Ask HN: What's a good 3D Printer for sub $1000?

If you don't care about business practices and general privacy concerns, Bambu.

If you want a large printer that's decent for tinkering, Sovol SV08.

If you want relatively good support and to support a company that has a history of giving back, Prusa.

If you want something cheap with a lot of features that tend to be more high end, Elegoo Centuri Carbon.

If you just want something cheap that's arguably incredible value with an active community, Creality Ender 3 V3 KE.

Bambu P1S, no question. Enclosed with filter for ABS fumes etc. Personally I've only used their A1, but it's the best printer I've ever used by far, and it's the first one that you can treat like a paper printer: plop it down, ignore it til you need to print, hit print and assume it works with no supervision. An absolute joy. It's also FAST compared to last gen printers.

They do have a bunch of cloud service BS and phoning home that runs afoul of the HN spirit, but there's a LAN mode that allows you to send prints from LAN without opening up to the wider internet. If that's still too restrictive, you can always do direct SD card transfers via sneakernet.

Software might be too closed for you, IDK if there are jailbreaks. Repairability is possible but fiddly – akin to current gen car engines, rather than 70s types. They're very popular printers, I've only needed to open the head once, and there were plenty of YT teardown videos to help.

The Bambu slicer is good. They've got niceties for basic operations like snapping to bed or scaling up/down by a few percent. I believe it's based on cura slicer, which is also excellent.

P1S is at the midpoint of your budget. Their next model up is $1200, depending on your flexibility. Might have some value if you're doing more obscure materials. Didn't realize how cheap the enclosed ones had gotten. I've got half a mind to upgrade myself now....

Voron would be my recommendation. It ticks all the boxes of what you need it to do. The only caveat is you need to build it, screw by screw (unless you buy a pre-assembled one such as siboor). It also requires printed parts which can be ordered via Vorons PIF program (high quality, printer-verified parts).

Depending on how easy you find it, it will take at least 10 hours to build. But that is part of the fun.

Software and repairability are there. Spares are cheap and klipper is open source. It can work offline but it works better paired with tailscale. You can upload sliced models OTA.

Slicing models will be the easiest part. I'd recommend the basic orcaSlicer set up for the printer of choice and go from there.

Good luck and have fun. 3D printing has become the most addictive hobby I have ever taken up. Be careful with your time!

Creality K1, fast, enclosed, similar print size, well priced.

You are sadly getting a lot of answers completely ignoring your requirements.

A Voron or RatRig are right up your alley. They are highly customizable, buy a kit as a base, then upgrade components as needed to do more complex printing. They are completely open source and repairable with no phoning home or any other shenanigans, the GNU/Linux of 3d printers. If you have CAD and machining experience it should be fairly straight forward.

My Vorons are both extremely reliable, I just hit print for 99% of my stuff and it just works with either auto leveling or static fixed offsets (depends on the Voron chosen). If something doesn’t work out, there is an enormous community with many swappable components and the machines are upgradable year after year, or can be kept in a specific older configuration.

I am surprised nobody mentioned the Qidi printers. They are the perfect balance between tinkerability and reliability (but see below - QA varies), and have open firmware. They are the only ones that currently compete with Bambu in high-temperature materials. These will outperform PC/Nylon and can also print advanced stuff as PPS, especially on the new Q2.

Now, for their QA - it is not on par with Prusa or Bambu, however, there are a few tips to avoid the pitfalls. 1. If buying the Plus 4, buy the US version of possible. The EU models are older units with a faulty part. 2. Buy from places that offer returns. If the printer is faulty, you can always return it 3. If something breaks, document and send to support. Expect free replacement parts shipped within a week.

By following the above, you will get an extremely capable printer at a fraction of a cost of a Bambu, with offline modes, open source FW a great community and hotend capabilities that are virtually unparalleled and venture into engineering grade machines.

Happy printing :)

I bought the Anycubic Kobra S1 Combo recently, and it's really good, especially looking at the price

I've been very happy with my Qidi Q1 Pro. I paid about $350 pre-tax off Amazon almost a year ago (Black Friday). For me, it was the most machine for the lowest cost I could find. It almost fits your desired print volume (245 x 245 x 240), but it is fully enclosed and has a dedicated chamber heater. I have almost exclusively printed ABS at a 60 deg. C chamber temp. It runs open source Klipper firmware, but I'd imagine repairability wouldn't be the best. Best of all, I have not needed any calibration. It seems pretty spot on out of the box.

My Voron is hands down a better printer but also required significantly more investments in components and especially time.

The first part of your post sounds almost like an ad for the Bambu Lab P1S. The second part sounds more like the Prusa CORE One kit (build volume is not a perfect match).

I really wouldn't bother buying anything else as a beginner. Pick between these two.

It's a weird thing in 3D printing right now that if you don't have the open source stuff as a requirement you get better print quality and reliability for half the price with Bambu Lab.

> I am not very familiar with 'slicer' software yet.

and

> durable, temperature/chemical resistant materials such as PC/Nylon/ABS or infused materials.

are a little cart-before-horse. This is like asking what ink-and-paper printer to buy for making complex, multi-format printed books to specific criteria, while admitting that you've not used any form of publishing software or understand any of the non-software processes involved in making a book.

The slicer is by far your most important tool for _effective_ 3D printing with a variety of materials, moreso than CAD or 3D modeling. Get a cheaper, more plug-and-play printer that doesn't meet all of your criteria, and focus on learning how to effectively use its slicer.

Print basic things, experiment, and force and make hands-on mistakes with it on relatively forgiving PLA/PETG. Do these _before_ jumping up to a pricier, fully enclosed machine _and also_ before printing harder-to-use materials, each of which will add new difficulties. You don't want your first hotend blob to happen on a decent machine that you actually like while using a material that's difficult or dangerous to deal with.

A Sovol SV06 or SV08 meets most of your criteria at about 1/3 to 1/2 of your budget; I haven't had the best experiences with their reliability but they fit many of your criteria. Used Creality Enders might be even cheaper depending on where you are, and while also fussy are hackable and repairable to the point of often being used as platforms for entirely different printers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmMW6_7lrlQ

> I am ok assembling the machine and learning how to dial it in.

Get a Prusa Core One kit, or build a Voron.

Bambulab should be off the table for their bait and switch behaviour. AMS is not particularly impressive and very wasteful. Get a Bondtech INDX down the road if you want true multi material printing.

After having owned many 3D printers I can recommend Bambu Lab X1C with AMS. It will be a bit over budget but does not matter, you will spend time just printing and not messing with settings or bed leveling, it’s a workhorse and just prints what you tell it to reliably, no tuning or tweaking required. When using official filaments it will automatically recognize them, switch them during print etc.

After maybe 10 years of printing this is what I initially imagined it would be, now its finally there for consumer - I want this part in plastic let’s go

Oh and it’s also fast.

Hmm, I wonder if bambu gives me a cut for the sales pitch, but if not it is also ok - i just have to give credit to good engineering when I see it

PS: no prusa or clones, no creality, dont mess with that nonsense

> I would prefer something that doesn't phone home and can work offline. Opensource firmware/software and repairability are important.

I built myself a Voron, and it's an amazing learning experience. I learn how things work, and the trade offs. I get to pick and replace the exact parts I want. I design my functional parts knowing exactly the printer's capability. There is something very fascinating about it. You can look at a print, and can tell different issues at a glance because you have seen (and fixed) them while you built and tuned the printer. The majority of 3D Printing quality issue are due to Hardware constructions / trade offs, and not Software (slicer settings..). Without building a printer from scratch, it's hard to tell the root cause.

https://vorondesign.com/voron2.4

- Fully open sourced

- Repairability and updatability. Lots of fun mods.

- No phone home / privacy issue like Bambu

I think before going down the rabbit hole, it's best to make sure you have a clear answer for this question: Do you care about the learning / tinkering / optimizing part, or do you care more about "it just works" printing?

- Many recommendations in this thread is for the "it just works" printing case. The top candidates are Bambu, Creality, and Eiegoo. The quality is good for most cases.

- If you're an engineer and into tinkering like me, you would be much happier with a Voron v2. Depending on your effort, you can match Bambu's quality, or _greatly_ exceed it.

Regarding Slicer, don't worry much about it. You can learn one very fast. The top ones are Cura and Orca Slicer. I use them both, and they have pros / cons. Personally on my Voron, a well tuned Cura profile yield better result. But Cura is missing one important feature: it can't limit the speed based on Flow Rate.

Another quick tip:

- Take the advertised number with a grant of salt. For example, many printers advertised 600 mm/s print speed. The mechanical frame may be able to handle 600 mm/s, but the Hot End is the limit of the build (e.g. it can't melt material fast enough, friction, the ability of extruder motor to quickly change speed, etc).

Hope you have a great time!

Elegoo Centauri Carbon. I am blown away at the quality which rivals or exceeds my X1C and it's like $300. It was on sale $49 off earlier this week which was insane. Subsidized by CCP but keep it offline and you're good to go.

I'm going to make an unpopular suggestion. Have you considered using a service that will print and ship to you, like CraftCloud?

Depending on volume, your total cost would likely be lower. I know you mentioned privacy concerns so this may not be an option. But it significantly simplifies your work, letting you focus on the parts themselves.

Bambu Lab A1 Mini ($299-399)

Excellent print quality out of the box Automatic bed leveling and calibration Very user-friendly with great software Compact size, perfect for beginners

Creality K1 Max (~$599)

300x300x300mm build volume Fast printing speeds (up to 600mm/s) Auto-leveling and enclosed design Good balance of features and price

Prusa MINI+ (~$429 kit, $529 assembled)

Exceptional reliability and support Magnetic flexible bed Excellent community and documentation Great for learning and consistent results

I hate to say this. Bambu A1. I'm operating a farm of mixed plumage: 20 Prusa's, 12 Creality K1s and 24 Bambus. Of all of those the Bambus are by far the least troublesome and I would definitely recommend those to a beginner. That said, Bambu is a crap company and they can't be trusted not to do a rugpull sooner or later. We don't have them connected to wifi for that reason alone and tbh it doesn't really add anything to the experience. I like the fact that they're all stand-alone and as long as the power is up the printers are printing. In the last year we've processed about 3000 Kg total with these. In some more detail:

- The Prusa's are real workhorses. They are not the fastest, but they're expensive and they break. But you can always fix them and the degree to which you can tinker with them (especially while they're running) is much higher than the others. I've made a couple of custom ones (one 1x1 meter x 25 cm build volume, five more that are the regular width and length but 60 cm height), with adopted firmware. It's an insanely flexible platform. If you can think of it, handle a hex key and do some minor firmware hacking you can probably make it.

- The K1s... well. Initially we were very impressed. Got a couple to test with, decided they work and ordered 10 more. After a few days the first extruder broke. Gears just snapped their teeth right off. Turns out the extruder gears are plastic. So, ordered upgraded extruders. Next, one after the other, power supplies dying. After that print fans, Then cpu fans. They also had many screws loose right from the factory, we had a whole inspection list made just to structurally address all of the shitty stuff that would be wrong. For $10 more in parts and better QA it could have been a winner.

- The Bambus. We plugged them in. They work. They still do.

People in this thread are mentioning the SOVOL, if you have the money, that's probably the best printer. But I'd get a couple of Bambus instead and get that many more kilos pushed through. At 200 bucks for the mini and 350 or so for the big A1 it's insane value for money.

Does that help? Feel free to ask more questions.

Bambu X1C: I can recommend the Bambu X1C. It would be my printer of choice. In addition to bed-leveling it has flow calibration and AI detection. With the H2S release prices on the X1C are coming down quickly.

Elegoo Centauri Carbon: I know lots of people will recommend the P1S but this printer has 95% of the features at half the cost. Also extruder temp goes higher (320C), for more exotic materials.

Look into snap maker u1 if you don’t mind kickstarter,

I do mechatronics for a living. I have (and still have) some “hobby” 3d printers. For my job, I don’t want to screw around with settings, I just need the part to come out well.

My day to day goto is the creality K1 line. I have 3x K1Cs and a K1 Max. The K1 Max is for you. It costs about $800. 300mm cubed build area. Runs every material I throw at it. PLA, PETG, TPU, Nylon, ASA, PC, etc.

It has a cloud option, but I don’t use. They all run on a separate vlan so no phoning home. Doesn’t cause any issues.

They run unlocked klipper firmware, so if you want to mess with it feel free. Also means most slicers work well with them. I typically use OrcaSlicer but the CrealityPrint and Cura work also.

I don’t recommend the K2, it has quite a few annoying bugs. The Enders are hobby machines for sure. Go with K1C or even K1 Max for the bigger bed. You won’t regret it.

I bought my first 3D printer six months ago, it feels as high quality as an HP printer, couldn't be happier.

Flashforge Adventurer 5M https://www.flashforge.com/products/adventurer-5m-3d-printer

There are fully open projects like Voron or RatRig, and sellers of DIY kits based on them. Potentially a lot of work unless you're interested in 3D printing itself as a hobby rather than as a tool.

Prusa Core One would be a bit more complete OOTB. It is 220mm in the smallest axis (Y) though. Slicer and firmware are open source, but the hardware is not (unlike previous Prusa printers).

Bambu gives you the same capability for much less, but the firmware is not open source (third party open source firmware does exist). I believe the stock firmware also has to "phone home" at least once before it can be used offline.

Even cheaper are less-well known Chinese companies, like Qidi. Firmware is usually a proprietary fork of Klipper or other open source projects; some people have had success flashing the mainline version.

> Need to be able to print with more durable, temperature/chemical resistant materials such as PC/Nylon/ABS or infused materials.

I would double check what kind of air filtration setup you want. In the voron/sovol space there's the StealthMax filter system kit which is going to add on a couple hundred bucks at least.

As others said, you could consider a sovol sv08.

Another option is a used voron 2.4 or trident to meet your budget. My regret in going down the new printer rabbit hole was not waiting a couple months and checking used listing because theres usually a used printer that comes up, sometimes saving you quite a bit of money and assembly time.

The other factor to consider is you ever plan on having any expansions requiring a better MCU or additional motors. The sovol is a more 'integrated' electronics design so you'd need to possibly replace it if wanting to do certain mods later.

I've had a number of different printers, and the one I like the most [by far] is the Bambu P1S. It doesn't hit your desire to avoid the cloud, but as a machine it is top notch quality, and very reliable. It requires far less babysitting and tweaking than something like a Creality. If you just want to print things and know that most of the time it Just Works, they are a great tool for that.

PSA: large universities often sell 3D printers, of seemingly great quality, at their public auctions. Great deals can be had.

I have a Qidi plus 4, and have had good results with it and engineering materials.

Bambu is nice for the community, it's much more popular, but the specs for the Qidi are bit better for engineering materials and so far I am very happy with it.

That being said, it isn't quite open source, but I do believe it can be run offline.

i just picked up an ultimaker s5 for $400 on ebay with tons of extra filament and it worked off the bat. Been printing for almost 2 weeks straight and my daughter loves it :D

I would not print PC/Nylon/ABS at home. It’s really hard to make it work especially during colder months. Work with PLA to get the shape and order it online when you’re ready for advanced materials. I would also recommend HP MJF for nylons.

Get a bambu, dont put it online, use the SD card or lan for transfer... yes they're Chinese and have run roughshod over their contemporaries with respect to IP, yet it's the most die hard printer you'll ever buy. I own 5.

I got a Bambu P1S two years ago for Christmas as a gift. It's been fantastic. 98% of my prints have been successful.

They aren't the free open source dream machine, but it also works quite well and needs little messing with.

I've played with 3d printers back to the RepRap and Makerbots - but those always required so much work to get a successful print.

I haven't seen something clearly better in the price range.

I love my Voron Trident. It might not be under $1000. I have about $1300 in it, I start with the Voron Tap tool head which added a bit plus other stuff.

I picked up an Ultimaker 2+ with 15,000 hours on it at an ewaste junk shop for $100. Really was expecting it to need some TLC, but I plugged it in, leveled the bed, and it spit out an absolutely passable benchy in a couple hours. Cura (Ultimaker's slicer) isn't open source, but it is free, fairly unobtrusive, and works fine. The printer itself isn't connected to anything but mains power, and loads gcode from an SD card.

If you've got a budget of $1000 for that, have you considered getting a used 3D printer first? Some models are sold used for like 50€ (e.g. Ender 3 V2) on classified ads which hardly makes a dent in your overall budget. This will force you to actually familiarize yourself with the processes and will allow you to make more informed decisions later?

Whatever you do, you're going to have to dry your filament if you don't use it within a month of opening it.

I used to like the tweaking, but once I got a Bambu P1S, I've gotten spoiled just being able to hit print and let it go.

Not under $1000, but I ran an Ultimaker like a rented mule for 2 years straight with minimal maintenance. Worked great. Reliability isn’t limited to just one brand. There are plenty of printers available that just work.

none of the printers mentioned going to meet any of your requirements.

Prusa isn't fully opensource, but has the worst enclosed chamber printer imo.

Bambu isn't open source in the slightest (beside the slicer).

You are never going to print PC on a bambu either way, at least not Pure PC. Blends, sure, you need at least 100c chambers for pure PC.

diy kits are the way to go, but it is going take you a LONG time. a voron, ratrig, or annex k3 are your best bets with the requirements you want. each kit has their weaknesses, and most of them, are going to require upgrades from their BOM.

What do you intend to make?

Is your goal to earn or learn?

How much time do you have to spend on 3d printing?

I'll second the call for checking out smaller companies with Ender clones and similar like Sovol and Qidi; you can find refurbed models like Creality K1's for $200+ off if you're not averse.

Regarding slicer software, Ultimaker Cura is great for beginners, Orca Slicer has a slightly steeper learning curve but they both have their pros and cons such as different support generation algorithms, having an alternative when something doesn't seem to print right with one.

Bambu Labs P1S, X1C or H2D if you want something that just works.

For printing ABS and ASA, insulate the enclosure with XPS and heat the chamber to above 55C for good results.

Printing Nylon is difficult. You have to control not just the temperature but also humidity.

Bambulab A1 user here.

It's nice for simple stuff, but wouldn't recommend for anything needing precision. In the beginning it was laying out perfect layers, but after 6 months just lost it. Been doing every possible maintenance stuff and it just doesn't go back.

As someone who started with junk printers from the very beginning, and now sell 3D prints, please don't buy a machine you have to assemble. Don't learn how to dial it in. And spend more than $1,000.

Your time and money is worth more than trying to make some open source diy kit printer do what you want. Bambu has body slammed the market with printers that work.

Get a H2S or X1C, run it in lan only mode if you're paranoid, and don't look back. H2S is a better option for your material choices.

My comment will probably get flamed because I'm not saying Prusa makes the best printers and only support open source, but do you want a tool that makes things, or do you want to waste time baby sitting your tool trying to get it to do something others can do out of the box.

I WISH my machine was open source, but the reality is it's not. It's like asking what mill to buy, but rulling out HAAS and Bridgeport because you're ok with trying to machine around crazy slop.

I got a Sovol Sv07+ and it’s decently fast, large build space, and can crank out miniatures that are ‘good enough’ for table top.

Wish the resin printers didn’t have the toxic fumes problem though, then I’d get one of them too.

I have a 5 toolhead prusa XL, meets every one of your criteria except for not being $4K.

If you want good prints and only care about the prints, get Bambu P1S. If you want to tinker with the machine and have a lot of free time on your hands then Prusa. although Prsusa starting to close up it's walls like Bambu.

If you could tolerate 1/8th the build volume the sovol zero seems amazing. 120mm ^3 though .

Whatever you choose, make sure you leave enough money in your budget for a second printer. Easiest way to double your print throughput :)

Buy a bambu P1s, a 0.4mm hardened nozzle for CF filaments, and maybe a filament dryer. You'll have a tool to spit parts out instead of a hobby in and of itself[0]. Bambu isn't the least evil company, but it's honestly just that good.

Can work offline, but you'll probably need to block it at the firewall level if you care enough about privacy.

[0]Unless that's what your looking for.

Buy a lightly used Bambu X1C.

Bambulabs P1S ($549 now), or if you can spend just a little more, get the X1C ($799). If you want the best they have, it's the H2S ($1,249).

I have been using 3d printers since 2015. I've never seen anything close to Bambulabs, and the first time I used A1, I almost cried thinking about the countless wasted hours with Creality and Prusa printers I have. Don't get Creality because they have quality control issues. Prusa is currently behind and more expensive. Bambulabs is lightyears ahead of the game.

Creality K1C or K1 Max