I’ve wanted to get into 3d printing for a while now and have been checking out the prusa mk4 and the bambu lab x1.
The bambu looks amazing in all aspects besides repairability and offline printing, with the latter one looking like a real deal breaker. It seems like all the more advanced features need a connection to the cloud, which I really don’t like.
On the other hand we have the prusa which seems to be running really rushed software still missing a lot of features that the hardware should be able to support and the price looks like way worse value compared to the stuff you get with the bambu. At least it’s repairable and no cloud bullshit.
Should I just come back in a year and hope that the mk4 software has gotten better or the bambu doesn’t require internet for all the cool stuff?
Edit: Just woke up and I want to thank everyone in this thread for the quality replies! I’ll look into 3d modeling first and if the prusa doesn’t anymore have janky alpha input shaping 2-3 months from now I’ll go with that, otherwise I’ll have to look for alternatives. Since I’d be running prints throughout the day while I’m not at home, I’d want something more reliable than an ender 3.
Edit 2: I just found out about the Bambu p1s, I might just get that one.
If I waited until printers were completely fool-proof, I would never have gotten one. Instead I jumped in 6yrs ago and I’ve printed so many useful things and a lot of toys. Most rooms in my house have at least one printed item in them because of how useful it is.
Yes I’ve had my share of failures and have had to rebuild a printer a ton of times while learning how it worked, but I also learned a lot of new skills.
- Soldering used to be scary and now it’s no big deal.
- I can de-pin connectors and build new adapters instead of spending $8-10 for someone to ship me one from Amazon.
- With TinkerCAD I can knock out roughly designed parts that are ready to go in a few hours instead of waiting days/weeks
From learning all of those skills I’ve swapped the motherboard and rewired my first printer to have bed levelling and be whisper quiet, 3d printed an RC car, designed parts for my vehicles, completely overhauled my sim racing setup, the list goes on.
If you want to get in to it and have the money to get started, go for it. I started with something like an Ender 3 and still use it today. You don’t need an expensive machine if you want to learn how to maintain it. It all depends on what your goal is with 3d printing.
3D printers are far from bleeding edge anymore.
If you have a need for a printer, then just get one. It’s really that simple.
I think it comes down to whether you mind waiting a year or not to print your first print. I’d personally just jump in and buy something even if it’s not exactly what you want.
Much like computers, printers are always advancing and waiting a year might mean you wind up seeing some other new feature on the horizon a year from now and then have to wait an additional year.
We’ve been getting by without proprietary hardware or multifilament printers for years, so it’s not as if either of these printers are the only way to get into the hobby.
Are you the kind of person who enjoys tinkering with things and learning? Or does that frustrate you and you want something that “just works”?
If you are in the first category, just buy something like an ender 3 or a sovol sv06. They are cheap, open platforms, capable of great prints, and are a fantastic learning platform. If you buy one of the cheaper options to get your feet wet, then you can always spend more on a high end machine later if you decide you need it. The more locked-down systems like the Bambu might be nice for the “just work” crowd, but personally I have no interest in closed ecosystems and vendor lock-in.
I do not expect that the Mk4 will have caught up to the Bambu in 1 year since it’s missing physical hardware that seems necessary to do so. Here are some examples:
Input shaping calibration for a specific machine benefits from having an accelerometer. The Mk4 needs a module that can attach to the extruder and the bed. The current beta firmware with input shaping only allows for Prusa’s universal preset setting instead of allowing you to measure the frequency responses of your own machine. Critical reviews of the current input shaping implementation show subpar performance with excessive smoothing and high frequency artifacts. I expect that comes down to inability to calibrate your specific machine and environment.
When you print with a new filament, especially a new manufacturer, you usually need to tune a filament profile to get better printing results. With the Mk4 this is a manual process, and this is where many new to 3d printing quickly get frustrated with failed or poor quality prints. The lidar system on the X1 has been fantastic for automatic pressure advance and flow calibration right out of the box and I’ve found I largely do not need to maintain custom filament profiles for the Bambu.
Webcam support and failed print detection are absent from the Mk4. The closest feature the Nextruder assembly supports is crash detection via its load cell sensor and I’m not entirely sure if the Mk4 even has that enabled. If you attach a webcam to the frame and run octoprint / something else standalone, you’ve again thrown off the preset input shaping calibration.
It’s an i3 style printer or “bed slinger,” which is fine on it’s own, but it will never reach the same speeds as core-xy because it’s physically moving the mass of your printed object sitting on the bed. Printing speeds aside, you’ll potentially run into taller objects wobbling slightly as they are moved.
I really like Prusa’s open source commitment, and I’m still in line to purchase a multitool Prusa XL, but I cannot recommend waiting for the Mk4 to improve and reach parity with the Bambu if that’s your expectation. If it doesn’t do what you want it to do today, I’m not sure it ever will.
As for cloud connectivity on the Bambu, you’ll really have to consider just how important that is to you given the significant tradeoffs. Minimally you can print from the sd card or use lan mode. It looks like you currently lose the camera and mobile app connectivity with lan mode, but I haven’t tried this myself and these are at least software aspects that could easily improve.
Thank you for the detailed reply. What do you think about the new Bambu P1S? Looks like the main difference to the carbon is no lidar and a worse screen and with the ams addon it’s 1000€ vs 1500€ for the carbon. I’m seriously considering getting the P1S.
The P1S does seem like a good value overall.
I’ve heard the screen is quite primitive with the P1 printers, and I expect that will become your primary interface with the printer if you are not using the cloud print functionality.
You will also not get the benefit of the automatic calibration features.
For myself that makes it less desirable. However, there is also some value in understanding the manual filament tuning and printer calibration process as it helps you troubleshoot when things go wrong.
If the P1S existed when I was getting into 3D printing, I likely would have purchased it. It’s at a similar price point without the AMS to the Ender 3 S1 Pro (which is what I learned on) and the P1 has many more capabilities.
You will also not get the benefit of the automatic calibration features.
You are talking about the lidar? It can still auto-bed-level without internet right?
I’ve got the P1P (and am waiting for the P1S upgrade kit) and I’ve got to say I absolutely love it.
I know it’s not popular on here because it’s proprietary, and a lot of people in this hobby don’t like the “It just works” mentality as opposed to the “I custom built this from scratch” outlook, but I got into 3d printing because I want to print things, not because I want to spend loads of time fiddling with my printer. I spend plenty of time fiddling with my various creations and custom models, I just want a printer that I know will reliably print what I’m asking for and use my time and energy on creating things.
I also went back and forth over the X1C over the P1P (The P1S didn’t exist when I ordered mine), but from what I understand the differences between the X1C and the P1(P/S) are very incremental. The lidar is nice, and does improve print quality, but having looked at some comparisons, the end-result difference is very minuscule. As for the screen, I honestly don’t see why people are so fussed about the smaller screen - I use Bambu Studio for kicking off all my prints, so the only thing I really use the build it screen for is checking up on print times when I don’t feel like going up to my PC, or changing filament, and it works fine for those purposes.
Especially now that the P1S offers a high quality enclosure, I think the value add for the X1C doesn’t make a ton of sense, You can literally buy 2 P1P’s for the cost of a single X1C, and I don’t personally feel that the improvements to the X1C justify that price difference unless you really need the absolute highest possible print quality.
Repair-ability is the usual issue most people take with Bambu printers, because it’s proprietary - but their replacement parts are super affordable, and I’ve yet to hear actual testimonial from a Bambu printer owner who had their printer die on them and was unable to get it fixed. The proprietary nature also makes people worried about “what if Bambu goes out of business in a few years”, which is valid - but given that they’re one of the biggest players in the consumer 3d printing industry after only a short time in the market, I really don’t see them going anywhere any time soon
tl;dr - The p1p was my first entry into 3d printing, and the only complaint I’ve got so far is that the P1S upgrade kit is backordered to August. Otherwise it’s been a practically flawless entry into 3d printing
Thanks for the input. I’m mainly worried they rugpull us by doing something like nfc proprietary filament once they have a big enough customer base but the P1S is just killer value compared to any other fdm printer. I commissioned some 3d models this week and have friends who ordered a carbon so I’ll probably get a P1S in a couple of weeks (unless the recently trademarked bambu models are even better value).
