Geeetech E180 follow up

I've had people ask if I've tried out the second E180 that I had and if it changed my opinion on the machine.

Short answer: Nope

The second E180 that I unboxed went well enough until we tried to turn it on. The power adapter had, strangely, a plug that didn't fit in it. The male end was too long to fit in the receptical and make contact with the leads. In otherwords, as it came out of the box, it would not have worked.

Fortunately I had a second Geetech that I could strip parts from.

Let me say that again. The only reason I was able to get this second one working was because I had another one to use as parts. You getting the idea now?

So I got it printing and started printing the test dog. I honestly wanted to see this dog happen. However, at about 75% through the print it was apparent that the filament sample they sent with this model was not enough to finish the print. I will remind you that the filament sample on the first printer was excessive and would have been more than enough. But on this one it wasn't enough. So I threw in another sample, one that came with a MP Select Mini that's just been laying around, and let the print finish. That left the print with a visible difference in the finish of the dog where filament changed, but otherwise it worked fine.

So we set up a cura setting, did a few other test prints, messed up the filament diameter on one of them, and then disaster.

I came in this morning and the LCD read "Touch screen calibration failed". I did not initiate a touch screen calibration. So I started poking at the touch screen and, guess what? Yup, entirely unresponsive. Bricked. It bricked itself because I left it on all night and it got bored, and it bricked itself.

At this point my message is exactly the same as in the first video, but in even stronger language. I have to tell you to avoid this machine, and it pains me to do so. Because this machine gets right all the things that 3D printing needs to get right to move forward. And yet it fails at basic function. And I really hope one day we'll see a 3D printer with this pretty a UI that actually works at a reasonable price. But the E180 is not that machine. At all.