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.
I have Prusa I3 MK3S+s at work that are great, but I just bought a Sovol SV06 for home use. I got it for $229. It was $200 during prime days. Auto bed-leveling. Prints well out of the box after short, easy assembly. Far, far less troubleshooting than my old Ender 3 V2. It comes with a branded Cura slicer, but I use Prusaslicer instead. I’m recommending the SV06 to the makers that come into my makerspace if they want to get into 3D printing at a low price point and not have the headaches of older machines that lack the more modern features.
I wanted to get a Sovol S6, and I nearly did, but I decided to splurge on a Creality K1.
The K1 put out amazing prints for a week, then it started throwing an error (key:2507 not heating as expected) and I’m having to jump through the hoops with Creality tech support so I can get the parts to fix it.
I could have almost bought two Sovol S6’s instead.