OctoPrint(octoprint.org)
octoprint.org
OctoPrint
https://octoprint.org/
108 comments
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If all Octoprint provided was the ability to print directly from Cura it would be worth it. Luckily it does much more than that.
The only downside I've found is I've lost the Ender 3 Pro's resume ability if the power goes out.
The only downside I've found is I've lost the Ender 3 Pro's resume ability if the power goes out.
I put my Prusa on a UPS, and was delighted to watch it just keep right on printing during a 10 minute power outage a week ago.
Out of curiosity, did you measure the prusa's load on a kill-a-watt or similar while printing, before you put it on the UPS? I wonder what the load during printing is.
IIRC it's around 120W printing something like PLA. Obviously higher when heating (pretty much maxes out the PSU), and higher steady state when printing other polymers.
Is that a measured amount, or a guess based upon the heating element?
Asking because if it's a guess, then the electronics + stepper motors need to be factored in too. :)
Asking because if it's a guess, then the electronics + stepper motors need to be factored in too. :)
It was a measured amount at the outlet with a Kill a Watt style device, so including electronics, stepper motors, and PSU inefficiency. That said, I did it a year ago so I could easily be misremembering. I'm pretty confident it was < 150W printing PLA ~215°C with a 60°C bed.
Yup, that's pretty consistent with my measurements. 210/60 temperatures: https://i.imgur.com/i1L5rwo.png Prusa MK3S, with enclosure.
Cool, that's good info then. :)
Can't you just look at the power supply ratings? For example, 20A*12V would be 240W. Assume 80% efficiency, so 300W on the 120V side. Seems reasonable for an UPS designed to power a desktop.
You can if you want an absolute maximum of what the thing can draw as a load, it'll be labeled, but very often the real world use of a thing with an AC to DC power supply is a very different wattage figure from what the power supply is theoretically capable of.
Such as having an ATX midtower size 'gaming' desktop PC with an 850W power supply, that might be measured at 350W at the wall under full CPU+GPU benchmark load.
Such as having an ATX midtower size 'gaming' desktop PC with an 850W power supply, that might be measured at 350W at the wall under full CPU+GPU benchmark load.
Right, so if your max rated load is below your UPS's capability, it should work with plenty of margin and you can stop worrying about it. If your max rated load is higher than your UPS's capability, then you can either analyze the actual load more to see if it still works, or just buy a beefier UPS.
There's a dramatic difference between max draw and how much energy it takes to keep everything at a given temperature. Particularly so if heating the bed to a high temperature for ABS or PC or whatever. Looking at the power supply rating you could easily be 2-3 times the average real power consumption, which is a big deal if you're trying to use battery back up.
Yes I agree with you? You need to size your battery supply to meet both peak power and overall energy needs.
Generally when folk express concern about running random equipment on an UPS, they are concerned about peak power rather than energy capacity.
I'll also make the claim that most hobby grade 3D printers come with power supplies that are barely adequately rated for the printer's peak power, so using the supply's rating is probably in the right ballpark.
Edit: ah, I interpreted the thread a bit differently. Ignoring the UPS rating aspect, yeah the average power draw will likely be a fraction of the peak. My guess would be around 100W total for most Prusa style printers printing PLA. The stepper motor draw would be highly dependent on the speed of the print and the shape of the part, since power draw will be highest when accelerating at higher speeds.
Generally when folk express concern about running random equipment on an UPS, they are concerned about peak power rather than energy capacity.
I'll also make the claim that most hobby grade 3D printers come with power supplies that are barely adequately rated for the printer's peak power, so using the supply's rating is probably in the right ballpark.
Edit: ah, I interpreted the thread a bit differently. Ignoring the UPS rating aspect, yeah the average power draw will likely be a fraction of the peak. My guess would be around 100W total for most Prusa style printers printing PLA. The stepper motor draw would be highly dependent on the speed of the print and the shape of the part, since power draw will be highest when accelerating at higher speeds.
> since power draw will be highest when accelerating at higher speeds.
Hmmm, that seems more like a "maybe" thing? Stepper motors seem to draw a bunch of power when trying to hold position (eg not moving).
They can get very hot, needing heat sink + cooling, that it shows up pretty quickly when they're holding position.
That being said, many drivers seem to have options for lowering power consumption when holding.
Personally, I'm more used to CNC applications rather than 3D printing. So it might just be more noticeable for CNC things... :)
Hmmm, that seems more like a "maybe" thing? Stepper motors seem to draw a bunch of power when trying to hold position (eg not moving).
They can get very hot, needing heat sink + cooling, that it shows up pretty quickly when they're holding position.
That being said, many drivers seem to have options for lowering power consumption when holding.
Personally, I'm more used to CNC applications rather than 3D printing. So it might just be more noticeable for CNC things... :)
For sure, and to me it's definitely worth getting the nicer drivers with efficient idling and interpolated 256-microstepping.
Conceptually though, ignoring any power saving idling features or other fancy algorithms, stepper drivers basically want to drive a constant amount of current through the active phase (which is what you're adjusting with the potentiometer). In order to do so, it needs to overcome the voltage drop of the resistance of the windings, and the induced voltage of any changing magnetic fields. The resistive voltage drop is roughly constant, while the induced voltage is proportional to the speed of the motor. Power is equal to current times voltage. The current is constant, and the voltage increases proportionally with velocity, and so power should go up proportionally with velocity. The motor gets hot regardless of what it's doing because of the constant resistive losses, but the total power goes up the faster the motor is moving.
Motors are a lot more complicated than that in reality, and higher end stepper drivers don't actually drive constant current at all times. Semantically, a stepper driver's promise is to move the motor one step "quickly enough" after each pulse on its step input. A clever stepper driver will only apply current when it's actually needed to produce useful torque. Torque is only needed when the motor/load needs to accelerate to get to its target position. Ignoring the rotational aspect, force equals mass times acceleration, and power equals force times velocity. For a maximally clever stepper driver, power is therefore proportional to the product of acceleration and velocity. The motor only gets hot when accelerating regardless of velocity, while the total power goes up when accelerating at higher velocities.
Conceptually though, ignoring any power saving idling features or other fancy algorithms, stepper drivers basically want to drive a constant amount of current through the active phase (which is what you're adjusting with the potentiometer). In order to do so, it needs to overcome the voltage drop of the resistance of the windings, and the induced voltage of any changing magnetic fields. The resistive voltage drop is roughly constant, while the induced voltage is proportional to the speed of the motor. Power is equal to current times voltage. The current is constant, and the voltage increases proportionally with velocity, and so power should go up proportionally with velocity. The motor gets hot regardless of what it's doing because of the constant resistive losses, but the total power goes up the faster the motor is moving.
Motors are a lot more complicated than that in reality, and higher end stepper drivers don't actually drive constant current at all times. Semantically, a stepper driver's promise is to move the motor one step "quickly enough" after each pulse on its step input. A clever stepper driver will only apply current when it's actually needed to produce useful torque. Torque is only needed when the motor/load needs to accelerate to get to its target position. Ignoring the rotational aspect, force equals mass times acceleration, and power equals force times velocity. For a maximally clever stepper driver, power is therefore proportional to the product of acceleration and velocity. The motor only gets hot when accelerating regardless of velocity, while the total power goes up when accelerating at higher velocities.
For a UPS you want to know both the max wattage of the load, as what % of the total output that the UPS's inverter can put out at any given time, and also the nominal steady-state watts so that you can calculate the Watt-hours, which is what will determine runtime on a given battery size.
If you have a UPS with, for example, 4 x 12V 8Ah AGM batteries, it has a certain amount of Wh you can realistically use before you deep-discharge the batteries into severe damage.
If you have a UPS with, for example, 4 x 12V 8Ah AGM batteries, it has a certain amount of Wh you can realistically use before you deep-discharge the batteries into severe damage.
Indeed. Depending on the intended use of the UPS though, the energy capacity might not matter all that much. For a 3D printer, it seems like an UPS would be in place to weather the occasional hiccup in utility power. Utility power interruptions seem inherently bimodal. Either it glitches out for a few seconds and comes back, or it's out for hours. Pretty much any UPS will have enough energy to run a 3D printer for a few seconds or minutes, but very few UPSes exist that would run one for hours on end.
Taking that use case to the extreme, maybe someone lives in an area with very unreliable utility power. They might absolutely need to have enough energy stored to run their 3D printer for an entire print. Maybe they solve that with lots of batteries, but in many places with unreliable utility power, it's more likely they're just going to fire up a gas powered generator whenever the power goes out. Once again, the UPS only needs to last long enough for someone to notice and fire up the generator.
Folk certainly might have more exotic use cases. Maybe someone lives completely off-grid and powers their 3D printer off of solar panels, and a generator isn't a sustainable option. They'll definitely be more interested in energy capacity.
The power capacity seems important no matter what, since exceeding it will either result in a voltage brownout, tripping of a protection circuit, or melting something.
Taking that use case to the extreme, maybe someone lives in an area with very unreliable utility power. They might absolutely need to have enough energy stored to run their 3D printer for an entire print. Maybe they solve that with lots of batteries, but in many places with unreliable utility power, it's more likely they're just going to fire up a gas powered generator whenever the power goes out. Once again, the UPS only needs to last long enough for someone to notice and fire up the generator.
Folk certainly might have more exotic use cases. Maybe someone lives completely off-grid and powers their 3D printer off of solar panels, and a generator isn't a sustainable option. They'll definitely be more interested in energy capacity.
The power capacity seems important no matter what, since exceeding it will either result in a voltage brownout, tripping of a protection circuit, or melting something.
I measured this previously on a Kill-a-Watt with a Prusa clona (Monoprice Maker Select v2). Heat-up sequence draws between 120-130W (heating both bed and hotend at the same time). Once at temp for PLA, it only draws around 80-90 average depending how many steppers are moving.
I tried it with the Ender 3 V2 and there is some kind of bandwidth issue that kept it from printing successfully. Exact same gcode worked great from sdcard, failed miserably via octoprint. I’m guessing it has to do with the available ports?
It might have to do with the USB buffer on the Ender. If the buffer is too small (e.g. 4 gcode commands or so) then when the buffer is filled with commands that execute very quickly, its possible for the printer to empty the buffer before new commands come down the pipeline from Octoprint. This causes the printer to stop the printhead sharply, which can cause quality issues on prints, or maybe even print failure if the sudden stop causes the print to detach from the bed.
[You can fix this if you're using Marlin](https://www.reddit.com/r/ender3/comments/btjk22/octoprint_is...), since Marlin allows you to configure the buffer size. Generally more buffer is better, but do be aware that increasing the buffer size will cause the printer to be less responsive to the "stop print" command on octoprint (since the printer will continue executing the commands that have been buffered).
[You can fix this if you're using Marlin](https://www.reddit.com/r/ender3/comments/btjk22/octoprint_is...), since Marlin allows you to configure the buffer size. Generally more buffer is better, but do be aware that increasing the buffer size will cause the printer to be less responsive to the "stop print" command on octoprint (since the printer will continue executing the commands that have been buffered).
Will give this a try thank you!!!
I've been using octoprint on my Ender3v2 from a Raspberry Pi 3B and I've never had such an issue in almost a year.
I use Marlin 2.0.1-bugfix branch for firmware because stock creality lacks some useful GCodes (such as for print pausing) but otherwise I did nothing special.
I'm also using OctoDash (https://github.com/UnchartedBull/OctoDash) on the Pi which is mounted onto the printer with the Raspberry Pi 7" touch screen (https://i.imgur.com/p8Mf5Em.jpg) and removed the stock screen.
I use Marlin 2.0.1-bugfix branch for firmware because stock creality lacks some useful GCodes (such as for print pausing) but otherwise I did nothing special.
I'm also using OctoDash (https://github.com/UnchartedBull/OctoDash) on the Pi which is mounted onto the printer with the Raspberry Pi 7" touch screen (https://i.imgur.com/p8Mf5Em.jpg) and removed the stock screen.
You might be having too many very small moves, which will hurt print quality as well from micro start/stops.
Watch 30-ish seconds starting at 2:57 here: https://youtu.be/Hvw3DrVAeTA
Watch 30-ish seconds starting at 2:57 here: https://youtu.be/Hvw3DrVAeTA
I’m using the same exact setup, works fine for me. My OctoPrint is running on an old Mac mini.
I have prints fail over serial on my CR-10S Pro (both stock and TM3D firmware). Maybe it’s a Creality design flaw, maybe it’s a Marlin firmware issue.
Also, the micro SD card slot has never worked well. For a while I had to be very gentle when inserting micro SD cards to have them stay in after the click. Now micro SD cards never stay in. I haven’t found any references to this issue with 3D printers online, but from what I can gather it is an issue seen on faulty micro SD card slots in other equipment. My fix has been to buy a micro SD card extender (flexible PCB), duct tape it in place, and pray it doesn’t come loose. It survived a 3 day print so far.
Also, the micro SD card slot has never worked well. For a while I had to be very gentle when inserting micro SD cards to have them stay in after the click. Now micro SD cards never stay in. I haven’t found any references to this issue with 3D printers online, but from what I can gather it is an issue seen on faulty micro SD card slots in other equipment. My fix has been to buy a micro SD card extender (flexible PCB), duct tape it in place, and pray it doesn’t come loose. It survived a 3 day print so far.
Octoprint is amazing. There are also some very high-quality plug-ins, like Octolapse, which Octoprint's standardized plugin interface makes a breeze to use.
I upgraded my printer's motherboard and didn't even bother to connect the screen and dial, Octoprint is now the printer's GUI, as far as I'm concerned.
I upgraded my printer's motherboard and didn't even bother to connect the screen and dial, Octoprint is now the printer's GUI, as far as I'm concerned.
It seems I'm the minority here, but I dont like OctoPrint. My main issues:
- Terribly slow startup and load times.
- no support for mobile devices just with some app.
- While it can do lots of things with plugins they tend to kill performance which might cause artifacts on the print.
- slow on updates, they ware on Python 2.x until this year.
I'm currently migrating to mainsail (https://github.com/meteyou/mainsail), which looks much better.
- Terribly slow startup and load times.
- no support for mobile devices just with some app.
- While it can do lots of things with plugins they tend to kill performance which might cause artifacts on the print.
- slow on updates, they ware on Python 2.x until this year.
I'm currently migrating to mainsail (https://github.com/meteyou/mainsail), which looks much better.
I think they handled the python upgrade professionally, the author even went and fixed some of the communities more popular plugins to be python 3 compatible. When the python 3 update didn’t work for me, the rollback scripts worked great and a few months later I just upgraded to python 3.
All in all the main maintainer, which is working full time on it, is communicating well with the community. The iteration cycle has become faster during this last year, and updates seem to be rather stable.
Regarding the performance killing plugins, never had a problem on a RPi 4. What are you using?
All in all the main maintainer, which is working full time on it, is communicating well with the community. The iteration cycle has become faster during this last year, and updates seem to be rather stable.
Regarding the performance killing plugins, never had a problem on a RPi 4. What are you using?
OctoPrint only has a single main developer. They also spend a lot of time triaging bugs (https://github.com/OctoPrint/OctoPrint/issues). I'm sure they'd appreciate any help they can get.
To counter your example, I run a Prusa Mk3s and recently bought a mini and have quite literally never run either printer without OctoPrint.
I've got no interest in shuffling around sd cards in order to print models, nor do I want it connected to my primary pc that gets rebooted regularly.
And in their defence, I've been running OctoPrint for about 3 years and never had an issue with it across any updates.
I've got no interest in shuffling around sd cards in order to print models, nor do I want it connected to my primary pc that gets rebooted regularly.
And in their defence, I've been running OctoPrint for about 3 years and never had an issue with it across any updates.
Idk what you mean about plugins and performance. Yes, the UI and startup get slower, but print performance? I ran it on an OrangePi Zero (== one of the jankiest SBCs out there) with a bunch of plugins and one webcam without a single OctoPrint-related failure for more than half a year. I ended up switching to something powerful only because of power supply issues (OrangePi are even more voltage-sensitive than RaspPi).
I agree, OctoPrint is very slow to load with the default settings. I disabled these plugins and now it loads very quickly:
- Action Command Notification Support
- Action Command Prompt Support
- Announcements Plugin
- Anonymous Usage Tracking
- Discovery
- Error tracking
- File Check
- Firmware check
- Logging
- Pi Support Plugin
No app is a feature for me. It's a fairly big ask for a free open source project to navigate the Google Play and Apple stores too, I feel app stores have no place in the open source ecosystem. I wouldn't wish that headache on any project trying to provide something for free.
The TouchUI plugin gets the web interface very usable on mobile.
Agreed, TouchUI is great!
And there is an unofficial app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kabacon.oc...
And there is an unofficial app: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.kabacon.oc...
What device are you running it on that you are seeing slow startup and load times?
Even on a Pi 2 with a plugin heavy instance (TouchUI with custom theme, octolapse, etc) the web interface loaded acceptably fast enough.
Python 3 support was in Beta/RC for a very long time intentionally so plugin authors could update.
Even on a Pi 2 with a plugin heavy instance (TouchUI with custom theme, octolapse, etc) the web interface loaded acceptably fast enough.
Python 3 support was in Beta/RC for a very long time intentionally so plugin authors could update.
The initial systemd service startup takes about 6 minutes on an original Pi.
I spent a while wondering why octoprint wasn't responding to http requests before sshing in and seeing python using 100% CPU.
I spent a while wondering why octoprint wasn't responding to http requests before sshing in and seeing python using 100% CPU.
Duet controllers are another good option of OctoPrint doesn't appeal. Having everything integrated into one board makes a lot of things easier, and from a safety perspective it feels a lot more trustworthy than random cloned driver boards.
I just wish there was a good octolapse-alike for the Duet. I'm gonna try https://github.com/kriechi/DuetRRF-timelapse but really wish the was a more 'native' solution...
Does it only work with the Klipper printer firmware or can it work with Marlin?
I have a 3D printer, and I don't get it at all. I have yet to need to print something remotely, and can't think of a scenario in which I would want to.
I guess if you have reason to want process pictures?
I guess if you have reason to want process pictures?
It does much more than this, though. Printing directly from cura, gcode viewer, bed levelling visualizer, notification when done and emergency stop.
These are the plugins I love so far. I guess it depends on which printer you have but these are all amazing for my uses.
These are the plugins I love so far. I guess it depends on which printer you have but these are all amazing for my uses.
My workflow of slicing and printing is totally separated. I do my slicing on my main computer and save the stl to a network drive with organized folders for filament types and dates. Then I can print whenever I want from anywhere through octoprint. That's almost always just on my phone or laptop or main computer, but it's nice being able to access it remotely and I don't need to bother with anything but an rpi in the room with the printer. I think octoprint could be so much better but for how easy it is to setup and configure I'd choose it again today
Inserting and removing the micro SD card gets old real quick.
I like being untethered from my PC or SD card. Drag and drop the gcode into the web UI and click print. My printer sits in the room adjacent to my office so then I can monitor it remotely using phone apps (OctoPrint provides a mjpeg stream).
Edit: plus visualization for auto-bed leveling is amazing trying to fine tune the printer bed.
Edit: plus visualization for auto-bed leveling is amazing trying to fine tune the printer bed.
My first printer was an Anet A8, which lived in the garage due to the noise. I used Octoprint with a webcam to keep an eye on progress, both to abort bad prints and to know when it was done.
I now have a Prusa Mini, which is quiet and small enough to live in a cupboard in my office. It's far more reliable and the print time estimate is so accurate that I don't need Octoprint any more. It also has a USB port instead of SD card, so walking across my office with a USB stick is a viable alternative to sending jobs directly from my desktop browser.
So I guess it depends on your printer - if it's noisy, large, unreliable or you have lots of them, Octoprint is a godsend.
I now have a Prusa Mini, which is quiet and small enough to live in a cupboard in my office. It's far more reliable and the print time estimate is so accurate that I don't need Octoprint any more. It also has a USB port instead of SD card, so walking across my office with a USB stick is a viable alternative to sending jobs directly from my desktop browser.
So I guess it depends on your printer - if it's noisy, large, unreliable or you have lots of them, Octoprint is a godsend.
I don't use OctoPrint or similar yet, but it's been on my to-do list since before I got my printer. (Prusa mini.)
It depends what you envisage by 'remotely', I don't imagine ever starting a print while not at home, but I do want to sit at my computer, slice, and send straight to the printer; without faffing about with a USB stick.
It depends what you envisage by 'remotely', I don't imagine ever starting a print while not at home, but I do want to sit at my computer, slice, and send straight to the printer; without faffing about with a USB stick.
two reasons for me; these apply to any remote administration suite for printing and not just octoprint.
1) It isn't pleasant to be near many industrial machines. Chemical vapor/off-gassing can be a real problem, so on top of the usually loud metal-component motion systems/gantries you have loud evacuation/exhaust fans. One place to deal with webcams/remote features on many machines at once is convenient.
2) Real time notifications create less machine downtime. A thermistor failed so a machine stopped mid-print? This time can be salvaged by a notification to browser or mobile for quick repair rather than discovering the issue by returning to the machine at the supposed end-time and being greeted with a non-finished print.
1) It isn't pleasant to be near many industrial machines. Chemical vapor/off-gassing can be a real problem, so on top of the usually loud metal-component motion systems/gantries you have loud evacuation/exhaust fans. One place to deal with webcams/remote features on many machines at once is convenient.
2) Real time notifications create less machine downtime. A thermistor failed so a machine stopped mid-print? This time can be salvaged by a notification to browser or mobile for quick repair rather than discovering the issue by returning to the machine at the supposed end-time and being greeted with a non-finished print.
Are you using an old raspberry pi? Going from the 3 to 4 helped loading time immensely. Although you still have to get a new board.
You forgot to mention Klipper which is an amazin project and firmware.
Because its a different thing. Octoprint is a remote GUI for your printer, Klipper is a firmware (and I agree, that its the best)
Input shaping is revolutionary.
as an RRF user I hope to see those features move over one day.
as an RRF user I hope to see those features move over one day.
https://github.com/Duet3D/RepRapFirmware/issues/443
It's planned. I'm unsure if I like RRF or Klipper more, so kinda keep up with both.
It's planned. I'm unsure if I like RRF or Klipper more, so kinda keep up with both.
What's good about it?
I'm not who you asked, but since i'm preaching about it elsewhere anyway :
input shaping allows one to get rid of mechanical resonances without re-engineering the motion system on a printer. It's pretty unique to klipper -- but it's one of those features that I suspect is brilliant enough to where the other groups who develop such software will probably follow-up with their own variations.
https://www.klipper3d.org/Resonance_Compensation.html
input shaping allows one to get rid of mechanical resonances without re-engineering the motion system on a printer. It's pretty unique to klipper -- but it's one of those features that I suspect is brilliant enough to where the other groups who develop such software will probably follow-up with their own variations.
https://www.klipper3d.org/Resonance_Compensation.html
Oh huh, nice! I think the latest Pruša firmware versions have something like this too, no?
Not sure, I haven't been following Prusa too much lately.
I've spoken to a few people on klipper who are inputing the variables for compensation in directly from an attached accelerometer on the printer frame. That'd be the way i'd want to go rather than taking a pair of calipers to the ringing artifacts on the print itself.
I've spoken to a few people on klipper who are inputing the variables for compensation in directly from an attached accelerometer on the printer frame. That'd be the way i'd want to go rather than taking a pair of calipers to the ringing artifacts on the print itself.
Yeah, attaching a simple $1 accelerometer to the frame sounds like a great solution, I wonder why this isn't done more often.
I used OctoPrint on a RPi to drive my 3D printer for years. It was great. I added the RPi camera and could keep an eye on prints remotely, which while leaving home while printing was maybe not a great idea, certainly was convenient.
Yep that's exactly my setup. I don't even leave the house I have the printer in a closet and can peek at it from time to time while watching tv. I added an LED strip I can turn on/off from octoprint as a light for the camera. One thing I really like is just being able to look at the first couple layers just before I hit print so I really know I've got the right file loaded.
There's a plugin that will visualize the entire print in 3D, and can also sync with the print. It's fantastic. I don't remember what it's called now, but if you search for "Gcode visualizer" there can't be that many.
GCode Viewer is included with OctoPrint, it lets you preview the loaded GCode layer by layer before/while printing, and can sync to the print in realtime too.
OctoPrint is one of the reasons I got a 3D printer. I thought the idea of being able to view and control the printer remotely was a great bonus. Now I basically have one Pi running the printer, and another one next to it running a web browser connected to OctoPrint. I really found it to be a great way to monitor what’s happening in a more interactive way. Instead of just watching a few numbers on the side display of the printer, you can get so much more information. Because of this, I think it makes printing more fun.
This was the first "upgrade" I did when I finally bought a 3D printer. And I don't think I could go without it at this point. Can't recommend enough.
I just got a resin 3D printer and had to do some digging to find something similar to OctoPrint for a resin printer. I found Mariner [0] which I’m thinking of installing in my Sonic Mini 4K. It’s limited to a few types of resin printers but I was feeling left out from how cool OctoPrint looks.
[0] https://github.com/luizribeiro/mariner
[0] https://github.com/luizribeiro/mariner
Hey! I wrote mariner :) There's been people in the community that got the Sonic Mini 4K working.
mariner is obviously not as fancy and sophisticated as OctoPrint, but I'm happy to take pull requests and improve it. Since MSLA printers are quite different from FDM, I found it would be simpler to write mariner than to add support for MSLA printers on OctoPrint.
mariner is obviously not as fancy and sophisticated as OctoPrint, but I'm happy to take pull requests and improve it. Since MSLA printers are quite different from FDM, I found it would be simpler to write mariner than to add support for MSLA printers on OctoPrint.
Im really surprised to hear it didn't work for a resin printer. You should create an issue for it.
Doesn’t look encouraging.
https://community.octoprint.org/t/octoprint-for-sla-resin-3d...
Shameless plug for my iOS OctoPrint client, Kraken: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/kraken-for-octoprint/id1472939...
I've run octoprint on a dedicated pi for several years now. My latest build is a Raspi 4 booting off usb and it runs a modified frontend quite nicely.
Fantastic project.
Fantastic project.
One of my favorite things about the Prusa 3 series is that you can embed a Raspberry Pi Zero running OctoPrint in it - it fits right inside the power supply enclosure. Bam, you've got a networked Prusa with no external anything.
It is highly discouraged to use a Pi Zero with the current versions of OctoPrint, it just simply doesn't have enough computing power and causes quite a few problems. Prusa really should remove the page in their wiki.
Prusa has a customize build of Octoprint that addresses these problems. As long as you’re not using a webcam with it (and you can’t if it’s embedded anyway), it runs fine, if a bit slow.
I have octoprint on all my printers. Klipper or marlin but always with octoprint on a pi. It is incredibly useful and there are many plugins for what ever you may need. Additionaly I have Printoid om android which talks to octoprint.
OctoPrint is great. I use it with a modified Ender 3 Pro and Cura + Cura's OctoPrint plugin. Having said that, I have been very curious about https://github.com/meteyou/mainsail. I can't quite tell if it'll work with Cura so I can just hit "print" from the slicer and have it go, but the UI is quite slick and free of a lot of random notifications, etc. that come with OctoPrint.
I've got 2 printers - an artillery sidewinder and a big duet driven beast...both have an octoprint. Octolapse is soo much better then anything I've found for the Duet.
The SideWinder was a breeze to setup. I need to sit down and spend a day hooking up the Duet though - gonna try using https://github.com/kriechi/DuetRRF-timelapse
The SideWinder was a breeze to setup. I need to sit down and spend a day hooking up the Duet though - gonna try using https://github.com/kriechi/DuetRRF-timelapse
I've always found the architecture to be amazing. It's my go to reference for implementing things like plugins or events into other python projects.
This is a pretty old thread at ~12 hours, but there's someone putting in an active effort to enable OctoPrint to run directly off of an Android device. Still pretty early days. The author currently still distributes and gathers feedback through the linked Telegram group.
https://github.com/feelfreelinux/octo4a
https://github.com/feelfreelinux/octo4a
So basically you install this on a dedicated, network connected computer and the it connects to the printer? How tough is the setup?
Well it goes onto a raspberry pi which acts as a web server, that connects to the printer. You then visit the octoprint website interface to manage connected printers. That's handy because I can do it from my phone or computer so long as I am on the wifi, and you can in theory reach it remotely while out of the house if you set up your network to allow that.
It works well on a raspberry pi but there are multiple ways to host it (docker, etc) so even if you have old spare hardware you're in luck.
Not at all in my anecdotal experience! My Prusa Mini just connected to my old Pi via MicroUSB and it all "just worked" for me. Ended up adding a Pi camera to the setup and installed the OctoLapse plugin to automatically generate timelapse videos of my prints; been very happy with it all so far.
Another data point:
I also found it super easy. The most difficult part for me was finding a data capable MicroUSB cable to connect the Pi to my printer. Most of mine were only for charging. I used an old RPi 3 and used the OctoPrint SD image. After that, everything just worked. It even worked with my USB webcam instead of the default RPi camera.
This was connected to a Creality Ender 3.
It might be more difficult to install as a package as opposed to using a pre-made RPi image, but it should still be pretty straightforward.
I also found it super easy. The most difficult part for me was finding a data capable MicroUSB cable to connect the Pi to my printer. Most of mine were only for charging. I used an old RPi 3 and used the OctoPrint SD image. After that, everything just worked. It even worked with my USB webcam instead of the default RPi camera.
This was connected to a Creality Ender 3.
It might be more difficult to install as a package as opposed to using a pre-made RPi image, but it should still be pretty straightforward.
For those that like tinkering with 3d printers, check out Klipper. It's an alternative "firmware" that differs in that the kinematic brains run on a raspberry pi and the actual firmware is just a minimal binary that consumes a reduced instruction set. It works with Octoprint, or with Klipper-specific tools via its api server.
Klipper is great. It makes 8-bit control boards about as effective as 32-bit ones. Having a single easy to modify config file is nice too. There's some quirks about it that take a while to wrap your head around, but once you do there's really no going back (at least for me).
(At least as of a couple years ago when i last used it) Octoprint is a lovely, well integrated system that comes close to being easy for newbs and utilitarian users to deploy; while still not impossibly complicated for hacking into whatever adjustments you need. That's a neat trick.
10 Minutes of browsing the website and I have no idea how to set this up with my printer. I'm sure it's great and all, but the info on what printer I need and how to set it up besides installing the software on an RPi should be accessible right from the main page.
Ah, how disappointing. For a brief moment I hoped someone had replaced the boring old three-axis mechanism with one based on eight articulated robot arms using muscular hydrostat principles. Or at least one arm.
Offtopic, but I like the web UI for its cookie use notification. It's fitting to the color scheme, not obtrusive and yet noticeable at the end. It's one of the best I've seen. Good job!
Octoprint was my printer interface until I accidentally destroyed my serial interface. Now I’m using the Ethernet interface. It’s not as nice but I can print still.
I use it with my Prusa mini's. The only pity is that it's a bit annoying to run two printers with it. Two instances... is that really necessary?
Octoprint is great for 1-2 printers, but quickly becomes cumbersome when running more than that. What's the best option for big print farms?
Haven’t actually used it, but I’ve read Octofarm works ok.
https://octofarm.net/
https://octofarm.net/
I got a resin printer about a month ago which is a lot of fun. I’m thinking of getting an FDM printer, does anyone have recommendations?
/r/3dprinting megathread on the topic :)
https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/lv818a/purchase...
https://www.reddit.com/r/3Dprinting/comments/lv818a/purchase...
If you've got the money, I'd suggest Original Prusa, since I got one I've never used my Creality CR-10 again. Even though the CR-10 isn't a bad printer at all, the Prusa provides the overall better experience. :-)
I'd say, if you like me don't enjoy the tinkering with calibration here, and adjustment there, then get a Prusa.
They are by no means perfect, and calibrations/adjustments come with the territory, but they have a certain threshold for quality that removes some of the most horrible sources of errors.
Eg, flex in the structure often comes from cheaping out on material or design, and is imo the worst kind of sources of errors. A static error (eg a fixed offset of the bed leveling) is more easy to calibrate/compensate away.
Other big brands may be as good as Prusa, but I have no experience of them. A friend got an Ender 3, bed was warped, replaced the unit, bed warped on that one too. Our Prusa mk3s2 had no such kind of quality errors. YMMV.
Some things I learned:
* do a z-level calibration (finding distance for the first layer) according to guides
* increasing temp (bed and head) by 5degC on first layer increased adhesion
* clean the bed with IPA only, that's well enough if you never touch it.
* never touch the bed with bare hands - I always used tissue paper as a glove
* never needed to use paper glue or hair spray or anything after the above things (but before that I used paper glue which didn't help, and was haaaaaard to remove)
* don't scrape the print off with the metal spatula, it'll scratch the bed surface easily
* when turning on the printer, don't use the small amount of filament that's been sitting in the print head since last time. Back out the filament and cut that off and start with new filament.
They are by no means perfect, and calibrations/adjustments come with the territory, but they have a certain threshold for quality that removes some of the most horrible sources of errors.
Eg, flex in the structure often comes from cheaping out on material or design, and is imo the worst kind of sources of errors. A static error (eg a fixed offset of the bed leveling) is more easy to calibrate/compensate away.
Other big brands may be as good as Prusa, but I have no experience of them. A friend got an Ender 3, bed was warped, replaced the unit, bed warped on that one too. Our Prusa mk3s2 had no such kind of quality errors. YMMV.
Some things I learned:
* do a z-level calibration (finding distance for the first layer) according to guides
* increasing temp (bed and head) by 5degC on first layer increased adhesion
* clean the bed with IPA only, that's well enough if you never touch it.
* never touch the bed with bare hands - I always used tissue paper as a glove
* never needed to use paper glue or hair spray or anything after the above things (but before that I used paper glue which didn't help, and was haaaaaard to remove)
* don't scrape the print off with the metal spatula, it'll scratch the bed surface easily
* when turning on the printer, don't use the small amount of filament that's been sitting in the print head since last time. Back out the filament and cut that off and start with new filament.
If you have a microcenter nearby they sell 3d printers, you can go see them run and take one home. I’m extremely pleased with the Ender 3 V2 from Creality, especially for the price. It makes some fan noise but the steppers are very quiet which is nice. I haven’t had any issues with print quality and overall the build seems solid. If you’re thinking about running OctoPrint check my question in here for what appears to be some good advice.
All that said, Prusa seems to be the benchmark.
All that said, Prusa seems to be the benchmark.
I've used octoprint alot. But prusas management software is getting a lot better and will definitely have my consideration for my next printer
I used to work at a little shop that did a lot of custom prints. OctoPrint was awesome. We had almost 20 printers controlled by it