Ideas, news and tutorials for makers and hackers – Arduino, Raspberry Pi, 3D printing, robotics, laser cutting, and more
Monoprice Ultimate 2 is a fully-enclosed 3D printer, with auto-level compensation, and filament runout sensor. It has a removable, glass, heated bed, and easily switchable nozzles.
Let’s see how it fares in practice …
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I don’t usually post negative reviews. My approach is to first let the company know of any issues I find, and if they can not be resolved, I move on, unless something is particularly dangerous or misleading, or there is a real risk of people being out of pocket.
This is the latter.
There has been a flood of cheap resin 3d printers hitting the market recently, so I thought I would take the plunge and buy one. Seeing as the Monoprice Mini was available for $200, and at Amazon, I thought it would be a low-risk purchase.
Yeah …. about that …
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Glowforge review (laser engraver,not laser printer). This review is about the Glowforge Basic — the Glowforge is the best laser cutter I have ever reviewed, or used for that matter. Heck, the Glowforge is the funnest machine I have ever owned.
I say that as an owner of several CNC, laser, and 3D printing machines!
Personal Update – we got so much value out of the first Glowforge Basic after this review, we bought another one which arrived early May 2019!
[Read more…]Do you want to laser engrave or cut, but don’t like the idea of pumping the smoke out of a window? Or perhaps, like us, you live in a climate not conducive to that?
The Glowforge Compact Filter has come in handy during our freezing cold winter days, but it is not entirely good news, so I thought I would put my thoughts into this post to serve as a review of the compact filter and feedback for how things could be improved.
[Read more…]Bittboy or PocketSprite? Which is best? Which should you buy?
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Soldering. Love it, hate it, tolerate it, but if you are into electronics, learn to do it. Are you making it more difficult for yourself than it needs to be?
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Glowforge reviews like mine have convinced you to buy the Glowforge over other options such as Full Spectrum, Trotec, or a more DIY solution. That’s great!
But which Glowforge should you buy?
Let’s take a look at the differences, what those differences mean in practice, and help you decide!
[Read more…]What were the best tools you bought or used in 2018?
I review a lot of stuff (to the point where I stopped listing everything), but a few things stood out above the rest. Let’s see how many match what you are thinking of …
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Occasionally I get stuff to review, but I also buy stuff to review. Fact is, however, most of the stuff I get either sent or I buy I don’t review.
Why?
I try not to publicly criticize. Plus, I don’t think it is a good idea to publicize things that are bad.
Praise in public, criticize in private.
When I get sent things that don’t work in some way I will let the manufacturer or retailer know. They don’t always appreciate that even.
For my 3D printed turntable I obviously need some way to turn the turntable, and preferably for video and scanning, some method to control speed.
Fortunately, I have a whole box full of those cheap and ubiquitous stepper motors, the 28YBJ-48 plus the ULN2003 driver board.
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