When I first got started in 3D printing, I was well aware of the trend for enthusiasts in the field to quickly find themselves with an entire flock of them. I can confirm that stereotype, as now I am in the possession of (most of) five printers.

My first printer, a Monoprice Select Mini, was still functional but due to its limitations I had not used it for many months. I had been contemplating taking it apart to reuse its parts. When I talked about that idea with some local people, I found a mutually beneficial trade: in exchange for my functioning printer, I traded it for a nearly identical but non-functioning unit to take apart.

My second, a Monoprice Maker Ultimate, has experienced multiple electrical failures with an infamous relay, and I suspect those failures had secondary repercussions that triggered other failures in the system. It is currently not working and awaiting a control board upgrade.

My third printer, a Monoprice Maker Select, was very affordable but there were trade-offs made to reach that price point. I’ve since had to make several upgrades to make it moderately usable, but it was never a joyous ownership experience.

Those three printers were the topic of the tale of 3D printing adventures I told to Robotics Society of Southern California. One of my parting advise was that, once we get to the ~$700 range of the Maker Ultimate, there were many other solid options. The canonical default choice is a Prusa i3 and I came very close to buying one of my own several times.

What I ended up buying is a MatterHackers Pulse, a derivative of the Prusa i3. I bought it during 2019’s “Black Friday” sale season, when MatterHackers advertised their Pulse XE variant at a hefty discount. Full of upgrades that I would have contemplated installing anyway, it has performed very well and I can happily recommend this printer.

Why would I buy a fifth printer when I had a perfectly functioning Pulse XE? Well, I wouldn’t. I didn’t get this printer because it was better, I picked it up because it was free. I have some motion control (not 3D printing) projects on the candidate list and a retired partial Geeetech A10 printer may prove useful.