I see a Creality Ender 3 V3 (not SE or KE) for $130 refurbished, and also a Creality CR-10 SE for $103 refurbished on ebay. Are either or these a good choice to get into the hobby, or am I making a mistake? Should I rather buy a Bambu? My budget is around $100-$200 max. Please advise.
Not a mistake, I’ve got an ender 3 and a cr10. Both are fine, keep your expectations realistic and calibrate each axis, especially the extruders. Use PLA, consider getting a new build plate if your prints won’t stick. I recommend flashing firmware on the ender 3 unless you know what was loaded onto it last, doesn’t have to be fancy firmware just something you know for sure is configured for your printer. A cr10 should probably get firmware as well but I never loaded new firmware on mine and the controller is older so I’m not sure if it’s a good idea.
Don’t forget the cost of filament, if you print a lot you may spend more on filament in a year that your printer budget.
Lots of comments here, plenty of information for you. I’ll add to the pile that I started playing with my buddies stock ender 3, fought it often, lots of tweaking and configuring.
Then I got my own ender 3v2, and fought it less, but still needs tinkering. Usually though I can fire it up and print small stuff without touching it. I print infrequently these days, so the procedure usually involves wiping the dust off the bed first. But it works well enough for my needs.
I tend to get into hobbies for awhile and then back off, so I’m glad I didn’t spend more. And really, while $300 is a lot of money in many ways, in some ways it’s not so much. I’m glad I have a printer, it is occasionally highly useful. But I’m glad I don’t have a $600-1000 printer. Personally 🤷♂️ but that’s just me.
That’s kind of exactly me. I have a bunch of discarded hobbies. I have hundreds of dollars worth of esp32 circuit stuff, rotary woodworking stuff, musical instruments, sewing machines, power tools, painting supplies, fitness equipments, etc. collecting dust because I get super into something for a while and then don’t touch them anymore. At this point, I don’t even know if I should actually get a 3d printer.
Wow, are you me? Haha also circuit stuff, woodworking when I was a kid, piano I never play, just got my first sewing machine a few months ago.
Add in fpv drones, ham radio, meshtastic, homelab, enthusiast grade flashlights, longboarding, snowboarding, wake surfing, backpacking, flipperzero, LINUX! Lol you can run out of time and money pretty quickly.
But, do all these things just a little, and it’s good.
Do you really never ever touch your stuff anymore? Or just nowhere near as much as you did?
Because for me, I still sometimes, rarely, but sometimes, utilize the skills I gained. I don’t go hard on any single one of those things anymore, but I’m glad that I did, or at least I tell myself I am. Now when I go backpacking, I know I have the best flashlight for the job. When I play with meshtastic, my ham radio skills tell me my antenna placement is optimal. When we were sending a care package to a sick friend, we thought of a funny inside joke to reference, so I dusted off the 3D printer and printed up a couple trinkets that were perfectly matched to the joke. When I decided to set up my homelab, my previous love of Linux made it easier to set up proxmox. When I wanted to use my camp chair at the beach, I was able to sew a sheet to stretch between the feet to support me on the sand.
It’s up to you what you wanna do. But I don’t view my hobby jumping as a bad thing. So long as I keep the spending more or less in check, who cares? I’m having fun, learning skills, and those skills can come in handy.
Other people are sometimes jealous of my ability to learn and enjoy so many things. I’m able to help them when they get started later, because I have an approximate knowledge of many things 😂
I say go for it 😁
Lots of Bamu fanboys in here, and don’t get me wrong, those print with minimal hassle and have great customer service, but you are selling your soul, always on internet connection, bambu account required, every print you ever try sent to the cloud.
I recently got a creality K1, refurbished, super cheap, awesome machine, zero tinkering. and creality just gives me root access at the click of a single button so I actually own the hardware.
Before that I had a super cheap no-name bedslinger with no auto-anything, and taking that apart multiple times a week was terrible but also very educational to actually understand the hobby
Don’t believe the marketing, there are viable options.
I have a CR-10s that I bought used. I asked the seller to ensure that it worked before I bought it. Most of my problems I had with the printer are due to me trying to make it print faster. If I had just downloaded Cura and used the default profiles it would have served me well.
Learning how to level a bed is probably the most significant skill you will need. It’s not too hard.
A creality anything shouldn’t be your first printer. I own two creality printers.
creality is for tinkerers not printers
I tell people if you want a printer with the most upgrade paths, pick the ender 3 stock. You can make it bigger or taller, add direct drive, magnetic beds, put a laser on it or a cutter, switch out the board for different firmware, all available on alibaba.
own ak1max. no need and no desire to tinker
I have a CR-10 clone and maybe because it’s a clone, but I now have to calibrate it before every print. It was good when it was brand new but quickly forced me to learn troubleshooting.
It depends on the type of person you are. Those machines you reference are in a class of machine where you are likely to have to put a lot of work into them to get them running reliably and probably more money than if you just bought a better printer from the get go. They are machines to recommend people who want the 3D Printer to be their hobby rather than designing and printing stuff.
If that doesn’t sound like you, just buy a used Bambu or Prusa even if you need to delay the purchase to save up longer.
Thanks for the advice. I do know that I am sort of the kind who picks the flavor of the month to get obsessed over, then throw it away for the next shiny thing, so I am a bit of both of your usecases.
If that’s the case I’d encourage you to just research everything and then park it for a while. If you’re still interested down the track then pull the trigger. There’s a fair bit to learn re: printer setup, slicing, CAD (if that’s your thing). Yes you can plug and play some things, but if your interest wanes it’s likely going to become an expensive paper weight.
Thank you, I think I’ll play with my library printer for a while and figure out if I can make good use of it if I purchase one for myself.
That’s a great idea!
I got an Ender 3 V3 KE. I am long past obsessing with 3D printing but it bleeds into my other hobbies or fixing things around the house.
“I need a plastic thing that is this-this-and-this dimensions…” I model it in FreeCAD, do a few test prints, adjust my design and re-print until satisfied.
A 3D printer became a tool that I use a couple of times per month.
I’ve always heard “if you want to print things, buy Bambu. If you want to fix your printer, but an ender 3”
I don’t know if bambulab should be recommended. With the cloud issues and the very closed nature of it. Better recommend Prusa.
Wow, when did this flip happen? When I got into 3D printing, Ender 3 or any other printers based on it since it was open source was the printer to get. I’ve got a VoxelLab Aquila which is an Ender 3 clone and I have not had to do much fiddling with it aside from leveling the bed, and all the cool 3D printed mods that you can slap on it.
Basically the moment bambu came out I think is when that whole thing started. Bambu really made 3d printing approachable for many.
Fix probably really means tinker with, adjust or change in the context of that statement though
If its your first printer I would not go for a second-hand one. There are so many ways you can subtly mess up a printer and if you don’t know your way around printers yet, then it’s quite hard to fix all that.
Considering you can get a Bambulab A1 mini which does everything out of the box and works better out of the box than an Ender 3 after months of upgrades.
I’m seeing FLASHFORGE 3D Printer Adventurer 5M new for $200 after coupons. Would you recommend the A1 mini or the 5M?
I haven’t used the flashforge but my brother who never did any 3d printing before got it and loves it. He says it just works. I just got the elagoo centauri carbon for 300 and it’s so great but might be out of your price range. If your just printing with pla flashforge is probably the way to go. I never liked bedslingers since tall prints tend to tip over or delaminate and I keep my printers in my garage where temperatures can swim and change the prints drastically.
I have to agree. My ender 3 has been through hell over the past 5 years, but since I am familiar with it, I can usually dial it in.
If I was just starting out I would be overwhelmed with trying to understand it AND troubleshooting.
If you have an electromechanical background, such as bench repair and/or having repaired lots of truly broken printers, then it is less of a risk imo. I know that refurbish items are usually okay, but there are bad items that make it out of any shop.
The Ender 3 is like an old Jeep Willy’s. Teaches you a ton about how it operated but it does so poorly.
I went from a highly modded Ender 3 to a stock K1. The difference in consistent quality and speed is staggering.
OP, save up your money for an enclosed printer. It makes such a big difference it’s well worth it.
The max is pretty, but the SE is more in my price range.
My use is for making little plastic bits cheaply, and I’m not concerned about time. If my kid wants to upgrade to something better, I will probably “buy” it off him.
I never got the Ender 3 to be consistent. If anything it wasted time, filament, and money because it might finish a print and it might not. Great teaching tool. Awful printer these days.
I found it to just be slow. My only complaint was some weird layer squish, but that was very wrong esteps.
Thanks for the advice. I hadn’t considered that refurbished printers are technically used ones with inspection. Is it that important to avoid used printers for a first printer? I had no idea.
“refurbished” is a word that might not mean anything either.
When buying your first printer you should first choose what you want: Do you want to print or do you want to tinker?
If you want to print, get a printer like the Bambulab a1 mini. If you want to tinker, an Ender 3 is ok.
If you want to really tinker a lot, get an used one.
But I really wouldn’t recommend getting an used printer for your first one since you don’t know how they have been treated and messed up.
I’m seeing FLASHFORGE 3D Printer Adventurer 5M new for $200 after coupons. Would you recommend the A1 mini or the 5M?
Tbh, no Idea. I haven’t heard anything about the Flashforge one, so I can’t say anything about it. Maybe look for some reviews.
Thank you that’s very useful
You can get a new Sovol SV06 for less than $200. That worked very well out of the box compared to my older Ender 3. Prusaslicer also has a good profile for it. I don’t care for Cura slicer as much. Enders are of an older generation of printers that I will personally avoid just because of the legacy of having to tinker with them just to get them to work. The opposite end is the Bambu where “it just works” except it doesn’t always and it’s not as easy to fix and it doesn’t play well with third parties. Sovol is a good starter printer that I’d had even better bed adhesion with over Prusa MK4Ss at work.
Thanks for the advice. I’ll look into that one.
I picked up a used ender 3 V3 se off of marketplace for $60 and had to repair it. Since then it’s been printing 10x better than my anycubic kobra neo. I think it comes down to slicer profiles in orca slicer. The ender 3 was a wildly popular printer compared to the kobra. Cheap printers cut corners but can still print good. If you’re not mechanically inclined then don’t get a cheap printer.
My ender 3 stock wasn’t my first printe and isn’t my only printer, but some days it’s my best printer.
It’s almost impossible to begin on a second-hand machine. It Will be a looong learning curve and you won’t obtain anything satysfying.
Best printer under 200, the A1 mini : https://eu.store.bambulab.com/fr/products/a1-mini
This is the only fiable plug and play printer for this price.
If you wan’t the whole 3dprinting learning program, you’d better find an Ender 3 v1 😉. Totally manual but very easy to tinker, a lot of tuto, big community to help.
How much would the size difference make me regret not getting a bigger one, and how soon would I reach that point?
I don’t think the smaller size is that big of a deal. I got a friend into 3d printing a year or two ago and he started with the A1 mini and still has it. Most of the stuff beginners print isn’t that big anyway. If you go with the A1 mini and find that you love it, you may want to upgrade to a bigger size in the future. If you go with something like an Ender 3, you may just give up on 3d printing all together. Bambu printers are just so user friendly.
I’m currently printing some accessories for my xreal glasses at my library on a MakerBot replicator mini, and just found out a1 mini is actually bigger than that one, so I don’t think the size is a big deal for me right now.
Depends on what you are doing. I’ve been 3D printing since 2017. I’ve had maybe 2 prints over that time that wouldn’t fit on the A1 Mini. Both of which were useless throwaway toys that I could have easily done without.
The thing with FDM is that print time and filament usage scales cubically with size. Double the size, 8x the print time and filament usage.
The sweet spot are parts that are a few cm into each direction. Below that the printer often doesn’t have enough detail, above that it takes forever to print.
Quickly. 180 is pretty small. I’d get a 250 at the least. Ender isn’t bad, whatever people seem to want to say here, if you get it with the autobedleveling kit. The Bambu is proprietary and wants to lock you into their cloud BS.
Creality also want to lock you into the cloud. The soft is open source, but you won’t really work on the soft…
I have an Ender 3 v1 and a Creality Hi.
Since the Hi is on the market, the e3v3 won’t be maintained (Just have a look at the prices).If you wan’t something bigger than a A1 mini, can you add 50€ for an A1 or a Creality Hi ? You’ll have both very good printers.
I’ve had an Ender 3 v1 and v2, and enjoyed them. They were perfectly fine for what I did, but I spent a good percentage of time with them printing parts to make them better. Recently bought a Hi with the CFS, and have had almost no problems. The only problems I’ve had would be non-existent if I’d clean the bed more often. I personally think the Hi would be a good starter printer.
Totally OK. 0 problem after 400 hours printing with the Hi.
But the budget is 200$, that’s why I was spotting the A1 mini.I’m seeing FLASHFORGE 3D Printer Adventurer 5M new for $200 after coupons. Would you recommend the A1 mini or the 5M?
I don’t know the 5M.
But if you can translate french, the feedback are good. One of them is transforming it into a 5m pro :https://www.lesimprimantes3d.fr/forum/topic/60026-review-flashforge-5m/
It’s a reliable source, full of passionnates #makers.
What do you want to print ?
I’ve been printing some accessories for my xreal glasses at my local library and some trinkets for my kid, but to be quite honest I don’t have any specific things I need to print. I’m looking at functional prints to get an idea of what things I can print lol.
I went from the Ender 3 v3, to the Anycubic Kobra 3, and the difference is so wide, or makes it hard to recommend the Ender. With the Ender I could do small simple models, but anything with multiple parts were hard to dial in tolerances. The anycubic allows me to do multiple days of printing and be assured all the parts will come together. I now also get error handling so a tangle or running out of filament won’t ruin the job. It even resumes after power loss. I know it’s not in your budget, but the difference is very noticeable.
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