thousand dollars printer. I own a CR-10 and a Prusa i3 MK3S+ though. The CR-10 is fun to tinker with. When everything is in place and the printer is properly tuned, it prints well. My main usage for it is less printing parts I care about and more tinkering and learning about the printer itself though, as it's not very reliable (some are, some aren't - I suspect it's cheap because of poor manufacturing and QC). The Prusa, on the other hand, rarely requires any maintenance apart from the normal stuff -- checking belt tension, replacing nozzles, cleaning the print bed, etc, and with less frequency ensuring that all screws are tight and doing a bit more deep cleaning. That's it. It prints well every time. It's both a pleasure and a bore, since I can just send stuff to it and it will chug away without intervention. Their support is stellar as well, and everything they do is open source. Most consumer printers you see around are considered i3 clones (from the original Prusa). I don't know what a few extra thousand $s will give you. I imagine corporate-level support, etc. For the hobbyist, you can't go wrong with Prusa. They are now taking pre-orders for a larger, CoreXY printer. I'm trying hard to justify not shelling out for one.