04 Nov
Blog

HP Envy Inspire 7900e Review: A Versatile Office Printer

The HP Envy Inspire 7900e has robust photo printing capabilities.

"The HP Envy Inspire is an excellent home office printer for the hybrid working world."

advantages

  • Strong photo printing performance

  • New sleep mode for almost silent printing

  • Companion app with many functions

  • Versatile workhorse for home office or home use

  • Affordable price

disadvantage

  • Box shape is boring at home

  • No USB port for printing from flash drives

A few years ago it would have been inconceivable that we would still be as dependent on the printed document as we are today. But the reality of working remotely has changed that.

HP's new Envy Inspire series stands out for being the first printer developed by quarantined engineers for anyone who needs to live, study and work from home during the pandemic. Printers have seen a new renaissance in our workflows, and the $ 249 HP Envy Inspire 7900e is a printer that feels like it was made with that reality in mind.

It has some helpful features to keep us productive as the world looks forward to the transition to a hybrid work environment when things return to normal.

draft

Unlike HP's Tango range that blends into your home, the new Envy Inspire doesn't hide the fact that it's a printer with a scanner attached. The Envy Inspire is available in two models: The Envy Inspire 7200e is the more compact version with a flatbed scanner on top, while the higher quality Envy Inspire 7900e, the model we received for review and which comes first on the market, has an automatic document is equipped with a feeder (ADF) with duplex function. The price range starts at $ 179. However, if you have more robust copy or scan needs, we recommend spending an additional $ 70 to upgrade to the Envy Inspire 7900e for $ 249.

Each printer model is available in a range of colors including Everglades in shades of green, Thistle in shades of purple, Cyan Surf Blue, and neutral Portobello. Whichever you choose, the Envy Inspire looks like a printer – no doubt about it.

The HP Envy Inspire 7900e is available in one of four colors.

The hues are applied as accents to add a pop of color to an otherwise bland cream colored box, and on our 7900e we found the Portobello highlights on the ADF and on the paper tray.

With dimensions of 18.11 x 20.5 x 9.17 inches, the 7900e is a practical workhorse for the home office with an ADF on top and a paper compartment with a front loader. The more compact 7200e could pass as the modern and box-shaped version of the HP Envy 6055, while the 7900e series takes inspiration from HP's OfficeJet Pro series.

Like most modern printers, both new Envy Inspire models have a built-in 2.7-inch color touchscreen for accessing printer settings and shortcuts.

Since the Envy Inspire is primarily aimed at home users – families and students – and small home workers, the paper tray is a bit small for the capabilities of this printer. There is a 125-sheet paper tray at the front and bottom of the printer. That's more than double the 50-sheet input tray on the Tango X, but the paper tray leaves something to be desired for small office environments. Most home office printers start at around 200 sheets for the paper input tray, and the HP OfficeJet Pro 9025e comes with a 500-sheet tray. This means that every time you replace the paper when you attempt to input on the Office Jet Pro, you will have to do so four times on the Envy Inspire. Since the Envy Inspire isn't a compact printer at first, we would have liked HP to have increased the overall height of the device slightly to accommodate a larger input tray.

The new sleep mode reduces printing noise by 40%.

A new and much appreciated innovation is that the photo printer tray is a modular add-on that fits right into the paper tray that you load standard 8.5 x 11-inch sheets into. The photo tray can hold borderless prints in standard 4 x 6, square 5 x 5, or panoramic 4 x 12 inches.

Traditionally, most printers have the photo tray on top of the paper tray, but on the outside. Moving the photo tray inward helps prevent dust build-up, especially if you don't print pictures regularly.

HP Envy Inspire Photo Tray.

The biggest design change – and one you can't visually see – with the new Envy Inspire is a new print mode. A new quiet mode reduces noise by 40% by using intelligent algorithms to slow down the printing process for a quieter experience. The mode was developed during quarantine by HP engineers who were disturbed by loud printer noise during conference calls – a disadvantage of having to share the office space with children who had to print homework.

HP claims to have combined the best features of its Tango, OfficeJet, and Envy lines to create the Envy Inspire.

"We built what we believe to be the best printer so families can work, learn, and get creative – to get things done no matter what life has in store," Jeff Walter, HP director of strategy and product marketing, told Digital Trends. "Whatever you need to create, we can help families with it."

Walter added that the Envy Inspire is a product that combines the best writing systems from HP's OfficeJet Pros, the best photo capabilities, and the best app capabilities from the HP Smart app.

power

An app is required to set up the HP Envy Inspire.

The Envy Inspire wasn't built for speed. Unlike office printers, home users do not stand around the printer to access their documents. Still, the Envy Inspire is a rugged printer that can deliver speeds of up to 15 pages per minute (ppm) in color and black and white, with the first page done in just 18 seconds.

The print resolution is up to 1200 x 1200 dots per inch (dpi) for black and white pages and 4800 x 1200 dpi for color prints and photos. Print speeds here were just under the 24 pages per minute output on the HP OfficeJet Pro 9025e, which is one of the best printers on our list this year. Compared to the color speed of 10 pages per minute of the somewhat older HP OfficeJet Pro 8025, the speed of the Envy Inspire wasn't a problem.

To put speeds in perspective, the Envy Inspire's boxier build includes internals that allow it to print at speeds much faster than cuter, design-conscious home printers. The HP Tango X, another high-quality printer, achieves around 10 ppm. Monochrome and 8 ppm about half the speed of the Envy Inspire for color jobs.

Pages per minute is only half of the print speed equation, while the second half depends on how fast the first page can be finished. In my experience, the first page was finished in a little over 15 seconds, and the HP specifications for print speeds were largely correct, with speeds between 12 and 16 pages per minute. Printed text appeared razor sharp and was legible even in small fonts.

Color prints were similarly sharp. Photos printed on Epson glossy photo paper appeared sharp, and the quality – sharpness, tones, and dynamic range – reproduced by HP's Envy Inspire rivaled prints made by the online photo service Shutterfly. Shutterfly's prints appeared a bit warmer compared to HP's photo print rendering. And like Shutterfly, the HP mobile app gives you access to a variety of different templates for creating posters, greeting cards, invitations, and other printable content.

HP's smart app for printing from mobile devices. I can't tell what HP's photo capabilities will be like on HP photo printing paper as none was supplied for this test. In general, most printer manufacturers recommend that you pair their printer with their branded photo paper for the best results. According to HP, the Envy Inspire's new ink technology offers a 40% wider color space and new ink technologies to render lifelike photos.

HP claimed that when printing on 4×6, 5×5, or 4×12 paper, the printer will be smart enough to select the photo paper tray – instead of the standard letter-size paper tray – to print. I couldn't test this feature because I didn't have photo paper of these sizes to test.

While it's admirable that HP is promoting its cloud-based approach to printing, the Envy Inspire could have been easier to set up. Once out of the box, you must download the HP Smart app and follow the instructions to begin printer setup before you can print or make copies. The app guides you through connecting to the printer's ad hoc WiFi network so that you can then connect to your home or office WiFi network. After the printer connects, it will take a few minutes for the printer to update its firmware.

This means that unlike a traditional printer, not only is the overall process a bit complicated, but you also have to use the process dictated by HP before you can do anything with your printer.

Unlike dedicated photo printers, the Envy Inspire doesn't have separate cartridges for color ink. Instead, the printer is powered by two ink cartridges – a black and a combination cartridge with three ink colors for cyan, magenta and yellow.

Both the cartridges and paper must be installed before you can begin setting up the printer. We therefore recommend doing this immediately after taking the printer out of the box and removing all protective films – and there are plenty of them!

The ADF on top of the Envy Inspire 7900e can scan up to 50 pages at a time and handle up to 8.5 "x 14" paper, while the flatbed can handle 8.5 "x 11.7" sheets. The scan resolution is set to 1200 x 1200 dpi and the scan speed is around 8 pages per minute. In addition to using the hardware for scanning, you can also use your smartphone's camera as a scanner with the companion HP mobile app, available on both Android and iOS smartphones.

Duplex scanning, copying and printing can be performed on this printer, which can save you paper if you need to. If you are concerned about saving ink, you can set the printer to print in draft mode. This mode produces lighter prints, but you use less ink and get faster print speeds.

The nice thing about the Envy Inspire is that it has advanced features to simplify your document workflow, making it feel like a more capable office printer. You can set up custom shortcuts to make the printer's tasks easier. For example, small businesses with more extensive accounting needs can program a shortcut to make a physical copy and upload a digital copy of a document to a cloud service such as Google Drive or QuickBooks when they scan a receipt or invoice. In addition to storing documents in the cloud, you can also configure shortcuts to send you the scans by email.

Other useful features include the ability to create printables, which are photo cards and invitations from templates. These are great for handicrafts or for sending a birthday card if, for example, you forgot to pick one up at the supermarket.

Another app function is the ability to send a mobile fax with the app. HP is offering a trial version of its mobile fax service and you can configure it to send a digital fax through the app. The Envy Inspire does not have native fax functionality, and this could be a useful feature when you need to generate a fax.

I really appreciated the new Quiet Mode from HP, which reduces the noise level by about 40% by slowing the printing speed by about 50%.

"When we developed it, it was really interesting … because we developed (Quiet Mode) at a time that we also experienced personally," said Walter. “So if you work from home and there are several people in the house using the printer, for example, you can schedule sleep mode from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. when you might be making Zoom calls and have the printer print 40% quieter during those times . "

HP's new Quiet Mode

Since I don't need a printer to be a speed champion at home, I've generally always kept sleep mode on and not intended for the work day as the system's noise level is noticeable.

"What we're doing is we're essentially slowing a lot of things down and trying to tweak that adjustment to roughly cut the noise in half," Walter explained. “And so we end up slowing it down by about 50%. There are things like, do you know how fast the paper spins? How fast does the cartridge go back and forth? And all of these things produce different decibel levels. And so some things slow down more than others, some adapt more than others, and so we just optimized everything. "

The Envy Inspire's double-sided photo printing is a great addition.

The company stated that sleep mode will not affect print quality, which I think is correct.

For home users who want to print photos or work on scrapbooking projects while locked, the Envy Inspire's double-sided photo printing is a great addition. In addition to printing beautiful photos, the Envy can also extract the removable image file format data from your smartphone's camera to print the geotagged location, date and time on the back of the photo. This makes it easy for you to remember when the store was created. You can also add your own personal note – like "Grandma's 80th Birthday" – as a caption.

For now, the duplex photo printing feature with date, location, and timestamp is limited to the mobile app, but the company is working on bringing it to its desktop software in the future. The reason we rolled out the feature on mobile first is because most of our photos are already on our smartphones, HP said.

The Envy Inspire is designed for PCs and Macs as well as Android and iOS devices. In addition, HP has also worked with Google to make the Envy Inspire the first Chromebook certified printer.

“We have also thought of all the devices that will be in the household,” says Walter. “With more kids doing schoolwork or technology becoming more important to students, we partnered with Google, which has a certification program for Chromebooks. And we made sure that the HP Envy Inspire is the first HP printer to be certified to work with Chromebooks. "

Our opinion

The HP Envy Inspire complements HP's printing universe as a powerful printer for all your home, craft and work projects. With the Envy Inspire, HP not only delivered on its promise to bring the best of inkjet technologies into a single printer, but also created a tool with features that can come in handy as more people, including, work from home during the pandemic a quiet mode and powerful photo functions.

Is there a better alternative?

HP's Envy Inspire uses inkjet printing technology, and the company claims it combines the best of features from the Tango, Envy, and OfficeJet Pro lines. Suitable inkjet alternatives include the HP Tango series. Make sure to check out our recommendations for the best inkjet printers.

If you need a faster printer to process documents, the OfficeJet Pro 9025e from HP is a great alternative. At $ 249, the Envy Inspire 7900e is $ 100 cheaper than the dedicated office range from HP in the test. The hybrid work / home market that the Envy was designed for makes it a more versatile solution as it is designed for printing documents and photos. Moving to the flatbed version of the Envy Inspire – the Envy Inspire 7200e is coming early next year – will make the price even more competitive, as this model is expected to cost $ 179 when it launches.

Budget conscious buyers who are concerned about the price of inkjet printers, printers with refillable ink tanks, like Epson's EcoTank ET3830, will lower your long-term running costs with cheaper, refillable ink tanks.

How long it will take?

The HP printer has a one-year limited hardware warranty that can be extended to two years. The printer benefits from regular software updates to keep it secure and may even add new features over time through the HP Smart Printing app.

Printers are not designed for annual or biennial upgrades like smartphones, and the HP Envy Inspire should last for many years provided you keep getting fresh ink and paper. The company offers a subscription ink service that makes it easy to refill ink, but not paper. A combo subscription to refill ink and photo paper would make this an excellent printer for the craft room, home historian, and budding photographer.

Should you buy it?

Yes sir. If you are looking for a home printer that can print, scan and copy, the HP Envy Inspire is an excellent choice. Unlike Envy printers, the Envy Inspire doesn't reinvent printer design. Instead, HP plays up the utilitarian aesthetic of this printer to deliver a solid all-round workhorse that will blend in well with your home or home office workflow.

Editor's recommendations



14 May
Blog

Printer Reviews | Digital Trends

Improve your lifestyle

With Digital Trends, readers keep an eye on the fast-paced world of tech with the latest news, fun product reviews, insightful editorials, and unique insights.

Digital trends can earn a commission when you buy from links on our website.

Copyright © 2021 Designtechnica Corporation. All rights reserved.

12 May
Blog

Matterhackers Pulse XE 3D Printer Review: A Durable High-End 3D Printer

matterhackers pulse xe review 11

MatterHackers Pulse XE NylonX Advanced Materials 3D printer package

"If you need to print with exotic, high-performance materials, this is the right printer."

  • Excellent out-of-box performance

  • Wide material capacities

  • Durable, well-designed components

  • Attractive, modern design

  • State-of-the-art functions

  • Requires a dedicated computer to reach its full potential

  • Lack of ventilation system

  • Not the fastest

Printing with high-performance materials can be difficult. Sure, there are options on the market, but most come in the form of retrofitting aftermarket components to a printer in one way or another, at least in the mid-range consumer market. Enter the MatterHackers Pulse XE, the highest end of the MatterHackers Pulse line of 3D printers, and one of the few devices designed exclusively to instantly print some of the hardest materials on the market.

The pulse line is an interesting linchpin of its creators. MatterHackers has long been known as a reseller of a wide variety of 3D printers and materials that can be used with them. Thanks to this, MatterHackers has been effectively gathering information about what members of the 3D printing community expect from their printers for years and showing what types of pulses are available. The Pulse range is available in three options with multiple combinations of even more specialized hardware and a love letter to your market. Resolve dozens of common complaints with out-of-the-box hardware and include many of the most common aftermarket upgrades as standard components. In conjunction with MatterControl (MatterHackers control software), each pulse is an attractive product in itself.

STANDOUT FUNCTIONS AND SPECIFICATIONS

The outstanding selling point of the Pulse XE is its versatility, but also its user friendliness should not be underestimated. With a build volume of 250 x 220 x 215 mm (10 x 9 x 8.5 inches), the Pulse finds a good balance while maintaining a manageable space requirement with a respectable capacity.

In addition, the leveling routine via the connected BLTouch sensor ensures a reliable, easy-to-calibrate printer. The functions of MatterControl when a host device is connected to the printer make it incredibly easy to use. An optional magnetic removable build plate (included with this test model) makes removing the print incredibly easy.

MatterHackersJames Lynch / Digital Trends

Finally there is Olsson Ruby nozzle on hotend. The Pulse XE can hardly be called "high performance" when using a standard brass die for extrusion. The name of the Olsson Ruby nozzle doesn't just sound cool. At the top of this otherwise normal-looking 3D printer nozzle is a small ruby ​​with an even smaller hole on the bottom that serves as an opening. The hardness of the ruby ​​gives the nozzle an exceptional lifespan and enables it to withstand even the most abrasive filaments with ease. While other nozzle options exist that achieve similar goals, they are typically made entirely of hardened materials such as steel. The ruby ​​achieves the same goal with a laboratory-made gem that is held in the head of the nozzle. Admittedly, this is the brightest way to get things done.

The Pulse XE was manufactured using some of the highest quality parts in the consumer for prosumer markets

Another unique feature of the Pulse line is that, unlike most printers on the market, MatterHackers printers are specifically designed for their MatterControl control software, as they work mostly independently and connect to a computer that serves as a backup option. Connecting a dedicated computer to the Pulse increases its capabilities through several functions that are otherwise only found in the upper market segment. From the ability to self-calibrate with up to 100 individual data points, to a greater degree of control over movement during printing, to the resumption of 3D printing that was interrupted in the event of a power failure or other power failure, MatterControl increases the flexibility of the Massive machine (as long as the semi-finished print is still on the bed when the power supply is restored). This doesn't mean that the Pulse can't work on its own in the same way as other printers, just that adding a dedicated controller turns a Matterhackers Pulse from a good all-round performer into a cutting-edge piece of personal manufacturing equipment.

BUILD QUALITY AND RELIABILITY

The quality of the Pulse XE should not be underestimated. With a frame made from a hybrid of specially machined aluminum, anodized extrusions and precise 3D printed components (undoubtedly made with other pulse printers), this printer was built for a long service life. The damping mounts attached to each of the motors offer noise reduction, and care and attention has obviously been put into the overall design. The underlying build quality is one thing, but a lot can go wrong on a 3D printer with good bones. So what about the other components? In this area, MatterHackers definitely used the best that they could find.

MatterHackersJames Lynch / Digital Trends

As an example, MatterHackers decided to use E3Ds v6, a precision-made hot end from one of the most respected brands in 3D printing. To push the plastic itself, the ultra-high-performance extruder from BondTech was selected to ensure additional performance. The Ultimachines RAMBo Mini-Motherboard (with Panucatt's Azteeg x5 GT as an even more powerful upgrade) forms the brain of the device and the excellent VIKI 2 control panel at the front.

In short, the Pulse XE has been manufactured using some of the best consumer end parts for prosumer markets and also uses many parts that are normally added to printers as aftermarket upgrades as standard. All of this results in a precision-made printer with a legendarily reliable extrusion mechanism, a long-life motherboard (just like Lulzbots Taz 6 and Mini, and I would say every motherboard that NASA trusts me will trust) with an easy-to-read, informative display the front of the device. In the month that I had the Pulse, he easily mastered every challenge I faced him and has printed almost continuously since leaving the box.

PERFORMANCE

Could the Pulse XE have disadvantages with all of these great features? Unfortunately yes. While the Pulse works incredibly reliably and immediately has remarkable versatility, the biggest disadvantage of the XE and the Pulse line in general is the underlying design. The Pulse XE is a 3D printer with a side bed or bed spinner, ie the print bed moves from side to side in one direction to move the model to be printed. This is an incredibly easy to construct, maintain, and repair design (since this configuration allows easy access to the axle and its parts), but has the obvious disadvantage that moving the bed can cause reliability problems if it moves too quickly (Due to the dynamics of the bed in the fight against changes in direction). . This can manifest itself in the fact that in extreme cases the entire pressure shifts from side to side to small, wavy lines over the pressure at lower speeds. Momentum is not a friend of a bed sling. This means that the Pulse XE prints at an average speed that should be enough for most, but fades compared to the speeds of some other models.

James Lynch / Digital Trends

How good it prints, the Pulse XE works flawlessly right away. I have nothing to report about any scatter marks or stains, the layers are smooth and the corners are absolutely within the tolerances that you would expect. While it is worth noting that print quality for most 3D printers in the FDM or FFF category (i.e. they use a hot nozzle to extrude plastic filaments) may need to be roughly the same over time, modification and careful optimization the Pulse XE doesn't work whatever to produce excellent prints. With a thin layer of glue on the build plate and a short automatic calibration process, I was able to simply select "print" from the MatterControl user interface and leave, knowing that I would return to a finished model. The adhesive may be a sticking point for some, but is easy to apply and required to print the materials for which the XE was developed, such as. B. nylon (which has the ability to permanently bond to most reusable construction areas and thus permanently ruin them). A plate that does not require glue and is intended for use with other materials is available as an additional option from MatterHackers.

So if I am not talking about speed and not necessarily print quality, what am I talking about when I call the XE a "high performance" DD printer? In a word, materials. The components of the Pulse XE are designed to reach and withstand elevated temperatures, push plastic with greater force, and withstand the risk of damage from some of the more exotic materials. Some of these components are significantly more expensive than the standard, which explains the high cost of this machine, but the advantages are significant in terms of versatility. Thanks to these hardened components, the XE has access to materials such as nylon and polycarbonate, as well as materials with hard fibers or particles to increase strength, such as carbon or glass fibers.

Access to these materials opens up whole worlds to a print shop owner. Glass-infused nylon is widely used to manufacture power tool housings, drone frames, and low-power electronics heatsinks, while polycarbonate can be used for such diverse things as high-strength electronics housings, greenhouse walls, and any application that values ​​high impact strength. Another advantage of the hardened nozzle, however, is a material that few newbies would consider a risky material for a printer, namely anything that glows in the dark. With its hardened nozzle, the Pulse XE can withstand the heavy load of hard particles, which give the objects glowing in the dark their clear shine, whereby the nozzle of a standard printer wears out as soon as the first layers of the material are in place. From surprisingly challenging to previously impossible, the MatterHackers Pulse XE seems to print with almost any plastic that can be turned into a string.

SAFETY

James Lynch / Digital Trends

All of this goes well with an often overlooked disadvantage of working with such materials. Safety. I have used nylon extensively in my pulse testing over the past month, and during that time I had to feel quite comfortable in a ventilator because of the dangers of using such materials. For example, nylon releases some chemicals when it melts, but one of the most notable must be hydrogen cyanide. Yes, the cyanide. While my mask filters out a good amount of these toxic materials, it is certainly not a long-term solution. Proper ventilation through my skylights and exposure limitation also help, but an option for a filtered housing for the Pulse would work well for the future. Until then, use should be limited to a room where such materials are adequately ventilated and not in locations where the user can be continuously exposed to the materials during the printing process.

Our opinion

Overall, my time with the Pulse XE was phenomenal. From my fourteen printers, it quickly became a favorite, and the use was largely a blast. I can't imagine a task I couldn't do, and the latest version of MatterControl has proven to be an incredibly powerful control system. I would recommend it to anyone who wants to work with some of the wilder materials, and to those who are simply looking for a highly reliable printer, the cheaper standard Pulse is also a good choice.

Is there a better alternative?

While the desktop FDM printing market definitely has a lot of competition, the Pulse line stands out across the board. The basic Pulse model goes from head to toe with the original Prusa i3 MK3 / S, but offers the advantages of many other customization options and a shorter lead time.

In the meantime, the Pulse XE can be seen as a competitor to the Lulzbot Taz line and other real performance printers. In this case, the Lulzbot has an advantage in terms of build volume, but the ready-to-use ability of the Pulse XE to print with some of the most powerful materials on the market without modifications or additional components, magnetic beds, and slightly lower costs means that it is attractive Option remains.

How long it will take?

One of the biggest advantages of open source 3D printers like this is that their future lifespan is more or less unlimited. Both motherboards used in the Pulse run commonly used, widely used firmware systems that use a common protocol that has been standard in the 3D printing community for years. One particular advantage of the Pulse line is that it relies on MatterControl. Further updates to more advanced features are likely to be in preparation, and support for the product will be available in the coming years.

Should you buy it

Would you like to work with the best without fuss? If so, absolutely! Otherwise yes! This thing is awesome!

Editor's recommendations




07 May
Blog

Anycubic Photon 3D Printer Review

anycubic photon review 3d printer feat

Anycubic Photon 3D printer

"The Photon is one of the most detailed 3D printers you can get for $ 500 – but it's not perfect."

  • Extremely detailed prints

  • Touchscreen interface

  • Affordable price

  • No peeling mechanism

  • Small building area

Until recently, consumer-level stereolithography printers were essentially the unicorns of the 3D printing world. For years, there were few of them sold to consumers, and they were usually far too expensive for most 3D printing enthusiasts to afford.

Fortunately, that is starting to change. Over the past year, resin-based printers have entered the consumer market with increasing frequency – and this includes some extremely affordable options.

A typical example? The Anycubic Photon, one of the first SLA / DLP printers to hit the market at under $ 500. But can a cheap printer really be compared to industry giants like Ultimaker, Lulzbot and Formlabs? We took a spin to find out.

The Anycubic Photon was awarded the prize for the best products of the year. Make sure you check all other choices for the best 2018 products.

Excellent functions and specifications

There are a few things that make this printer stand out from the rest of the pack. It is primarily a DLP printer. This means that instead of spraying plastic filaments through a hot nozzle to create objects, UV light is radiated into a container with photoreactive resin to harden each layer. It is a fundamentally different machine than the Makerbots and Ultimakers in the world.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Second, it's tiny. In contrast to most consumer 3D printers, the Photon is about the size of two assembled shoe boxes and can therefore fit comfortably on your desktop. Unfortunately, this tiny space requirement also means that the printer has a correspondingly small construction area, so that you cannot print anything larger than 115 x 65 x 155 millimeters (4.5 x 2.5 x 6.1 inches) with this device.

It is far more detailed than even the highest quality FDM printers we have ever tested.

Fortunately, the photon offsets its tiny footprint with some incredible resolution / accuracy statistics. It can print layers less than 10 microns thick, making it far more detailed than even the highest quality FDM printers we've ever tested.

To top it off, the Photon is also equipped with a 2.8-inch touchscreen interface, which makes it much easier to adjust settings and start printing.

Setup and configuration

Setting up an SLA / DLP printer differs significantly from setting up an FDM printer. The good news is that this is easier with the photon too.

The printer is almost fully assembled, so preparing it for the first print is a breeze. There are essentially two steps: install and level the build plate, and then attach the resin container.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

Unfortunately, the process of leveling the building board is in no way automated, but it is still relatively easy to carry out. To ensure that you set the starting point of the Z axis to the correct height, Anycubic asks you to place a piece of printer paper on the LCD screen and then lower the build plate until you feel resistance as you move the paper. It's not the most polished system, but it works and can be completed in just a few minutes.

Once you have completed the leveling process, all you have to do is install the resin container and fill it with the supplied resin. All you have to do is loosen and tighten a pair of button screws, so you don't even need tools to do it.

Design and build quality

Don't be fooled by the fact that this printer only costs $ 500. It's amazingly well built for a printer that's so budget friendly. The building board and the resin tub are made of machined aluminum, for example, while the machine frame is made of stamped sheet metal. Nothing about it feels cheap.

The printer lacks many of the sophisticated design elements that are common in high-end machines.

However, the design is fairly simple. Aside from the touchscreen interface, the printer lacks many of the sophisticated design elements that are common in high-end machines. There is no automatic resin filler to begin with. So when your goose bumps run out, you have to stop the pressure and add more yourself. The photon also has no peeling or wiping mechanism, which increases the likelihood of printing errors.

It is also worth noting that this computer is designed to use a DLP process instead of a real SLA. This means that the printer does not flash and move a laser spot into the resin to keep track of the shape of each layer, but uses an LCD screen to cure an entire layer at a time. This leads to slight (but remarkable) differences in print quality, which we will discuss later.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

All in all, this printer is very well built, but it lacks a bit of design – at least from a technical and performance perspective. From the appearance alone, it's almost impossible to say that the photon only costs $ 500. However, if you examine some of the technical elements closely, you can see where Anycubic cuts corners. Still, this is a lot of printers for the price.

User interface and software

The integrated user interface of the Photon is as simple and straightforward as possible. The menu directory is extremely simple, so you can hardly get lost or confused. In addition, everything is touchscreen, so navigation between the menus is very intuitive. If you can use a smartphone, you can use this printer.

Anycubic's proprietary slicing program, Photon Slicer, is also fairly simple – if not a bit primitive and functional. It's not very pretty to look at and feels a bit like a CAD program from 1997, but the advantage is that it's also pretty minimalistic. There are not many options in which you can get lost, which makes it very easy and accessible for beginners. Even without previous experience with the program, we managed to start it and prepare our first 3D model within a few minutes.

Printing performance

The photon has gotten a lot of hype in the past few months and after testing it for a few weeks, we are here to tell you that the hype is absolutely justified. This printer beats far beyond its weight class.

When we first printed it, we skipped the usual 3D benchmark benchmark and threw the photon directly into the deep end with a ridiculously detailed "Bearded Yell" statue. This print eats FDM printers for breakfast and usually has all kinds of aberrations, over-extrusion artifacts and significant loss of detail. We were excited to see if this small SLA printer could do better.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

To our great joy, the photon made the model print look like a cake. There were some places where printing errors occurred, but the remaining 95 percent of the model was practically error-free. Fine details – such as the wrinkles on his forehead, individual hairs in his eyebrows and the shallow depressions in his molars – were all reproduced with astonishing accuracy. The surface quality was so good that it was almost impossible to distinguish one layer from the next. In some cases, the people we showed it to in the office didn't notice that the model was 3D printed.

Our second test model (a very detailed lock) came out even better. Without a magnifying glass, we couldn't even see individual layers. Tiny elements like the battlements and battlements of the castle (which were so small that they justifiably couldn't be reproduced on an FDM printer) came out perfectly. The only other machine we've tested that delivers such incredible details is the Form 2, which costs $ 3,200.

This printer offers an incredible amount of bang for your buck when it comes to resolution and surface finish.

However, there were some minor problems. In our first two test prints, certain sections looked crushed as if someone had flattened them with a hot iron or hit them with a belt sander. These errors were caused by incomplete peeling – when the resin solidifies after the impact of UV light, but adheres more firmly to the bottom of the resin container than to the printed part, so the printer does not completely peel off to the next level.

Since the photon has no peel mechanism (some printers tip one end of the resin container so that the part gradually peels off from left to right instead of pulling straight up and peeling all parts at the same time), it is more prone to these types of errors. Despite the fact that the photon does not detach carefully, these errors have occurred to a very limited extent.

Dan Baker / Digital Trends

The other thing to note is that this DLP printer is also prone to voxelization due to its fact. Simply put, this is basically the 3D version of the pixelation. The UV light of this device is emitted from a pixel-based LCD screen, so that smooth curves cannot be generated at the microscopic level. Imagine trying to build a ball out of Legos. It is only on a really small scale.

Fortunately, in the case of the photon, this voxelization is so slight that you don't really notice it until you look for it. It's like watching movies on a huge TV. If you really approach, you can see the pixels, but practically nonexistent at normal range.

Our opinion

The Photon is without a doubt one of the best printers you can get for $ 500.

It's definitely not on a par with high-end printers like the Formlabs Form 2 when it comes to functionality and reliability, but in terms of pure print quality, it's just a few steps. If you print the same object on both machines and place it side by side, most people cannot tell the difference. That is damn impressive.

Is there a better alternative?

If you're looking for the most detailed, high-resolution prints for the least amount of money, look no further. This printer offers an incredible amount of bang for your buck when it comes to resolution and surface finish.

However, it is also worth noting that resin printers are not for everyone. Resin is sticky, messy, and a pain in the ass to clean up. You must soak finished parts in isopropyl alcohol to remove uncured resin and wear nitrile gloves to avoid direct contact. In other words, SLA printers are relatively maintenance-intensive. So if you are unwilling to post-process or plan to print in large quantities, we recommend sticking with FDM.

The photon is also not the best choice if you need to print large or even medium-sized objects. We recommend spending your money on an FDM printer like the Monoprice Maker Select Plus, which has a much larger envelope, but still costs less than $ 500.

How long it will take?

For the most part, there are not very many components on this machine that are likely to wear out – apart from the non-stick FEP plates on the bottom of the resin container, which you need to replace regularly anyway. The photon doesn't have many moving parts. As long as you keep the threaded rod oiled and maintain the resin pan carefully, it will likely take years.

Should you buy it

Hell yes you should. There are many ways to spend $ 500 and this is one of the best we can think of.

Editor's recommendations




25 Mar
Blog

3D Systems Cube 3D Printer Review

3D Systems Cube 3D printer spool

3D Systems Cube 3D printer

"The Cube 3 is one of the most feature-rich printers you can get for less than $ 1,000, but its hit-or-miss performance can be frustrating."

  • About simplified user experience

  • Double extruder

  • Self-calibrating

  • Wi-Fi connectivity

  • Closed design

  • Under $ 1,000

  • Buggy, frustrating software

  • Advanced user controls are missing

  • Expensive proprietary filament cartridges

  • Loud operation

  • Unheated bed occasionally causes misprints

As with beer, steaks, and roofers, you get what you pay for when it comes to 3D printing. Fancy features come at a price, and if you want to have two extruders and touch screens on your printer, for example, you'll have to spend a lot of money – unless you buy a Cube 3. This printer was developed by 3D Systems and offers a range of highs -End features for under $ 1,000.

It almost seems too good to be true, so we got our hands on one and put it to the test.

Features and specifications

For a printer with such a low price, the Cube 3 offers some incredible specs. In addition to a neat, completely closed design, the printer is equipped with two extruders, a maximum resolution of 70 micrometers, Wi-Fi connectivity and an integrated touchscreen for navigation. You'll find it hard to find some of these things on a $ 3,000 printer. So if you see them on a printer that costs less than $ 1,000, you'll see a unicorn riding a centaur.

Setup and configuration

3D Systems designed the Cube 3 to be user-friendly, and nothing makes this clearer than the ridiculously simple setup process. The machine is ready for use almost immediately, and once you start it up, it does almost everything for you – including calibration and leveling of the build plate. All you have to do is tap a few buttons on the device's built-in touchscreen display and you're done.

3D Systems Cube 3D printer LED screen 2 "data-image-id =" 811539BIll Roberson / Digital Trends

BIll Roberson / Digital Trends

The hardest part of the whole process is likely to be entering your WiFi password so you can connect the Cube 3 to your home network. To do this, you have to scroll through the alphabet to find and enter every number / letter / symbol. It's a bit annoying for sure, but it's not that difficult in the big scheme of things either. Entering the password is the most difficult part of the entire setup process? That says something.

Construction quality and design

Many 3D printers do not try to hide the fact that they are 3D printers, but the Cube 3 does, and we appreciate it. Instead of leaving all belts, motors and gears visible for everyone, 3D Systems stowed everything in a neat plastic housing and gave the machine a clean, smooth and inviting appearance. If you value aesthetics, this printer should definitely be on your radar.

If we had to summarize the printing performance of Cube 3 in one word, that word would probably be "meh".

This is also not a problem in the processing quality department. The plastic case feels a little thin and fragile at certain points, but the printer is fairly sturdy and well built overall. I had to move it between the DT office and my house a couple of times, and each time I just put my hand through the opening and carried the thing around on my forearm. Everything about the printer is closed and secure, so I didn't have to worry about damaging it – even if I had to take it with me on the bus one day.

3D Systems also included a number of other small design features that make the Cube 3 great to use, such as a waste collection system, a removable build plate, and a rapidly changing filament system. But some of them are mixed blessings.

Take the filament spool system, for example. Cube 3 PLA is supplied in these small, pre-packed spools that are attached to the sides of the machine and snap into the extruder (printhead) with a simple turn. This makes filament insertion a breeze, but it also means that you can't use cartridges made by someone other than 3D Systems, which is a little annoying. It is exactly the same problem you encounter with 2D printers: once you buy the device, it only works with a certain type of ridiculously overpriced ink cartridge. Your average PLA or ABS spool costs around $ 30, but these fancy (and admittedly practical) spool cartridges from 3D Systems cost you $ 49 per pop.

Another double-edged design feature is the magnetically attached construction board of the printer. The absence of clips makes the plate very easy to remove, which makes prying your finished objects off the plate a little easier. The downside, however, is that it's not heated and isn't quite as safe as if it were cut off. We had a couple of printing problems (more on that in a moment) with the Cube, and as far as we can tell, they were caused either by the building board moving on its magnetic armature so easily or by the filament not adhering properly to the unheated board. This didn't happen with every press, but it happened often enough that it was remarkable.

Last but not least, there is network connectivity. Cube 3 can connect to your computer via WiFi. That's great. Depending on the complexity of the object you want to send, this can take a few minutes to a few hours. With more complex models, it takes ages to transfer them to the printer over WiFi, and many basic models take a few more minutes. Wireless connectivity is great, but annoyingly slow most of the time.

All in all, I would say that while the Cube 3's design is far from perfect, its pros and cons definitely outweigh the disadvantages.

User interface and software

With just a touchscreen and a single button, navigation on the Cube's user interface should be a matter of course for anyone using a smartphone – which is practically everyone at the moment.

But the software you need to use to actually do the damn thing is terrible. We don't normally look too deeply at software reviews in our 3D printer reviews, but it was bad enough to warrant a discussion.

With such a low price, the Cube 3 offers some pretty incredible specs.

In contrast to most other 3D printers, which are designed for open source slicer programs such as Cura or Slic3r, Cube only works with its own software program called Cubify. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, and Cube 3 is definitely not the only 3D printer that runs on proprietary software. Unfortunately, the program that works with Cube 3 is a pain. It's like the crappy software that comes with some all-in-one printers / scanners / copiers. It looks good, but it doesn't work very well and is so simplified that it's frustrating to use.

Performing basic tasks (connecting to the printer, adding an STL file, changing the fill settings, etc.) is easy enough, but there are practically no advanced user controls, and some things just don't work properly.

For example, after loading an STL file onto your "shelf", the printer only appears to accept it in about 50 percent of the cases. The other 50 percent see an error message explaining that the model may not work with the printer and may need to be re-synced to get the best results. This is pretty annoying and happened to us on several computers. Oddly enough, the prints would work well if we ignored the warning.

3D Systems Cube 3D printer LED screen "data-image-id =" 811538BIll Roberson / Digital Trends

BIll Roberson / Digital Trends

In other cases, STL files loaded easily, but the program did not allow us to save the changes we made. This made it impossible to print with the desired settings. There have been several instances where this has happened to us. The only way to fix this was to close the program, reopen it, and try again. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't – which is insanely frustrating.

If 3D systems could fix this software, they would have an impressive little printer under $ 1,000 in hand, but currently this software is a major obstacle to usability.

Printing performance

If we had to summarize the printing performance of Cube 3 in one word, that word would probably be "meh". It's nowhere near as accurate or detailed as high-end printers, and the objects it produces are far from perfect – but it also has some redemption features that you wouldn't normally find in this price range.

The machine is ready for use almost immediately.

For starters, it has two extruders, so it can print in two different colors or materials at the same time. This is fantastic for two reasons. First, you can print two-color objects at once. Secondly, it is possible to print your object with a material and to print the supports with the absolutely fantastic water-soluble filament from 3D Systems. This means that you don't have to spend half an hour breaking off supports and cleaning your pressure. You can simply drop the finished product into a water bath and let the supports dissolve.

Nevertheless, the printing performance of the Cube 3 leaves something to be desired, even with two extruders. With Cubify software you can only print with layer thicknesses of 200 or 70 microns. So you have to choose between fast and low resolution or slow and detailed. To be fair, there is this compromise in every 3D printer, but Cube 3 doesn't offer you any options for the middle ground. If you want to print at 100 microns, you're out of luck.

Print speed and resolution are decent, but have problems with fine details and dimensional accuracy. The dimensional accuracy was omnipresent when we ran the 3D benchy test. The lengths and widths of certain parts ranged from exactly up to 200 micrometers. You honestly wouldn't be able to see this with the naked eye, and it probably doesn't matter whether you're just printing soap dishes and candle holders for your home – but if you need extreme precision, that's probably not the case. t the printer you should be using.

The biggest problem we encountered with the Cube 3 was an abundance of misprints – no matter how many times we calibrated it. If you do not apply the adhesive properly to the bed, the first layer may not adhere strongly enough to the ceramic substrate, which can (and will) lead to printing errors. But we also found printing errors when we applied the glue perfectly. So it's more of a hit-or-miss affair. We are not quite sure whether we should blame the unheated bed of the machine or the fact that it moves easily on the magnetic armatures, but the fact is that we have a number of printing errors with the Cube 3 and this couldn't I don't know how to avoid them.

Maintenance, repairability and upgradeability

One of the things we liked most about the Cube was that it was easy to maintain. 3D Systems has thought about this area and it really shows it. The quickly changing filament system is child's play and the magnetically anchored pressure plate can be easily removed for cleaning. There are also waste bins that automatically collect excess filament and a self-calibration system that levels everything with just a few clicks. Regardless of how you look at it, maintaining and servicing the Cube 3 is a breeze.

Just don't break it. The completely closed design of the printer makes disassembly difficult. So if something goes wrong internally, you probably can't fix it yourself.

You can't update it much either. This device is not designed for upgrades or accessories of any kind – except for software and firmware updates, which we sincerely hope will be available soon.

Conclusion

The DT accessory package

Improve your game and get the most out of your equipment with the following extras selected by our editors:

3D systems Isense 3D scanner ($ 455)

3D Systems 2.37 fl oz cube adhesive ($ 9)

3D Systems Sense 3D scanner ($ 386)

The Cube 3 scores with great design and useful features, but the poor reliability and frustrating software of the machine sometimes make it difficult to use. This is a great option for anyone looking for an easy, non-technical way to get started with 3D printing. However, users looking for high quality prints and advanced printing options should look elsewhere.

However, this is also one of the most powerful printers you can find for less than $ 1,000. Even with occasional misprints, this device offers you a lot of money.

Heights

  • About simplified user experience
  • Double extruder
  • Self-calibrating
  • Wi-Fi connectivity
  • Closed design
  • Under $ 1,000

Lows

  • Buggy, frustrating software
  • Advanced user controls are missing
  • Expensive proprietary filament cartridges
  • Loud operation
  • Unheated bed occasionally causes misprints

Editor's recommendations




07 Mar
Blog

Formlabs Form 1+ SLA 3D Printer Review

Formlabs Form 1+ SLA 3D printer

"Formlabs & # 39; Form 1+ produces some of the highest quality prints we've seen from a 3D printer, but high up-front costs and maintenance will scare off hobbyists."

  • Outstanding print quality

  • Attractive design

  • Supports multiple materials

  • Expensive

  • Maintenance intensive

  • Too complex for DIY repairs

When you hear the expression “3D printer”, you are probably imagining a conventional FDM (Filament Deposition Modeling) printer. These are the ones who take a thermoplastic coil, heat it up and spray it through a nozzle to create objects layer by layer. This technology has made leaps and bounds in recent years and is still improving today – but recently another 3D printing technique has crept into the mainstream: stereolithography, or SLA for short.

Instead of melting plastic to create objects layer by layer, SLA printers use a laser projection system to “grow” objects from a pool of UV-curable resin. When the laser flashes over the resin shell, a thin layer solidifies on the building board, which is slowly pulled upwards with each new layer.

Formlabs' Form 1 printer (which has now become Form 1+) was one of the first consumer-oriented SLA printers to hit the market. At $ 3,300, it's still more than most FDM consumer models, but according to the company, it can "outperform even high-end FDM presses."

Does it live up to all the hype? We got our hands on the company's new and improved Form 1+ to find out.

Features and specifications

When unpacked, the form weighs 1+ 18 pounds and measures 12 x 11 x 18 inches. Compared to most of the other 3D printers we've used, it's definitely a bit more compact – so it can be placed almost anywhere – including your desk. It's not that big that it affects all of your desktop real estate.

The bad news is that this leads to a relatively small construction area. Under its UV-blocking orange hood is the Form 1+ with a 4.9 × 4.9 × 6.5 inch building board, a removable resin shell and a 405-nm violet laser of class 1. Basically, this last specification means that the laser is strong enough to solidify resin with just a short flash, but not so strong that it burns your eyeballs if you stare into the printer while it is making your parts.

The machine also comes with the Form Finishing Kit: a set of tools, trays and other materials that you can use to improve your prints after they are finished. This is a nice touch for sure, but it's not just a nice little bonus that Formlabs introduced as a bonus – it's crucial and you have to use it every time you print something. More on that later.

Finally, the printer comes with a number of different "functional resins" that allow you to print more than just hard plastic parts. In addition to the normal photopolymer resin, Formlabs also offers a clear resin for faster printing, a flexible variant for the production of parts that can be bent easily, and a “pourable” variant for the production of molds.

Setup and configuration

According to Formlabs, Form 1+ was created to be simple and easy to use. This statement could not be truer in terms of furnishings. We are not sure if it could be easier. Everything is pre-assembled and since there is no filament extruder to play with, the machine does not need to be calibrated. To start printing, all you have to do is empty some resin into the tray, connect the printer to your computer's USB port, load a print file, and click Go.

The most difficult part of the setup is probably the installation of the associated software. Due to the nature of Formlabs' SLA printing technology, the printer cannot use conventional slicer programs such as Cura or Slic3r – it only works with PreForm.

Fortunately, the program is fairly easy to install and use. The user interface is great – the menus are organized logically, the icons make the button functions fairly obvious even to the unfamiliar user, and editing your 3D model is extremely intuitive. The learning curve is extremely low, but this is partly due to the fact that no advanced customization options are available in the program.

The system's default configuration settings should be sufficient to get you started. If something does not work or you need to make adjustments, all advanced settings are made in PreForm. This saves you the tedious task of navigating through menus on a tiny LCD screen and allows you to use a mouse instead of a button or a directional pad.

Construction quality and design

If a 3D printer can look cool, Formlabs has made it here. Unlike the efficiency-oriented industrial look that most printers seem to prefer, Form 1+ offers a much more elegant and attractive design. It looks like a modern "box with curved corners", which makes it feel a little more polished and professional – if you don't mind this large orange UV hood.

Practically every component feels robust and reliable on this machine.

Form 1+ also achieved good grades for the build quality. Nothing about it feels weak or cheap. The hinges on the bonnet, the clips in the resin shell, the single button on the front – practically every component feels robust and reliable with this machine. And although it probably wouldn't survive a fall from your desk, the occasional accidental bump won't bother him.

Printing performance

To test the capabilities of the printer, we went through our usual glove with print benchmarks and test objects.

The first thing we measured was the print speed. In theory, these SLA printers are said to be much faster than their brothers, who melt filaments because they only have to flash a laser over the resin shell to create a layer. To test the speed, we first printed a 1x1x1 centimeter cube with the standard layer thickness of 100 micrometers. With this setting, the printing took exactly 19 minutes. However, this is not particularly quick. For the second test, we increased the layer thickness to 200 micrometers (which is only possible with the clear resin from Formlabs – not with the colored variant). With these settings, the printer spat out the cube flat in 9 minutes. However, at the highest resolution settings (25 micron layer thickness), printing the same cube takes well over an hour.

Formlabs Form 1+ 3D printerBill Roberson / Digital Trends

Bill Roberson / Digital Trends

Based on these tests, it is clear that Form 1+ is not much faster or slower than an average FDM printer. At the standard resolution, it chugs at about the same pace as the other printers. However, if you reduce the layer thickness and use the printer's potential for full resolution, it will take a little longer. Even with SLA technology, the compromise between resolution and speed is about the same as with FDM.

That said, other print statistics are really impressive. Form 1+ absolutely shredded the test object “STRG V” printed by us, with which, for example, minimum wall thickness, maximum unsupported span, maximum overhang angle and more are to be tested. The piece was definitely not perfect, but it was much cleaner and more complete than what we normally see from FDM printers.

After a few weeks, it's pretty clear that Formlabs isn't just blowing smoke with all the claims about professional print quality. The Form 1+ indeed offers more detailed, higher quality prints than many other consumer-oriented 3D printers currently available. It's not much faster, but there are only a handful of competing machines that can do what this thing does. Oh, and not to mention that Form 1+ can also print flexible materials, which is pretty cool.

Maintenance, repairability, upgradeability

If there is an area where Form 1+ has problems, it is maintenance. The photopolymer resin that SLA printers use is an absolute pain in the ass. We can't knock on the Form 1+ specifically for that, as it's definitely not the only printer that works this way – but handling resin is definitely a nightmare – at least compared to a spool of plastic filament.

Resin requires drastically more attention to detail than ABS or PLA filaments. Before printing, you need to make sure there are no large bubbles in the resin tray as they may create a hole in your print. Sometimes a small hole is not a big deal, but sometimes it can ruin your entire model. The resin is also more viscous than water, so bubbles do not always rise very quickly to allow for easy bursting. So sometimes you have to wait for them to dissolve.

Formlabs Form 1+ 3D printerBill Roberson / Digital Trends

Bill Roberson / Digital Trends

And that's just step one. The real fun starts after your print is done. In this case, you'll need to put on rubber gloves (trust me, don't do it with your bare hands), pry the sticky model off the build plate, and wipe it around in a bath with isopropyl alcohol. This will dissolve uncured resin that may adhere to your model.

But you're still not out of the forest! Before you start printing again, you have to do one step. To make sure there are no cured parts lurking in the resin shell (which would block the laser and screw up your pressure), you'll need to rake a comb through the Goop pool to catch stragglers. Then you need to remove the tool used, wait for the bubbles to dissolve, and then start printing again. It's pretty tiring to be honest.

The photopolymer resin that SLA printers use is an absolute pain in the ass.

Repairability is also a difficult task for the printer. Formlabs has tried to keep moving parts as small as possible so that errors occur less frequently. That's nice – but if there is a chance that something will go wrong, getting into this machine and repairing it yourself is probably a difficult task. Everything about this printer is inherently more complicated than the technology that powers an FDM printer.

Smaller problems can be fixed easily enough – for example, a dusty mirror can be cleaned with a can of compressed air in just a minute – but bigger problems (an engine stops working, the mirror loses alignment, the laser breaks out, or you if you do If you drop some resin in the lower chamber, you will almost certainly need to contact customer service or send your printer in for repair.

The DT accessory package

Improve your game and get the most out of your equipment with the following extras selected by our editors:

Isopropyl alcohol ($ 25)

Canned air ($ 5.84)

flexible resin ($ 99)

However, we haven't found any of these issues during our testing, so we have every reason to believe that these issues are extremely rare. But still – if you ever have an accident, it's probably not going to be a DIY repair, which is annoying.

You can now simply forget that it can be updated. You get what you see with this machine. You can buy new types of resin and some spare parts, but as far as we can tell, the machine is not designed for upgrades or extensions.

Conclusion

Comparing an SLA printer to an FDM printer is similar to comparing apples to oranges: they are certainly different, but ultimately they are both fruits. Anyone who says you can't compare the two is a fool.

The Form 1+ is arguably one of the best consumer-oriented SLA printers currently available – but within the broader category of 3D printers, it is not necessarily the leader – at least in the opinion of this reviewer. The print resolution this device offers is excellent and, thanks to several quality measurements, far ahead of most FDM printers.

But not all of them. The Ultimaker 2 offers the same specifications for maximum resolution (only 25 microns) and can produce comparable prints without worrying about photopolymer resin (which is not only messy, but costs $ 150 per bottle). It's also $ 800 cheaper than the $ 3,300 Form 1+.

Simply put, we would only recommend this printer if your only concern is print quality. If you want the best prints you can possibly get from a printer in this price range, look no further.

However, if you're interested in things like price, convenience, and repairability, you should consider other options. There are tons of traditional FDM printers that offer slightly poorer print quality but also require far less maintenance and are sold at a much cheaper price.

While Form 1+ is definitely at the top of the list in terms of printing performance, you can get a lot more for your money elsewhere.

Heights

  • Outstanding print quality
  • Attractive design
  • Supports multiple materials

Lows

  • Expensive
  • Maintenance intensive
  • Too complex for DIY repairs

Editor's recommendations