Should I just wait another year or two?
Should I just wait another year or two?
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.
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Decide what you want from a machine, and if all of your needs are met...buy. It's getting much harder to recommend the Prusa as the baseline for quality has changed substantially. With many machines adopting input shaping and higher-end parts, you get a lot of bang for your buck.
I don't own one, simply because I build most of my machines from scratch...but it would be hard to recommend anything other than a P1P for someone with the money in their budget for it. If I were building a new printer factory of 50 machines running 24/7 then MAYBE I would consider the serviceability of a Prusa to be a time investment. Outside of those conditions, Bambu is the clear choice in the price bracket.
FYI At that new $599 price, even the P1P can print from sdcard, so from a "cloud" perspective, I don't think that's an issue. The cloud connection is for sending files remotely, and I also believe it has a local network mode(unsure). $599 P1P vs minimum $799 for a MK4 kit, I would go P1P in a heartbeat. I understand that the AMS is also significantly easier to use than the Prusa MMU. The P1S is an attractive replacement for my HEAVILY Frankensteined old Flashforge Creator Pro, which I only used for parts requiring high-temp enclosed printing. I will add one to my environment at some point in the future, as it's the only thing to come along in years that looks worthy.
I'm pretty sure that the P1P has local network printing. But, my dad uses his in SD Card mode so much that he cba to try the Lan Printing.