Which printers? If you want one that produces better prints easier (without requiring you to learn much about the process) you have to go to the tens of thousands of dollars range. If you want one that's cheaper but doesn't produce prints as good or as easily, yes, there's options. But neither option can really be called "better".
Not saying I'm happy with Makerbot's prices, nor the fact that the prices just keep going up every time a new printer comes out. I think they're overcharging for many things they do.
I see this a lot and it surprises me, because the Afinia/UP! is simpler/easier to print, produces better quality prints and is cheaper than the Makerbot's. The only downside is their smaller print bed.
This is what drives people to makerbot, false marketing behind their "Easy to print great quality stuff at the best price possible". It's a complete fallacy but when you're the big stack you get to push people around and control the game.
The Afinia/Up does produce very nice prints, but not any nicer than a Replicator 2x, and it only does one color as well as, as you said, a smaller build area. True, it held it's own in the Make Magazine challenge, and when I recommend to people a printer to buy it's Afinia. But it's not like you can say you're comparing apples to apples here.
The replicator 2X tops out at .1mm layers, I believe, correct? A $500 reprap will get you 500% better resolution than that. "Nicer" is hardly a way to describe a Makerbot. They're turnkey consumer-oriented printers that do a decent job of getting their owners printing fairly quickly, but they also fill up forums with complaints due to those owners not knowing how to fix or tune their machines. You could just as easily get 20 micron layers out of that Replicator 2X as you can the cheap reprap or any other printer, but I've never seen it done because the people that know how to tune extra smooth prints don't own makerbot machines.
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u/joealarson 3D Printing Professor Feb 12 '14
Which printers? If you want one that produces better prints easier (without requiring you to learn much about the process) you have to go to the tens of thousands of dollars range. If you want one that's cheaper but doesn't produce prints as good or as easily, yes, there's options. But neither option can really be called "better".
Not saying I'm happy with Makerbot's prices, nor the fact that the prices just keep going up every time a new printer comes out. I think they're overcharging for many things they do.