3DPrinting

I'm guessing the cheap, good quality, printers are cheap because they want to capture market share and enshitify (all the proprietary stuff they use is a hint).

I was looking for something to replace my old Creality CR10S a few months ago, Bambu and Qidi were tempting because of the price, but I didn't like how proprietary everything was. The Prusa Core One looked nice, but looks like they're going a little less "free" now with their Open Community License and locked boot loaders. I would have got a Troodon (Voron-derived pre-built printer), but they were out of stock. I settled on just getting a Formbot Voron kit. Took a very long time to build, but I'm very happy with it. I know the printer inside and out, so it's easy to debug, modify, or repair if I need to.

In my opinion, if you're already somewhat familiar with 3d printing, I'd build a Voron from a kit. If not, I'd get a Voron-derived pre-built like a Troodon or Sovol SV8 (I think the Sovol has a proprietary toolhead though). If you want an easy Apple-like experience, but still pretty "open," I'd get a Prusa.

If you think you're going to want to print higher-temp, warp-prone filaments like ABS/ASA/PA, I would not choose a bed-slinger (e.g. Mk4s), because they are harder to enclose nicely and take up a lot of space if enclosed. As one data-point, my core-xy Voron produces much higher quality prints (e.g. less artifacts) and is faster than my bedslinger CR10S.

I bought a Prusa MK1 kit back in 2014. It was the right choice at the time. 3D-printing was finickier and you had to know your machine inside out. It's since been upgraded to mk2.5.

It's starting to be worn out - bearing are giving up, belts are tied, cables are experiencing metal fatigue. I bought a flashforge ad5x for Christmas. It's just a lot of printer for the money. The ceramic heater broke, but I got a new on warranty. It's been quite reliable, and a lot faster than ye olde bedslinger.

Looks like flashforge might be pulling some shenanigans with the firmware, but there is opensource mods to save the day.

Prusa walked so other manufacturers could run. 15 years ago prusa were the ones who made 3d printing a viable hobby for the rest of us. And all this while keeping their designs and code open source.

Today I view the extra I pay today for their products as a well deserved reward for their integrity.

Bambu also is a no-go for quality reasons by now, they didn't care for their printers catching fire for way too long.

That article, while technically being correct on many things, is also a little bit hyperbolic (that picture with "Who's copying who now" is just laughable at best and utterly misleading). Prusa is still the best choice in what we call this "open market" (which repeatedly fucked them over), including openness.

Viable alternatives, including cheaper ones, would be Snapmaker's U1 and printers from Qidi Tech or Sovol. Mind that Qidi Tech and Sovol are somewhat known for sub-par customer support (they have to save the money somewhere I guess). Qidi Tech is better for "set up and use", Sovol is a good baseline to tinker with the printer itself as well.

Keep in mind that Prusa printers absolutely excel in longevity though, and they're the only ones known to offer upgrade paths. Not to mention data security when using their services… just saying there are good reasons their printers are more expensive. You'll most likely have more from them for longer. Not the MK4S though, that one is very much last gen by now.

Look into a Snapmaker U1. Multi toolhead under a grand by a company that is very open source friendly.

I've owned an MK3S+ and now a Core One+, I don't regret the money that I spent on either.

I love my Qidi XMax 3. I've basically only needed to change my z offset a handful of times and it just slams out prints. It's got a slightly larger build volume and runs Klipper out of the box.

Could be an option worth considering if you're looking for a printer that you can set up and run and don't need anything particularly fancy that just kinda goes.

Prusa is what i would call partly open source these days, the article you link is up to date. But they're behind the curve at the moment playing catchup with much cheaper printers. This is in part because they insist on their own proprietary firmware instead of working with the massive klipper community which IMO is driving bleeding edge of consumer 3D printing right now, and what almost all their competitors are also using (in some variation).

It's seriously difficult right now. A while ago I would have clearly recommended Bambu, especially the A1/A1 mini. Super cheap, perfect prints every time. But their current behaviour makes them unrecommendable.

If you are going for a higher budget printer, I can recommend the Snapmaker U1. That's a beautiful device. I got myself that one, and it's purely amazing. Custom firmware is available, which fixes some problems in the stock firmware. Perfect 4-color prints every time with very low waste.

The filament changer is even quite useful for single-filament prints, because you can just keep multiple filaments loaded and don't have to manually swap filaments.

Wife and I bought a Prusa core one late last year (on sale) as an upgrade to our entry-level cobra neo, which we had rapidly outgrown.

We disqualified Bambu for largely the same reasons you did. We had a look at many different brands, but settled on Prusa because it's the brand that we can reasonably expect to be supported the longest. Both on the software, but also availability of spare parts.

Many of the shipped parts are 3d printed, and there's no shortage of spare parts on their own website. I'm fairly certain I will still be able to figure out replacement parts 10 years from now if something breaks, either through Prusa directly or by ordering a printed part from a domestic print-shop.

From my understanding, you have the option of starting with the MK4S (or earlier) and upgrading to the core one later. Not sure I'd recommend it given how long assembly takes, but having this level of repairability and reduction in waste appealed to me: I don't want to throw out perfectly good hardware.

Prusa wasn't an easy choice (pricing, open source pull-back), but we felt it was the most reasonable choice since we could afford the premium.

@SorteKanin I briefly had MK4S, then Core one. I think MK4S is a decent machine, if you're mainly printing PLA and PETG. You can even have MK4S enclosed; though with enclosure it's usually quite chunky. I don't think there's any print quality improvement with Core One. Both machines are nice but require a bit of tinkering from time to time (core one belts/homing is a pain, door handle fell off).

(1/n)

There's no single best answer for you and it mostly depends on your preference.

Bambu Lab are excellent, beginner friendly printers, but I would argue that lately they're doing more harm than good. I have an A1 as part of a work print farm and it's very reliable but I still kind of hate using it. If their business practices are a deal breaker for you, look elsewhere.

Prusa are also rock solid. The mk4s is great and even older mk3s are still reliable (I also run one and although slower, never fails). I don't have hands on experience with any of their CoreXY machines but they are generally reviewed well. They have the non-chinese $$ premium, so if price is a deal breaker for you, look elsewhere.

There are many many solid smaller brands, I was partial to Elegoo for a while until recently they made some odd firmware decisions (I like Klipper). Right now my fastest and most reliable printer that's not a frankenstein machine is my Sovol Sv06 Ace. It was a great price and with a hot end fan replacement for a noctua fan, it's relatively quiet. Creality is still an option and some of their modern printers are also decent, they have a LOT of random models though so make sure you get solid reliable info if you go in that direction.

I've been fairly happy with my Anycuboic Kobra S1. Decent price for performance and fairly easy to use. Fully enclosed, has the capability of multicolor without requiring it, and handles everything we've thrown at it with ease.

I'll never recommend or buy Elegoo again after they provided the single worst customer service experience in my life. A total of three bad mainboards, six months of stalling, lies, and no resolution. If you care about after sale support, avoid them.

I've got a flashforge. Couldn't be happier.

@SorteKanin from my honest expert opinion i would go with a prusa core or a Lulzbot though Lulzbots are easier to clear jams then Prusa cores

I started with Creality K1C and I am generally happy - prints all the fancy filaments like PA6CF with no issues. It's an enclosed coreXY printer with an extraction fan so I can vent all the fumes through the window. Runs open source firmware that can be modified by user. If I wasn't limited by space, I would get a K1 Max. It needed some upgrades - most of them you can 3D print.

If I had more money to spend, I would definitely go with Prusa Core - for the ideological reasons mostly.

It depends, what do you want to print?

I would buy another Elegoo CC or Sovol unless there is a multicolor requirement.

I would wait to see what the New Creality printers coming in Q3 look like in good reviews.

https://youtu.be/Jx5lRca5OoA

That is just an ad, from the company famous for overpromising, but they have multiple tool heads, CMYK color mixing, dual nozzle sizes and TPU push pull filament feeding. Nice to see someone taking TPU seriously, unlike Bambu.

The consumer industry is now headed to multiple tool heads at every price level, AMS waste is unacceptable. I would consider two proper toolheads essential.

To me it all depends if the hobby is about the prints or the printer. If you just want to make stuff with minimal tinkering and effort, Bambu is what you want. If you want to customize, tweak, optimize, etc, then Prusa or Elegoo are both solid choices.