new to 3d printing

I'm looking to get my first 3d printer. I am looking for something around the $300 price mark and something that can fit in my room/on my desk.

So far I am eyeing these two machines:

[www.aliexpress.com]

and

[www.ebay.com]

I would appreciate any advice or comments.

Thanks

My advice is to spend more. For $300 what you will get will almost certainly need lots of new parts and upgrades before you get good prints.

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Large delta printer [miscsolutions.wordpress.com], E3D tool changer, Robotdigg SCARA printer, Crane Quad and Ormerod

Disclosure: I design Duet electronics and work on RepRapFirmware, [duet3d.com].

Yes, but it depends on what you'r after. I bought a $250 I3 kit and it had some issues, but taking care of those issues taught me a lot about 3D printing and can't put a price on that experience.

Not sure about the AliExpress one, as for the ebay one - look for a newer design like a Prusa i3.
If doing a Prusa i3 I would suggest scratch building one so you can dictate the quality of the parts.

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My updated Instructable on our Prusa i3 Build
[www.instructables.com]

Quote
SteveRoy
Not sure about the AliExpress one, as for the ebay one - look for a newer design like a Prusa i3.
If doing a Prusa i3 I would suggest scratch building one so you can dictate the quality of the parts.

Isn't the ebay folger tech a prusa i3?

What you'll find on the forum in my experience so far are two viewpoints:
1) quality is all that matters - those espousing this view are generally proper engineers and they have a point. The longer you do 3d printing the more this will matter to you, unless you really do not like it at all and do not get bitten by the bug.
2) 3d printers are now obtainable from very cheap to very expensive. There is a lot to be said buying a lower cost machine (don't go for the cheapest available) as you invest less initially, the problems, design limitations and corners-cut on cheaper printers will be a source of education about how these machines work, and you will learn a lot.

The other way to look at it is to ask what you want from a 3d printer. Do you want to get into 3d printing as an enthusiast and tinkerer, or do you need a machine that can produce parts/prototypes reliably without a lot of your time? I'd generally say the cost implications are that if you want to spend $hundreds you'll need to bank on spending a large amount of time on making it work properly, but learning and enjoying the process as you go. If you want to spend $thousands you'll likely be printing reasonably well within the first few hours of opening the box rather than days or weeks.

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Simon Khoury

Co-founder of [www.precisionpiezo.co.uk] Accurate, repeatable, versatile Z-Probes
Published:Inventions

Quote
Titan

Isn't the ebay folger tech a prusa i3?

They call it an i3, but it's more like an i2.
An i2 has the motors at the top where as the i3 has the motors at the bottom with a stiffer frame.
I think it's a marketing thing. The Prusa i3 is the most popular DIY and kit 3D printer and they would miss a lot of sales just calling it the "Folger 2020"

The "Reprap Wilson II" is an example if an i3 based 2020 extrusion printer.


Steve

Quote
SteveRoy

Quote
Titan

Isn't the ebay folger tech a prusa i3?

They call it an i3, but it's more like an i2.
An i2 has the motors at the top where as the i3 has the motors at the bottom with a stiffer frame.
I think it's a marketing thing. The Prusa i3 is the most popular DIY and kit 3D printer and they would miss a lot of sales just calling it the "Folger 2020"

The "Reprap Wilson II" is an example if an i3 based 2020 extrusion printer.


Steve

There is nothing about it that is close to i2. Flip the motor mounts and move them to the bottom if that bothers you. I have a Prusa i3 with original Prusa aluminium frame and would definitely prefer 2020 framed folger over it.