Reply To: Looking at buying a Anycubic 3D printer

[blinky465 17028xp 3]

I have a Photon (not S) and I love it! I went with the original, despite originally looking at the S, mainly because of the level of community support for the machine.

I believe the S now supports .photon and .pws files. At the time, it only printed .pws files which was a deal-breaker for me.

My currentl workflow is import .stl into Prusa Slicer (auto supports are far better than ChituBox and are much easier to remove, leaving fewer pock-marks). I then export the entire plate with supports as a new .stl file and import this into ChituBox for slicing. Lastly – and this is critical for me – I run the .photon file through the photon file validator, removing or fixing any islands.

For a full build plate of about 8 miniatures, I might spend an hour or so preparing the files (the entire process, for eight .stl files, slicing and fixing etc). But it’s time well spent – I imagine there’s nothing more galling than waiting four hours for a print and to end up with nothing on the plate and a whole load of nasty half-cured bits in the tank, and a load of baked resin stuck to the FEP! (I’ve only ever had one failed print, and that was because it was 8 degrees in my unheated workshop when I left it running overnight).

Of the two, I’d go for the Photon every time.

If I was buying a second printer, I’d probably go for another Photon. But that’s only because I’ve not seen the Phrozen Sonic Mini at a sensible price in the UK with a metal tank. They look really interesting. But of the Anycubics, I’d go with the original Photon every time.