I’m shopping for my first printer, I don’t have any experience with 3d printing but I’m vaguely familiar with the whole process and I understand there will be a learning curve and I’m looking forward to that part.
I’m leaning towards the Creality S1 Pro because I remember the huge hub-bub about the Ender 3 when it first came out and it seems like everyone and their brother suggests it as a good first printer but then when I read reviews it seems kinda janky and I’m an adult with a job so I don’t mind fussing a little but I don’t want to fuss a lot.
I picked the S1 Pro because I think it has an auto-leveling print surface and the name recognition from the previously mentioned Ender 3, but when I try to research other printers I’m completely overwhelmed by the options.
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I have an S1 Pro and I hate it. Creality support is terrible and I’ve constantly had issues.
Replaced multiple parts and cables. When I can tolerate it, I’m going to try a TH3D mainboard in it and see if that gets it anywhere near reliable.
My next printer will probably be an Elegoo on the cheap end or a Prusa if I can afford it.
Keep in mind that you are buying into a hobby, not buying a tool.
I was in the same boat a few years ago. I ended up paying the premium and got a prusa mini. I don’t regret it at all, the thing prints and prints and prints. The few times my prints failed were just because I was getting a little crazy with the settings.
A relative of mine was also looking to get a printer and I helped with the research. He ended up settling on an elegoo and so far has had a great experience with it.
Creality printers generally have the reputation of a tinkerer’s printer, so if you don’t want to spend a lot of time meticulously dialing in your print settings I would probably steer away from them.
Depends on your budget and how deep you want to dive.
I bought Ender 3v2 as my first 3D printer, and it traumatised me to the point I’ve not printed anything in a year. 3D printing has it’s learning curves, but Creality gives you no ropes here. Which is great and ultra frustrating at the same time. You will learn a lot about 3D printing, even stuff that you don’t really need. But it will take you a long time and loads of sweat and tears for your first successful 3D print (unless you are lucky and your printer will be good to go from the box).
This makes me feel so much better. I had the same start as you and was pulling my hair out a bit. I knew there would be some learning curves but not this hard. I just felt like a moron for a bit. Some things would be fine then the next print would be spaghetti for no reason. Don’t even get me started on the 4 contact points for balance/ leveling.
Hi! I was just going through the same dilemma, so you might find comments under my post helpful. Be warned though, as you lean towards S1 Pro, I was also biased, albeit towards Prusa MINI+.
If you look how cheap creality printers are, they are amazing. I never owned one, but I like S1 Pro much more than ender 3. It has all metal hotend, direct drive extruder, cr touch, filament sensor, magnetic pei sheet so actually it has what most people buy for cheap machines. Even tho they both are cheap, I dislike wheels instead of proper rods or rails, 4 point bed leveling and bed slinger design. Ive seen loads of perfect prints coming from ender, but Im sure you need some luck and loads of skill and patience for that. If you are prepared to recieve faulty parts and fix whats broken you can enjoy this hoby with creality. Dont expect much support from creality, but there is loads of people that can help on lemmy im sure. I heared good about sovol sv06 (prusa clone) so check that out, its same price range.
Better one but much more expensive is prusa, same kind of machine but better support and build quality.
Other than that most people recommend bamboolab p1p but thats not open source and also more expensive.
Whatever you buy have fun
Thanks for this question: I’m also looking at starting this as a new hobby, and I’m also an adult who would prefer to pay a little more to avoid constant fussing. I haven’t gone very far into looking into it though, except goi g to my local shop and saying “cool! But I wonder what’s different about different machines”
