Finally! Someone "actually" showing some multi color prints and comparisons! Up until now, it was creators showing off single color prints they added together to make a "multi color" print. Thanks for sharing!

But there is a Anycubic Cobra 3 profile for Orca Slicer... It works very well, and can optimize color switching.

Came here because of Jeff G and subscribed, some great videos! Rainbow filament one from a while back was very useful. Working my way through! Thanks

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

Thanks for stopping by! I review printers for Tom's Hardware -- I'm getting more content posted over here very soon!

I believe AnyCubic has said they will be shipping profiles for both PrusaSlicer and OrcaSlicer for this machine. (Not so certain) they will be fully open sourcing it so a conventional build of Klipper will be available as well. I have a Kobra 3 on order and am looking forward to getting it; the fact that an add-on product will be available later this year to simultaneously allow use of 2 ace units is very attractive.

Thanks for the quick comparison! It's good to know the ACE is at least executed fairly well. Lots of room for improvement. Personally, I don't think I'll get into any multi color printing that produces so much waste.

I have my kobra 2, and while it's had its ups and downs, I FINALLY have it dialed in and it is fantastic...for now. I was somewhat excited when I first heard about the K3, and I was interested, but everything I have heard and seen has confirmed my initial reservations: That anycubic STILL is not listening to their customer base and instead is going the same direction of far too many other companies, and instead of asking "What do you want?" they are pulling the standard "Here's what you get to have" nonsense. I'll hold onto my money and keep looking for something else where the customer's wants are taken into account instead of just pushing on more hype and trying to dictate the consumer preference.

With a Kobra 3 on order, I've been waiting for more reviews of the Kobra 3 to come out. What specifically got me to go for the Kobra 3 over the Bambu A1 was the drying function of the ACE. Being able to not only dry while printing, but to actively dry multiple spools of filament at a time without an additional piece of equipment is what really interested me. I have yet to see an in-depth dive into the ACE as its own piece of equipment, with a point-to-point breakdown between it and both the AMS and AMS-lite. The sole downside to the Anycubic setup that I've seen is the slicer situation... but software is much more readily changed than hardware, and the ACE is currently (if what I've seen can be believed) the top-end in multi-material management systems. The margin is narrow, but the dryer function is, I think at least, enough of an addition that it tops any minor downsides at the moment.

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

The only thing that really annoys me with this is the slicer, and as you said, that can be fixed with an update. The ACE is a true filament dryer, it has settings for everything from PLA to ABS .

Excellent breakdown on the differences in the printers. Very Entertaining.

@stldenise

16 күн бұрын

Thanks!

Thank you for this video. It's very useful to know these subtle details

Thank you for the helping Jeff!

The MMU2 with mk3s had a lot of problems to reliable swap filament. You need a lot of tuning the unload procedure. This problem magicly disapeared after changing the hotend to a revo. The unloaded filament got a much better filament tip, so no problems anymore to reload the filament. Of course, the Nextruder also works pretty well. The reason the MMU2/3 works so much better with Revo, Nextruder-Nozzle and maybe TUN (Trianglelabs unified nozzle) is the integrated nozzle/heatbreak combo with a long heatbreak. This forms the still weak filament quite nice. It´s much more tollerant to not perfectly dryed filament and not perfectly tuned unload procedures. So no cut&poo is required. However, with high-flow nozzles you migh still encounter problems. Bambulab and simular printers use high-flow for high speed. Also they do not have a long integrated heatbreak. So they use cut&poo. Wich not only produce a lot of waste, but also takes quite a lot of time (1:20 min on an A1) for every filament change. On smal prints even a mk3 with MMU2 produce multicolour prints in less time. Imho the best way to do multicolour would be a hotend with a nozzle/heatbreak combo you can swap easy. Like the Revo. Insert a normal flow nozzle for filament swaps for multicolour prints. Insert a high-flow nozzle for single colour. So you do not need cut&poo for multicolour but still can print fast in single colour. However, the AMS has a very nice approch to synchronice the AMS-Feeder with the feeder in the extruder. A spring, a slider, a magnet and an hall-effect sensor inside the very smal filament buffer is used to synchronice the AMS-feeders to the extruder. The AMS-feeder pushes filament until the spring is compressed and the slider moves. The AMS-feeder stops, until the extruder has taken enough filament to decompress the spring and slider moves back (on the X1C and simular, on the A1/A1lite the "buffer" is on the top of the printhead). This way the extruder is released from the workload to pull the filament (wich is still sometimes a problem on the MMU3 with bad placed spools or to long bowden). Also all AMS-feeder are permanently engaged to their filament. I realy would like an AMS-like filament changer with open source protocoll. Filament dryer, permanently attached feeders and automatic rewind. Much more easy to load/unload spools. Still, on a printer with integrated nozzle/heatbreak combo like the Nextruder hotend, Revo or TUN without cut&poo without a lot of waste and without so much time for filament changes. Sadly it is quite expensive to buy a solo AMS or ACE to tinker with. But with other companys now copying Bambulabs approach, we might get an open source variant eventually. Actually the feeder synchronisation might be a valueable function even without filamentchange. If you print big objects, you might want to use bigger spools. A 5kg is quite heavy to pull. So an extra feeder to push filament to the extruder might be quite nice. Esp. as you can make the extra feeder as powerful as you want - its not weight added to the gantry. Also with little changes in the "buffer" (or call it "feeder synchronicer") you could detect if filament is pushed back (more than 3 mm, so no retraction but unload) so you could do a 2 filament changer without any electrical conection to the actuall printer. If a filament unload is detected, obviously the other one has to be loaded... Just some ideas...

Such a good review! Thank you and congrats :)

Anycubic announced to open the source code. I think that will solve most of the poop probleme. There are solutions out there to get nearly rid of it...

Awesome comparison and review Denise!

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

Thanks so much!

Excellent video. I’m trying to work out where to go after being an Ender 3 user for about 5 years, and this is very useful! Thanks. 😊

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

I should be getting Creality's color printer at the end of summer. Fingers crossed they've figured it out!

@lawrencemanning

15 күн бұрын

@@stldenise is that the K2? Multi-colour is not a must have for me, just a nice to have. Inwas debating a K1C. They look great, but: proprietary parts, PCBs in hotends (I know that’s the thing now, but it seems like a massive point of failure), and generally they are noisy. But, I do want something modern and fast so maybe I’ll have to just go for it. Hope you are keeping well!

@_Richard_F___

14 күн бұрын

A1 or A1 mini, you won't be disappointed . And it's on sale at the moment . You can add multicolor later on if you want. I just think out my design if I want different colour parts then print them separately . So I don't consider buying multi-color printer

@_Richard_F___

14 күн бұрын

​@@stldenise don't do it . 👍

Mr Geerling sent me here. Thank you Denise

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

Thanks for visiting!

Great Video Denise. You got alot of Poop to clean up now. I will stick with my A1.

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

Yes I do. 🤣

Thanks this what I was looking for. Bamboo im coming.

Yeah the compatibility with orca is a must

My first printer was the kobra and I quickly bought an sv06 , sv06 plus and a K1. I put away the kobra and never touched it again. The quality just wasn't there compared to other printers. I lost faith a long time ago. If they don't come out with a core xy soon they are going to fall even further behind. They are also known for putting out printers and dropping support quickly. So I can't see them putting much effort into the software and slicer. I hope I am wrong.

solid review, not sure why youtube keeps recommending prank videos instead of good stuff like this

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

Thanks!

Briliant comparison!

Great Review

Ive been following you for sometime on twitter and only now found out you have a youtube channel lol.

Did you have some issues with Anycubic’s slicer ? I connected everything but I can’t painting objects. Slicer see ace pro and kobra but at workbench every labels looks blank / black without description and filaments. Version 1.4.3 and below also.

Do you think that this issue will be fixed in the future? The price is very good for the overall features

How is the printer if you only use it to pringt single color prints?

I have an X1C Combo, but if I was restricted in my budget I would not be keen on any of these 2 as the poop is not contained, It would drive me mad with all the cleaning up, my X1C misses the bucket with the odd poop and it drops down to the bottom of the enclosure along with the remnants of the nozzle wipe that also misses, I have enough on my plate cleaning that up !

I didn't know the channel, I think this was one of the best sincere videos I've ever seen on 3d congratulations!! I'm looking to buy the Kobra 3. I saw in other videos that it apparently had There will be it on the orca itself, someone who received it also received this version. Do you think that with the orca it will improve a lot?

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

Thanks! Orca will definitely improve this printer, but I'm not aware that Anycubic has made it compatible yet.

@joaovitorcerqueira7090

15 күн бұрын

@@stldenise Despite the loss of material, does the ACE work well?

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

The nozzle was a little close, but that was corrected in the slicer. Otherwise quality is very good. 😀

Nice video and great comparison. As you show it’s a shame about the poop issue but it will be sorted. Unfortunately quality control with anycubic has been a concern of mine for a while. How long did each print take when comparing the same models being printed? The dryer is a great idea but as with all multi roll dryers you’ll melt pla when drying higher temp filament in the dryer so mixing materials in the dryer becomes an issue. Does the anycubic have roll swap over when one roll runs out and you have another full reel loaded?

@stldenise

6 күн бұрын

You're right about the dryer, you can only do one material at a time -- the printer can only handle one temperature setting at a time too, so you're not going to mix PETG & PLA in one print anyway. I wasn't able to track the time on those prints accurately because both machines were being silly--the Anycubic got a clog and a spool fell off the A1. I did a little editing on the time laspe to take out the boring parts. Anycubic's slicer was off, it thought it could print a dragon in 8 hours, but it was more like 12. The A1 did it in about 13, so it was a tad slower. And last, yes, if you tell the printer all the spools are the same thing, it can automatically swap to the next spool when it runs out.

@Happy3dprinting

6 күн бұрын

@@stldenise thank you for the update and the information, I love my Bambu lab printers but they are not the final solution to 3d printing and I am always interested in what comes next. I wish someone else would take a design leap and not so much copying going around. Thank you for your great comparison videos and it nice to seen these machines being used side by side as everyone talks about how things compare but real world comparisons are very limited. As ever though hardware often outpaces software especially when it comes to slicers, I know I owned a Creality Halot mage pro for about 4 months before the slicer issues were resolved that I could get decent prints out of it.

Can you provide information on the plastic recycling place you mentioned in the video? Thanks you.

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

Sure! printeriordesigns.com is their website, they're located in St. Louis.

@wallylewicki3022

13 күн бұрын

@@stldenise Thanks

some dude did over 10,000 hours of testing to figure out that pressing recalculate then 0.536 multiplier is the best for bambu as any less is not enough and more is well waste

@arturvoskanyan2467

15 күн бұрын

you mean to reduce poop i have to set the multiplier at 0.536 ?

@andrikurniawan531

15 күн бұрын

wdym by recalculate?

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

Yes, that's why I'm using .6 (close enough)

I want the kobra 3max ace combo...

What is the best printer for tpu? I have been printing since 2012 and have had my Tevo Tornado since like 2014 It’s still doing its job but it’s time to get something new Any suggestions?

@stldenise

14 күн бұрын

Oh wow, send that Tevo to the front porch with a rocking chair and glass of iced tea! You need a good direct drive for TPU and I think everyone has made the switch now. Creality, Prusa and Bambu have all done great with TPU (you may need to tweak a setting here and there). TPU doesn't work in an AMS or ACE, it needs a plain old spool holder. If you want a machine JUST for TPU, pick something with a short distance from the spool to the toolhead, which is pretty much all the bedslingers. And no matter how fast they claim to be, it doesn't apply to TPU, so use a nice slow print speed. Again, if you're JUST wanting a TPU machine, go ahead and grab an older machine running Marlin & you'll save some money too. Think Ender 3 S1 Pro, or MK3+.

Or you could print the two parts separately then just glue them together , using two different filament colours

Do you pay delivery for the Kobra 3 like you do for the A1 ? May have forgotten to add that to the total price.

@stldenise

14 күн бұрын

Anycubic is offering free shipping, so you will save at least $25 by comparison. If you live near a Microcenter, you may be able to pick up an A1 locally.

@123-3D-UK channel did a review. He made his own profile for orca and it was pretty much the same as the A1. waste wise.

@stldenise

10 күн бұрын

That’s awesome! I hope he makes it public, when I tried I just got an error code. 🤦‍♀️

Thanks for showing the alternative to the Bambu printers. I agree that tool changers will be the future, if they can become more affordable. My Prusa Xl has almost no waste, but was very expensive.

What about VFA test on kobra and A1??? Can you make shorts or photos?

@riba2233

14 күн бұрын

I can tell you that A1 doesn't have vfa issues

Doh, I’m waiting on my Kobra 3 in the mail and my friend got a A1

I wish any cubic would open source their firmware, considering they are using a version of klipper. Due to how terrible any cubic supports their printers, open source firmware would allow the user more option settings. I have the kobra 2 pro, its so limited in everyday from a normal klipper printer or even marlin based firmware. No more any cubic 3d printers with closed firmware for me.

@billytalentrocks345

15 күн бұрын

They do, the k2 neo firmware (marlin) is on their github. (I flashed Klipper on the neo, so I'm happy. But the other models in kobra 2 are more closed down)

@oneanother1

15 күн бұрын

@@billytalentrocks345 any cubic 3dprinters need a lot of support if they want to be competitive with other machines. The broken multicolor slicer support sums up what any cubic sucks at. The closed sourced firmware klipper on the kobta 2 pro,plus, and max is a terrible idea. The web interface is what we want from a klipper machine. Edit: I don't want to hate on any cubic like what creality gets, but I own a lot of their previous 3d printers and all of them were open source marlin. They have lost their way, and it shows it, their machines are losing userbase, which was very small to begin with.

@anthonylong5870

15 күн бұрын

You think Anycubis is locked down? ROFL go look at Bambu....its not locked down , its imprisoned. Absolutely ZERO open source

@riba2233

14 күн бұрын

​​@@anthonylong5870 🤦‍♂️ stop spammlng, y0u are under every comment with the same 💩

@andreas.grundler

14 күн бұрын

In another video I saw about this printer it was said that Anycubic plans to release the source code.

The future is in multiple hotends, I believe it is = ) I guess this will be the next step, and may be Bambu will do this too. This is a good excuse to make older models obsolete. And they say "Bambulab" is an iPhone in 3d printing. And iPhones are become obsolete every years. So... = ) It is interesting to watch how companies create printers following 'the current thing'. Thanks for honest speed review. I am tired already from those 'amazing speed' devices which were 'the current thing' a couple of years already. But in fact they are not so fast as they tell that in ads. Now they do color printing, or should I say color pooping? = )

@stldenise

14 күн бұрын

I'm hoping that Prusa's XL makes everyone sit up and go I WANT A TOOL CHANGER and then we'll actually get affordable tool changers.

Bamboo labs Prints beautifully out the box . Clearly any cubic have copied it

Like poked :)

Is the bambu slicer kid friendly?

@MrBassard

13 күн бұрын

Well the bambu printers are more kid friendly than what was available before it came out. Just keep in mind all printers no matter the cost will have some issues and "quirks"

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

Depends on the kid and what you're trying to slice. The default settings are pretty reliable these days, it wouldn't be too hard to teach the basics. You can also set up custom profiles, so you could have a "Bobbie Sue PLA for Action Figures" setting saved. My kid learned Tinkercad & Cura way before he was comfortable changing a roll of filament (which on an old Ender required a lot of thumb strength.) He was 10 when he learned Tinkercad at school, and about 12 when we got a printer of our own. By 15 I was tired of printing things for him and gave him the Prusa Mini. 🤣

@PatrickDG

13 күн бұрын

Lol I just got a qidi xcf pro as my first printer and felt like the slicer for it might intimidate my daughter lol

@stldenise

13 күн бұрын

@@PatrickDG Hmmm, this might be a video idea! I have a Q1, so I just opened Qidi slicer. If you put it on "simple" mode and make the kid a go to profile that has things set up the way you like it, I think it will work. You do have to slice it before it will tell you it needs supports, which is annoying. File management might actually be harder!

Thank you for this video. I had the choice for these two 3D printers, but in terms of feel I opted for the Bambu Lab A1 Combo. And given the reviews, especially yours, a good choice. Have very good results with printing and will definitely delve deeper into the poop. But couldn't you use the poop to print another object?

@stldenise

16 күн бұрын

The Bambu will let you do that in either their slicer or with OrcaSlicer. It’s called “purge to object”. The Kobra is lacking this feature.

@martslittlediyshop8670

15 күн бұрын

@@stldenise Thank you Denise, we're going to try it all out.

Try orca?

@stldenise

6 күн бұрын

I did and got an error. But I'm told a British KZreadr got it sorted out, so I'll have to go bug him for insight. @123-3D-UK

@kennykobi

Күн бұрын

Have you had any luck? Also how is the camera? I know the software isn't quite there yet but is it worth it. I believe it is.

@stldenise

Күн бұрын

@@kennykobi Orca doesn't know what to do with the ACE, and they didn't send a camera so I can't tell.

great to see that they ripped off so many things from Bambu Lab, it increased their chances of actually making a good machine for once. Now let's hope that they keep supporting it. Honestly, I can't stand behind a company that doesn't care about innovation and stops supporting their own machines 3 months after launch. Bambu has been great for supporting every model trough firmware updates, adding features and tweaking functions and actually listening to their awesome customers. Thanks for the review, great video! but i'm happy that I just purchased the BambuLab A1 combo. It's been an awesome machine so far. Innovation!

@anthonylong5870

15 күн бұрын

Bambu stole 100% of their designs and tech from Prusa.....Literally 99% of their machines engineering is Prusa.

@stldenise

15 күн бұрын

@@anthonylong5870 Not quite. The AMS is ground breaking and not something Prusa had invented. Prusa does get credit for the slicer, not the hardware.

@anthonylong5870

15 күн бұрын

@@stldenise Do your reseach a bit more. Prusa invented the extruder, the gantry system for bedslingers (A1) and Voron invented the XY system. Bambu stole all of it. As far as the AMS goes, multicolor single extruder setups have been around for 10years+ , All Bambu did was put it in a box. Bambu innovated NOTHING , they just repackaged tech that was already out. Even their slicer is a Prusa clone. I know what your doing with your channel, You are trying to schill Bambu and hype it hoping you will get sponsored. Your reviews are nothing of the sort. They are just Bambu commercials....

@colinmetzger6755

15 күн бұрын

​@@anthonylong5870there's way too much bullshit in there to fully unpack. But show me who else did flow compensation with a LIDAR, who had first layer inspection with a LIDAR? The corexy gantries have been around for at least a decade.

@personwomanmancameratelevision

15 күн бұрын

@@anthonylong5870 Bambu further innovated my utilizing eddy current sensors in the nozzles to check flow while printing on the A1 series. This goes beyond the lidar and can actively control flow rates while printing. There is NO prusa tech coming close to that or any company doing that. Just remember it took Prusa 3 iterations to get the MMU right and it is a mess of cables, rollers, tubes and space. Having a cutter in the toolhead was a genius move that creates repeatable and reliable filament changes and the ability to expand to 16 colors isnt matched by the 5 filament mmu3 at all. It took years to ship a corexy XL that still have issues to this day. How many beta firmwares did they ship? They walked back the .6mm nozzle for .4mm because they could not get it to be reliable. There are a ton of folks fixing the XL because Prusa failed shipping a "just works" product. Bambu got it right on the first try and then released printers that completed directly with all of the sub 1100 printers in the prusa line up and beat the breaks off of them. A1, P1 and X1 printers all are top notch from beginners to print farms you can have a device up an running with multicolor in minutes. How long does it take to build, setup and configure an MMU3 again? Then you have the integration of printer, phone app, slicer, makerworld that allows printing completely hands free. Show me the Prusa arrangement that will print from a cell app a world away without needing to preload filament or touch a slicer. You can dislike the company, you can dislike the country but there has been NOTHING out there like it since 2022 and the FUD can be easily disproven. Maybe you should learn the difference between opensource being OPEN TO ALL. There is no theft as long as you abide by the rules. Usually code visibility or attribution. Bambu has a handy(see what I did there) link to all open source code on their wiki and git hub. So before you tell someone to "do their research" maybe you should do yours first.

I don't see how anyone can compete with Bambu's printers except for Prusa. My Prusa printer prints a little better prints than my Bambu printers.

I'm never buying anything but Bambu from now on. Genuinely the best - you can't convince me otherwise.

@oneanother1

15 күн бұрын

I'm never buying a bwmbulab, can't convince me otherwise. Taking all your data and spying on you. This is china we are talking about. Who knows what's in their encrypted cloud service.

@anthonylong5870

15 күн бұрын

​@@oneanother1Its actually worse than just the data harvesting. Bambu has the worst customer support. And their machines are made from B grade parts....Out of the 5 different brand machines i own my Bambu has by far had the most issues

@No0o0o0o0o0

15 күн бұрын

Bambu has earned their top spot. Even the naysayers who bring up spying gets awfully quiet when you can run the printer 100% offline or lan only which does not have any data being sent. Cloud was is and continues to be optional.* *source Run a a bambu X1C setup with zero internet and that machine is 10k+ hrs and 2 years in service with zero issues. Why would I need support when the printer doesnt break to need support? Seems the other team needs to lean into "good support" because you are going to need it for their overpriced diy projects.

@oneanother1

15 күн бұрын

@@No0o0o0o0o0 ibwmbulab is way overhyped. I don't think anyone cares anymore about 3d printers. They all pretty much haven't change in years. I care about open source, because it allows me to tinker on the machine. My cheap bed slinger does the job. I mean if you know how to tinker, just about any 3d printer can be reliable.

@colinmetzger6755

15 күн бұрын

​@@oneanother1some people want a 3D printer as a tool, not as a hobby. Bambu makes tool grade printers. Tons of 3D print shops are changing over to them for a reason. They have incredible reliability, good quality and print fast.

You do realize that Bambu Studio is also based on the core Prusa Slicer code base. Since Orca is directly taken from Bambu Studio it also is a re-skinned Prusa Slicer. So those observations we all invalid… Additionally “pop” to infill or to purge block or to an unneeded extra print are all still waste. This was very disappointing to watch, borderline a waste of time.

@riba2233

14 күн бұрын

How is purge to infill a waste? Also it doesn't matter if bambu slicer is based on prusa slicer because they actually added the features unlike the anycubic.

@riba2233

14 күн бұрын

The only waste of time was reading y0ur comment btw...

@stldenise

14 күн бұрын

So you didn't watch the whole video? Okdoke.

@_Richard_F___

14 күн бұрын

And prusa slicer is based on something else, hence it has to be open source

@andreas.grundler

14 күн бұрын

@@_Richard_F___ Prusa Slicer is based on Slic3r. Original Prusa Slicer was Slic3r Prusa Edition. They have never hidden this fact. On the contrary. When you start Prusa Slicer, the window title says "based on Slic3r".

Anycubic is good at one single things: resin printers. They should focus on that and leave FDM to who is really capable.

What's the point in multicolor prints, if we still have to deal with layer lines?

@yobtnirp

10 күн бұрын

Wdym?