5 ms·

Except this person cares about privacy and openness, and Bambu is an awful VC funded push everyone out by undercutting prices and then enshittify company.

multjoy 1y ago
Their machines are also excellent.
horsawlarway 1y ago
I guess. Having just bought a Prusa Core One because of concerns about the direction Bambu is headed... I regret it. Hands down. It is absolutely worse from a practical standpoint than the much older X1C I have, and the absolutely maddening part is that the "worse" bits are mostly software related. You can hate on Bambu all you want (and frankly - a good chunk of it is well earned, but some is exaggerated or false) - but it feels like they use their products, and they care enough to fix the rough spots. So while I like the ideals of Prusa... I can't say I'm super impressed with their latest offerings. Bambu's ecosystem is justly WILDLY better. The slicer is less annoying, the printer is more consistent, the monitoring tools are better, and most importantly - when I hit print, it just fucking does it. I've had the Core One for less than 3 months, and I'm already into the double digits for number times I hit print and I come back 5 hours later to find.... it hasn't even damn well started the job. Instead... "nozzle wipe failed. Retry?" "different filament is loaded. unload? Select No to start print" (side note - it's just fucking wrong here, the filament from the correct MMU slot IS loaded, I just did it manually at the printer because if I don't and I switch materials - the next print is a guaranteed failure. The MMU is a whole different clusterfuck of bad software design, cool 3d printed engineering, bad software design) "Nozzle clean failed. Retry?" "The bed appears to be unlevel. Perform leveling?" "Bed heating disabled due to inactivity" (This one still stumps me, I hit print, and came back to this message - my guess is nozzle clean fail and this just dismissed the first one... but who knows). "Nozzle wipe failed. Retry?" --- Basically - I am fucking tired of "Core One needs your attention!" popups on my phone. Especially for the stupid things like approving a nozzle clean retry, or re-leveling. I am also sick of wasted time thinking the machine is printing when it's not. Right now, I would absolutely buy a Bambu over anything else in the market for FDM.
- cosmic_cheese 1y ago
  The reality is that “just works” is going to outsell just about everything, including high ground on morals and privacy. If competitors want to keep up they’re going to have to offer models that don’t require any tinkering/tweaking even if doing so is possible, supported, and encouraged.
  - horsawlarway 1y ago
    Yeah... The market is still shifting in response to the X1C. 10 years ago... I would manually level my ender, religiously monitor it, and still deal with a decently high failure rate (esp for anything other than PLA). Tuning the printer took easily as much time as I actually spent printing with it. I upgraded all the things, flashed firmware, ran octoprint, etc... It was like driving - gotta keep the hands on the wheel and maintain alertness at all times. It was an activity that required my attention and focus. Then I caved and got an X1C in 2023. It's... a really, REALLY good machine. It's like flying somewhere. I get on the plane, start up a movie or a book, and someone wakes me up when the flight is over. It's a tool that is doing things for me while I do other stuff. I'm at the point where I'm not really interested in the "middle" all that much. Either go with a Voron and get the "I'm driving" feeling if that's what you want. Or get a Bambu and get chauffeured to successful print.
    - pests 1y ago
      The 3D printing community is really two different groups: people who like to actually print things and people who like to tinker with their printer.
      - deno 1y ago
        I hate this false dichotomy. Plenty of people like both. People that buy expensive consumer grade printers are just satisfied with mediocre results because they don’t know any better. To get great quality prints you need to actually know how the tool you are using works and what are its strengths and weaknesses.
thot_experiment 1y ago
To all the people in the comments popping off about how "it just works". I have a Makerbot 2 running Sailfish, it's "just worked" for 12 years. I haven't replaced a single part on it. Ever since I started using the Prusa Slicer I've got dimensionally accurate parts every time I hit print. At least from my PoV "the printer just working" is a solved problem and has been for a long time now. PLA, PETG, PCTG, TPU. No issues with anything and I've been able to drive it at about 150% the speed I could with the original firmware/software.
- jasongill 1y ago
  Yes, but you said it yourself - you had to replace the firmware with one that lets you run faster than the original, and you're using a different slicer. With Bambu Labs printers, you just plug them in, turn them on, and feed them filament and your files. They work so well that you don't have to think about firmware or anything else. I got my first 3D printer around a dozen years ago as well, and the comparison to the experience you get with a Bambu Labs X1C or H2D is absolutely night and day. It feels like with the previous generations of 3D printers, that operating and maintaining and tuning the machine itself was the "hobby". With Bambu Labs (and I'm sure some of the other competing printers that have come out since the X1C was released), the "hobby" is what you actually make. It just works, requires no tweaking, no fiddling, no flashing firmware or bed leveling or hairspray, and it has totally changed 3D printing from a nerd hobby to something anyone can do (IMHO).
  - thot_experiment 1y ago
    Sure but the last tweaking I did on this printer was years and years ago, and it's been "just working" ever since. I haven't fiddled with anything, I haven't even leveled the bed, I don't use hairspray. I don't think you can even find the firmware I flashed onto it in 2014 anymore because of link rot. It's just a solid printer that makes the part I want every time I hit print. I use it all the time for mechanical parts. I do prints that pause to embed hardware. Heck I even have it clear the bed by hitting parts with the print head so I can make multiple copies of things unattended. (only works on parts with low bed adhesion) It's not a brittle system. I don't deny that Bambu makes a good product, an excellent product even. If you can't afford to support the general ecosystem get one and do your thing. I just think the reason Bambu is where it is right now is because they are VC funded vampires on the ecosystem and supporting them will make things worse in the long run. If you can afford to support someone else you should because it helps make things better for everyone. FWIW until recently I championed Bambu as just the default easy solution, recommending it to my friends every time, but I had a long conversation with Josef about the future of 3D printing and it really changed my mind.

multjoy 1y ago

Their machines are also excellent.

horsawlarway 1y ago

I guess. Having just bought a Prusa Core One because of concerns about the direction Bambu is headed... I regret it. Hands down. It is absolutely worse from a practical standpoint than the much older X1C I have, and the absolutely maddening part is that the "worse" bits are mostly software related. You can hate on Bambu all you want (and frankly - a good chunk of it is well earned, but some is exaggerated or false) - but it feels like they use their products, and they care enough to fix the rough spots. So while I like the ideals of Prusa... I can't say I'm super impressed with their latest offerings. Bambu's ecosystem is justly WILDLY better. The slicer is less annoying, the printer is more consistent, the monitoring tools are better, and most importantly - when I hit print, it just fucking does it. I've had the Core One for less than 3 months, and I'm already into the double digits for number times I hit print and I come back 5 hours later to find.... it hasn't even damn well started the job. Instead... "nozzle wipe failed. Retry?" "different filament is loaded. unload? Select No to start print" (side note - it's just fucking wrong here, the filament from the correct MMU slot IS loaded, I just did it manually at the printer because if I don't and I switch materials - the next print is a guaranteed failure. The MMU is a whole different clusterfuck of bad software design, cool 3d printed engineering, bad software design) "Nozzle clean failed. Retry?" "The bed appears to be unlevel. Perform leveling?" "Bed heating disabled due to inactivity" (This one still stumps me, I hit print, and came back to this message - my guess is nozzle clean fail and this just dismissed the first one... but who knows). "Nozzle wipe failed. Retry?" --- Basically - I am fucking tired of "Core One needs your attention!" popups on my phone. Especially for the stupid things like approving a nozzle clean retry, or re-leveling. I am also sick of wasted time thinking the machine is printing when it's not. Right now, I would absolutely buy a Bambu over anything else in the market for FDM.

cosmic_cheese 1y ago
The reality is that “just works” is going to outsell just about everything, including high ground on morals and privacy. If competitors want to keep up they’re going to have to offer models that don’t require any tinkering/tweaking even if doing so is possible, supported, and encouraged.
- horsawlarway 1y ago
  Yeah... The market is still shifting in response to the X1C. 10 years ago... I would manually level my ender, religiously monitor it, and still deal with a decently high failure rate (esp for anything other than PLA). Tuning the printer took easily as much time as I actually spent printing with it. I upgraded all the things, flashed firmware, ran octoprint, etc... It was like driving - gotta keep the hands on the wheel and maintain alertness at all times. It was an activity that required my attention and focus. Then I caved and got an X1C in 2023. It's... a really, REALLY good machine. It's like flying somewhere. I get on the plane, start up a movie or a book, and someone wakes me up when the flight is over. It's a tool that is doing things for me while I do other stuff. I'm at the point where I'm not really interested in the "middle" all that much. Either go with a Voron and get the "I'm driving" feeling if that's what you want. Or get a Bambu and get chauffeured to successful print.
  - pests 1y ago
    The 3D printing community is really two different groups: people who like to actually print things and people who like to tinker with their printer.
    - deno 1y ago
      I hate this false dichotomy. Plenty of people like both. People that buy expensive consumer grade printers are just satisfied with mediocre results because they don’t know any better. To get great quality prints you need to actually know how the tool you are using works and what are its strengths and weaknesses.

thot_experiment 1y ago

To all the people in the comments popping off about how "it just works". I have a Makerbot 2 running Sailfish, it's "just worked" for 12 years. I haven't replaced a single part on it. Ever since I started using the Prusa Slicer I've got dimensionally accurate parts every time I hit print. At least from my PoV "the printer just working" is a solved problem and has been for a long time now. PLA, PETG, PCTG, TPU. No issues with anything and I've been able to drive it at about 150% the speed I could with the original firmware/software.

jasongill 1y ago
Yes, but you said it yourself - you had to replace the firmware with one that lets you run faster than the original, and you're using a different slicer. With Bambu Labs printers, you just plug them in, turn them on, and feed them filament and your files. They work so well that you don't have to think about firmware or anything else. I got my first 3D printer around a dozen years ago as well, and the comparison to the experience you get with a Bambu Labs X1C or H2D is absolutely night and day. It feels like with the previous generations of 3D printers, that operating and maintaining and tuning the machine itself was the "hobby". With Bambu Labs (and I'm sure some of the other competing printers that have come out since the X1C was released), the "hobby" is what you actually make. It just works, requires no tweaking, no fiddling, no flashing firmware or bed leveling or hairspray, and it has totally changed 3D printing from a nerd hobby to something anyone can do (IMHO).
- thot_experiment 1y ago
  Sure but the last tweaking I did on this printer was years and years ago, and it's been "just working" ever since. I haven't fiddled with anything, I haven't even leveled the bed, I don't use hairspray. I don't think you can even find the firmware I flashed onto it in 2014 anymore because of link rot. It's just a solid printer that makes the part I want every time I hit print. I use it all the time for mechanical parts. I do prints that pause to embed hardware. Heck I even have it clear the bed by hitting parts with the print head so I can make multiple copies of things unattended. (only works on parts with low bed adhesion) It's not a brittle system. I don't deny that Bambu makes a good product, an excellent product even. If you can't afford to support the general ecosystem get one and do your thing. I just think the reason Bambu is where it is right now is because they are VC funded vampires on the ecosystem and supporting them will make things worse in the long run. If you can afford to support someone else you should because it helps make things better for everyone. FWIW until recently I championed Bambu as just the default easy solution, recommending it to my friends every time, but I had a long conversation with Josef about the future of 3D printing and it really changed my mind.