I will second this, even though I also agreed with “build a Voron”. My 2.4 is a massively capable printer, and has a lot of quality of life features like actual mechanical bed leveling, but odds are your first build will have some teething issues. My extruder motor didn’t have a fully aeat wire terminal in its factory harness so it extruded inconsistently. Thankfully it was easy to find and fix. I’ve had a few wire breaks in my cable chains because I didn’t leave enough slack in the runs. The build itself is also long, but I did find it to be straightforward. Vorons are also Vorons, so the modding is endless.

Printer as a tool? Prusa. Maybe also Voron, especially if you want print volume/raw speed/quality of life. Printer as a tinkering device? Voron. Ship of theseus as you upgrade your way to a better printer? Ender.

Haha, came here to say the same thing.

Rather than 4x monitors, how about bigger and higher resolution monitors? I have 2x 27" 1440 monitors. They’re fine to read at 100% scaling, which gives me tons of space to put things. I often run four columns of windows side by side - two columns per monitor. Going back to 1080 in the office is a big downgrade. You could do a similar pattern with ultra wide and/or higher resolution.

Monitors with a built in KVM are tons cheaper in total, especially if you care about high refresh rates. I share my M27Qs and a mouse/keyboard between my personal computer and work laptop this way.

I’m not sure that I get the need for three laptops, but you do you.

Looks pretty cool. The frame reminds me a bit of a piper. Is this home brew?

Haha, our kids do go under our table at times but they know not to go under other people’s tables.

I don’t have much tolerance for absentee parenting either, especially if the kids wind up seeking attention from others, by say going under someone else’s table, because they’re not getting enough attention from their own parents.

As a parent of younger kids, we’re sorry. We come armed with as many activities as possible and will take our kids outside if they’re too excited until food gets to the table. That will help them focus on eating.

We very rarely went out to eat when they were toddlers due to fear of our kids bothering others and understand that our desire to experience some level of normalcy shouldn’t come at the expense of others.

All that said, if the parents are trying to keep their kids occupied, please extend some grace. Being a parent can be extremely isolating and we’re simply trying to pretend like we still get to do normal things once in a while.

Get a hear rate monitor and do High Intensity Interval Training (HIIT). It’s by far the fastest way to increase your stamina if you’re untrained and even if you are trained it’s a very effective means of increasing your stamina.

This is backed by science.

While significant improvements in endurance performance and corresponding physiological markers are evident following submaximal endurance training in sedentary and recreationally active groups, an additional increase in submaximal training (i.e. volume) in highly trained individuals does not appear to further enhance either endurance performance or associated physiological variables [e.g. peak oxygen uptake (V . O 2peak), oxidative enzyme activity]. It seems that, for athletes who are already trained, improvements in endurance performance can be achieved only through high-intensity interval training

It is generally believed that in sedentary (VO 2max <45 ml/kg/min) and recreationally active individ- uals (VO 2max ≈ 45 to 55 ml/kg/min), several years are required to increase VO 2max to that of the highly trained athlete (VO 2max > 60 ml/kg/min). [21,42] However, Hickson et al. [43] showed, in eight sedenyary and recreationally active individuals, that VO2max could be markedly increased (+44%; p < 0.05) after 10 weeks of high-intensity exercise training (alternating 40 minutes cycling intervals at VO 2max 1day, with 40 minutes high-intensity running the next, 6 d/wk

PrusaSlicer is a fork of Slic3r Bambu’s slicer is a fork of PrusaSlicer Orca Slicer is a fork of Bambu’s slicer and also pulls in ideas from super slicer (another PrusaSlicer fork).

In other words, they all share a common lineage. Each adds quality of life improvements over the fork, at least in theory. It’s possible those quality of life improvements will make it back upstream to the thing that was forked.

As for specific examples, Orca Slicer has a somewhat different set of tuning parameters, some unique-to-it quality things like scarf seams, built in tuning prints (temp towers, EM multiplier, pressure advance, a test to find your max flow rate, etc) a revamped UI, etc. I haven’t compared the two in a while, so it’s possible that some of this has made its way upstream by now.

TIL there’s a slicer called Lychee Slicer.

Sounds like a hot mess. Are you looking for a alternative? If yes, provide info but my off the cuff recommendation for a FDM printer is Orca Slicer.

On my direct drive Voron I could make it through retraction tower test prints fine with TPU, but it would always jam with retraction enabled on longer prints with my usual 0.3mm. Pulling apart the extruder would always reveal some TPU had gotten wrapped around the drive gear. Rather than try tuning until the failure went away, I just went with 0 lol.

Thanks for the recommendations, I will check everything out!

Viking metal eh? I recently found Brothers of Metal and they’re banging. What else do you recommend?

If it’s heat it could also be a cooling thing. If you search the web on your search engine of choice for “<printer name> driver overheat” you’ll see what solutions the community has already come up with.

If the print didn’t come off the bed, I don’t think adjusting z-offset will help. As prints get taller, if you’re running into issues with warping the corners will start to curl up.

Your printer definitely missed some x or y steps. Whether that was due to your drivers getting too hot and just that, or the extruder running into the print. Have you ever seen your printer do this:

It looks like you missed some x and/or y steps, which made the printer lose its orientation and make a lot of spaghetti.

Possible causes usually involve warping, the nozzle catching the wrapped up piece, and then your printer missing some steps.

Have you completed a large print before?

One other thought that occurred to me overnight: you might be asking about FIRE (financial independence, retire early). There are tons of strategies for going about that.

I would caution about moving toward “off grid” type scenarios. Your monthly costs will be less, but you will have significantly higher up front (if buying a new residence) and/or maintenance costs (if buying used and/or when you decide to sell). For example, our water and sewer bill is around $800/year. If anything outside the house fails, the utility company will fix it. My in-laws sold a home in NJ with well water and septic and had to replace their sceptic field before they were able to sell. That set them back somewhere between $30k and $40k. Depending on your goals it could be either an advantage or a disadvantage.

Feedback: your actual questions start about 2/3 down your post. Lead with them next time so we know how to answer better :)

it’s really hard to apply my city-living experience to try to extrapolate what life might be like if I make a goal to buy a small home in Nowheretown, USA to retire in 20 years down the line

We have younger kids, live in a lower cost of area, and bought our house in 2011. Excluding frivolous categories, our top expenses are:

1. Saving for our retirement. Between our 401ks and IRAs, this is our biggest expenditure by quite a bit
2. Food. We don’t eat out a ton, but also don’t do a great job of eating low cost. Feeding four is also fun, we can’t wait until they’re teens. This category is not much ahead of #3 though
3. Our mortgage (it’s a 30 year and taxes, insurance, principal, and actual mortgage are $1,250/mo)
4. Saving for our kid’d potential college tuition

Once the kids are out and we’re retired categories #1 and #4 go away, category #2 will probably get cut in half, and our taxes and insurance are currently well under $4,500/year. Speaking of taxes, mine are capped at a maximum increase of 5% or inflation, whichever is lower. With the housing run-up this has worked out in our favor.

Home expenses are a thing. It’s hard to say how much to budget for that though. Some of it depends on you (eg do you really need to renovate that bathroom in full), your taste, and your budget. I would expect a decent outlay every 5 years or so - roof, brick/siding/exterior work, furnace/ac, driveway etc. The more you’re willing and able to do yourself the better off you’ll be.

You don’t have to be in the boonies to live in a low cost of living area.

If nothing’s changed since you last print, including the filament, I would suspect a jam/clog. Is the extruder clicking?

Thanks for new and fresh vs old favorite! I posted something similar further down, will be sure to check this out.

Let’s skip favorite and instead answer fun find that I’ve come back to a few times: Brothers of Metal - Kaunaz Dagaz (it is in English, lol). It’s viking metal, and as went through highschool with Blind Guardian and Rhapsody, it’s great to find bands still making banging fantasy metal https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=Nzad__XGDbQ&si=atuCBlgpMSQ9UkRL

I’ve also been a fan of Bloodywood lately. Think an angrier Hybrid Theory Lincoln Park, but from India and with some fusion going on. Machi Bhased is a good toe in the water https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=3kLKYWDQVec&si=xsmCHcr6llZdaAWc as is Dana-Dan: https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=uo6OC34QjY0&si=6SxQ6T9MwvRUdlJF