EDIT:<p>After some more poking around, I’m finding out that the cloud features of this thing are pretty integral to the experience. This thing looks nice, but the enshittification scaffolding is too much. I knew the price was too good.<p>ORIGINAL COMMENT:<p>Wow, I've been out of the 3D printing world for a bit. I have a Monoprice Maker Ultimate (Wanhao D6, rebadged) that has a slightly larger build area, but otherwise it's bare bones on the firmware. I reflashed it with Klipper, and have an Octopi attached to it, but that still requires all sorts of futzing about to get it tuned right.<p>With multi filaments, all the tuning wizardry, and the quick-change nozzle, I might consider this.<p>The big thing that gives me pause is the closed nature of the platform. My current printer might be "just commodity parts" or whatever, but that can be huge plus! This feels very much like deciding whether to join the Apple Ecosystem™ or to stick with a beige box so I can run whatever OS I want. And that isn't an easy choice to make these days.
This looks much better than it <i>actually</i> is for a couple of reasons:<p>- Multicolor is not something you actually use often and is horribly slow. Slow like in a 2 hours print becomes 12 hours print if it's colored. And it wastes a lot of plastic (and doing so does a lot of noise, too).<p>- The printer can't print things like ASA. Limited to PLA/PETG/TPU.<p>- While the design of the hotend and swappable nozzle looks nice at a first glance, the printer is a closed design and is not clear how well you can service it when needed. I've a Prusa MK4 and owned different Prusa Minis in the past, to print for a shop 24h, and if you want to print for production and not just for a few weeks hobby, you need to be able to fix those printers. Also Bambulab has a bad track in providing parts, when needed.<p>So yes, competitors like Prusa should do something to improve their printers and adjust the price point a bit (at this point the Mini is too costly, and its hot-end needs to be redesigned, and certain XL/MK4 improvements back-ported to the Mini, like the load cell and the all metal nozzle design). But after the first days of printing colored things, a Prusa Mini is likely a much better printer for somebody that really wants to do something nice with a 3D printer, and not just a few colored miniatures.<p>Also Bambulab behavior in using open source software written by others, at least in the past was very questionable. Anyway: they are doing something good to the market by pushing other vendors to do better.
C'mon everyone, we can do better.<p>As someone who owns an X1C, it's abundantly clear that many of the comments are armchair quarterbacking from folks who don't own a Bambu and have never tried one.<p>Cheap Chinese clone? That's like calling SpaceX a cheap knockoff of Orbital ATK.<p>Camera can only stream to Bambu's servers? Factually incorrect, you can stream locally via RTSP.<p>I come here for insightful debate about a company and product that have plenty of interesting aspects, both good and bad, to discuss, not for the pedantic, ideological sniping that this discussion is full of. It really saddens me to see this on HN of all places.
Good review by Maker's Muse: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8sdrPgH9Fk">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8sdrPgH9Fk</a><p>tldw; Printer has great build quality for the price. Print quality and speed obviously below the bigger Bambu machines, but excellent for a "bed slinger". Print volume quite small and requires diagonal placing for bigger parts. Pretty much PLA-only, but TPU also possible if fed directly into extruder. The multi-filament solution has serious drawbacks: filament change extremely slow and generates lots of "poop" plastic, which is simply discarded to the side of the printer. All in all: great printer for beginners, but the multi-filament is more of a gimmick.
The interview[1] between Bambu Lab's CEO and Stefan from the CNC Kitchen YouTube channel has some details about the company's background and strategy.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pFtbybLlk0">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pFtbybLlk0</a>
This is a very interesting printer:<p>* the toolhead/nozzle quick-change is pretty fantastic and quite ingenius, you change nozzle and heatsink thereby guaranteeing good heat dissipation but the thermistor and heater stay put,<p>* the MMU seems to be able to handle many more types of spools due to center-mounting as opposed to edge-rolling and they reduced retraction distance substantially.<p>The noise cancellation seems a bit gimicky just like the LIDAR on the X1C.<p>The Makerworld integration goes a step further than most other 3D-printing-hub-websites by slicing the models and being to print immediately without having to fuss with a slicer. Should be a lot more beginner-friendly.<p>It does look like they're taking a page or two from the DJI playbook (not surprising, CEO and others being ex-employees). DJI went from solid drones just a tad above what hoobyists could build, like the early Phantoms, to improving video+link-reliabilty with later phantoms to crazy integration of everything in the newer Mavic and especially Minis that are way beyond hobbyist's possibilities.<p>I am somewhat doubtful that the exact strategy of tight integration of hardware components will work for 3D printers. After it probably won't matter if one printer is slightly smaller than another.<p>But they do seem to do more software/hardware integration which could be very welcome for beginners and those not in it for the tinkering, as well as their focus on reliability. Their AMS MMU systems seem to be a step above all others in terms of reliability and ease-of-use.
Just remember if a device that is intended to operate stand-alone/offline requires you to make an account or connect it to the internet to active it. It isn't yours and will stop working one day.<p>DJI and Insta360 for example require you to connect their cameras to the internet in order to "activate" them. What do you think will happen when those servers get turned off.<p>Same goes for 3d printer and regular printers. I wouldn't put it past HP to add a feature that would prevent you from printing if the printer hasn't been able to call home for the last x days.
I'm a hardware product design engineer, have been using 3d printers for 20 years professionally to get my work done.<p>Recently purchased an X1 Carbon with 2 AMSs and its incredible. It's a very high quality, enabling, wonderful piece if equipment.<p>I have used dozens of professional machines that cost hundreds of thousands, built, bought and run many lower cost machines also.<p>I can only count on one hand the number of times I've been this impressed by a 3d printer when it came out, and never by a printer even remotely in the X1s process range.<p>I think this A1 mini is a great entry level printer, if you only have $500 to spend on a printer, get this one. If you have $1500 get the X1.
Priced close to Prusa Mini+, with same print dimensions (18cm x 18cm x 18cm) but multi color.<p>What’s the general review of this company? Are these any good or are there more like Ender and other cheap Chinese printers?
I've been tracking the Bambu printers ever since the crowdfunding days, and the overall feature set is impressive. Like I wrote the other day* Prusa is in trouble here. As much as I appreciate them (being in the EU myself and owning an old Prusa clone), they are not competitive feature-wise (although the XL mostly holds its own against the X1 series as a workhorse printer if you buy it with multiple toolheads).<p>The A1 Mini is a better deal than the Prusa Mini if you need to print with support materials (never mind color, that's just a gimmick) or if you want to make sure it will keep going as spools run out, although mechanically the AMS lite looks rather fragile and takes up a _lot_ of space.<p>In a year's time smaller manufacturers like Kingroon are quite likely to be able to copy a lot of the quality of life improvements (and I would love to see some of those noise reduction features and improved auto-tuning come to Klipper, which I'm running on both my printers).<p>Until then, though, Bambu is ahead--although I have a feeling my next printer will be a Voron because I really like the idea of not relying on a manufacturer for maintenance (but that's just me).<p>* <a href="https://taoofmac.com/space/links/2023/09/20/2233" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://taoofmac.com/space/links/2023/09/20/2233</a>
nice hardware, crap controller and cloud tether.<p>it'll be a nice machine to buy on the aftermarket and put a real controller into in a few months/years, much like the rest of BambuLab's offerings.
I own a Prusa and I'm happy I bought it even at a premium. The team is always cool at the 3D printing fairs I attend, the slicer is nice, they release a lot of cool and open stuff, designed printable face shields during Covid etc. It feels like a company well worth supporting.<p>BambooLab on the other hand seems to be almost the exact opposite (OrcaSlicer etc.).
Printers are getting cheaper and better all the time. As far as I'm concerned the $200 Ender 3 V3 SE and $230 Anycubic Kobra 2 render everything else in the sub-$1000 space irrelevant. At this point nothing else is an upgrade unless it does multifilament RGB printing.
I am wondering if there is any special hardware needed for the "silent printing" calibration on the A1 Mini, or if this is just a firmware update away from getting into the P1S and X1 Carbon.
I honestly want to use the ams lite with my bambu x1c because it’ll be so much easier to use third party filament in a multi material setup. But I suspect that’s not gonna be an option
I own a P1P and it just works™. If you are just interested in printing and not have a 3D printer itself part of your DIY activities, the P1P is a safe choice.