tl;dr Don’t hate on people who got tricked into buying a Bambu printer. Direct your hatred to Bambu itself.
We all know about the anti-consumer Bambu Printer changes by now. But I think it’s important to remember not to make fun of people who already bought one. In fact, most agree with you that these changes are unacceptable. So those people already got kicked in the gut.
As someone who bought from Prusa instead of Bambu, I completely understand the feeling of “Ha, I told you so!” But spreading that on every post is actually counter-productive. Remember that most people who bought a Bambu printer did so because it topped every “best 3D printers” list, had tons of sponsored content, and were affordable easy-to-use printers. Not everybody heard about the potential for such anti-consumer changes to be made. And many who did know were often misled into thinking it wouldn’t happen.
Instead of being critical of individuals, be critical of Bambu themselves. Bambu are the ones who screwed over tons of people who love this hobby. If we want to see 3D printing be an open-source style hobby, then we need to help people see the value in that. So if anything, this is the chance for you to make more people aware of good, open systems. If you make fun of people and point fingers at them, you are just making them defensive. Don’t make them direct any hatred at you that could be directed at the company itself.
Hope this isn’t too preachy. I just wanted to get this out there.
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Direct the “I told you so”'s at media. That favorite YouTuber? It’s their fault. Just watched a couple of them complain as if they weren’t the problem in the first place.
It was their job to make sure everyone knew the risks. They are advocates, and highly knowledgeable, and ignored those risks when making recommendations. Or at best, downplayed them. Sad, really.
This.
I got super unlucky here, and this news dropped literally the day after I bought an A1.I’m still going to try and force it into a usable no-internet state, but I don’t have high hopes right now.
Alternative thought - don’t worry about hating anybody or anything, just print shit and have fun. I don’t regret my A1 for one second.
Doing some research comparing prusa’s github and bambu’s I realized the firmware was closed sourced and that completely disqualified it from consideration. Also, not being to update without connecting to their servers is a no no. I believe everybody should closely research what they’re getting next time they make a purchase. Sorry for all of those who bought Bambus.
I got gifted one, so I didn’t choose it. It’s a great printer, but it sucks that Bambu Lab is pulling that shit.
Yes.
You shit on the individual asshole executives. Not the people who got screwed. Not the company, which has no agency and can do nothing. The individual executives, including the board of directors.
Luigi has taught us well.
Stallman Was Right material
Pssh. With my amazing, unerring genius foresight, I predicted this years ago. All the dumb, mindless drones should have seen this coming, it was sooo obvious! Plus, I’m a fundamentalist, so neither myself, my friends, nor family use anything but open-source software at home, work, and school.
Seriously, that’s how it comes across…
I don’t get it?
How many people bought a Bambu expecting to legally and completely escape their walled garden?
All the “I told you so’s” and general haters can pound sand, their opinion and irrelevant smugness of something that does’t affect them is irritating.
I have 3 printers. One is completely FOSS, the other two not. I bought the two knowing that I was getting in to someone’s closed system and subject to the whims of the rights holder. Know how much Bambu’s change affects my day? Zero. Still a great printer doing what I want it to. And I also realize that a subscription might happen. Sucks, but I knew that when I bought in. This righteous indignation on behalf of those of us who knew what the score was is ridiculous.
It’s not the walled garden that I object to. I had been planning on Bambu until now. It’s the mandatory online mode where you won’t be able to print without being online and getting their authorization. They used to have a lan only mode.
Yeah this part bugs me the most. So if my internet is down for whatever reason I can’t use my local printer. Fuck you Bambu.
I’m glad you are able to make a different and more suitable choice for your needs.
Shame bambu enshittified. I was looking at bambu next as I just want a 3d printer that doesnt start putting out pure trash 2 years into its ownership for no reason.
Honestly, I’m just glad that going forward, when people ask which 3D printer to get, it’s no longer going to be “Bambu” 9 out of 10 times.
Still gonna be Bambu out of my mouth 9 out of 10 times. This change doesn’t affect most of my customers (to put it in perspective, I do over 1k unique 3D printer repairs per year).
I’m still an open source enthusiast/zealot - but the fact is, most “normal” people, don’t give a flying shit about this stuff.
This will be a footnote in my suggestions to them, however.
This 100%. Most people just want an easy experience without too much tinkering and bambu does just that.
Bambu made 3d printing an appliance. Before Bambu there is no way my ~65 year old mother would be able to own and be self reliantly productive with a 3d printer.
Prusa was close, but comparatively much more expensive.
I don’t and won’t own a Bambu, but if nothing else they opened the world’s eyes to what is possible, now hopefully more friendly companies like prusa will learn from it.
Does anyone have 3rd party firmware, or produce a board that would compatible with existing 3rd party firmware using stock bambu wiring? Because it seems like that sort of thing could quickly be pretty popular…
Up until this change you could install and root the firmware with Bambu’s permission.
One idea that crossed my mind is that the open(ish) firmware started to edge into future product territory.
Bambu’s pages for third party firmware are still up but seem to no longer work: (I tried today) https://bambulab.com/en-us/third-party-firmware/plan?ref=blog.bambulab.com
I was looking at getting the A1 with the multi material thing because it was fairly cheap and I wanted a printer that got good quality without me having to constantly tweak it like my Ender 3. Is there something else that offers similar at that price range? I just want to print good in multiple materials out of the box.
Prusa has a good 3d printer with it their version of the mmu but it’s more expensive. Kinda what you get when your company pays everybody fair wages.
There really isn’t. That’s why Bambu has such a strong stranglehold on the market. The price/feature set balance is just sooooooo tilted in their favor right now that it’s hard to legitimately pick something else unless you are a stone wall when it comes to compromise in open source philosophy. If the open source philosophy and dogma aren’t really part of who you are, there’s no reason this change will affect you in the first place.
I would be highly suspcious of anything running proprietary software and connected to the open internet, especially now that you’ve got ignorant states like NJ and NY looking to prosecute people who might be making anything that vaguely resembles a gun part.
Same goes for slicers. Some of those don’t respect privacy either.
Kinda hard not to when every 3d printer hobbyist I know of warned people about this. But you right.
I f-in knew it from the start. I kept telling everyone. But it’s hard to listen when every youtuber and their mom switched to bambu. I don’t like Prusa all that much either, but they are A LOT better than bambu. So I blame Bambu, but also YouTubers and influencers who started peddling them from the start. I’ll stock up on E3d v6 hotends and generic extruders while they are still available.
I don’t like Prusa all that much either, but they are A LOT better than bambu.
In what aspect? Because it’s not reliability. Or speed. Or ease of repair. Or features. Or price.
Jo’s been throwing shit at the wall as fast as he can to catch up to Bambu; and that’s good for all of us - certainly. But this isn’t a Bambu vs Prusa thing here. Prusa added the dogbone that voids your warranty if you want to flash a new bootloader to the buddyboard – did you have a problem with that? Did you cry ‘slippery slope’ back then?
What about all the other great machines out there that are quickly catching up to Bambu’s feature set? The K2 seems to be quite interesting. There’s room for everyone here.
In terms of being open source and maintaining that model. Also having some of the parts actually be 3d printed. Other than that, I don’t know, Ive never owned one, never used one. It is too expensive for me for the features it has. Also xl seems to be a unique thing. Too expensive, though.
As for flashing the Prusa, I don’t follow Prusa, so I didn’t know about that one, but voiding a warranty vs locking you out isn’t the same thing really. Though I wouldn’t consider it a good move, I understand it somewhat.
If I was buying a new printer, which I won’t, I’d go for a Sovol SV08, which is somewhat of a Voron clone.
