these are handheld portable ink printers that can print nearly any text image or
design onto almost any surface and material from paper cardboard wood
clothing even skin will look sorta it's this new sort of gadget I've had a ton
of fun playing with and I'm excited to show you guys what it's all about I'm
Ben from authentech and today we're checking out these two handheld printers
and I'll show you how they work which is pretty incredible technology a
comparison between the two which one I found is better which spoiler alert I
like to stay efficient for you guys the MBrush wins by leaps and bounds and is
the cheaper option which is very cool the PrintPen has some great potential
but one major downfall so let's jump in and I'll show you
first up disclaimers no sponsorship on this video but huge things to Evebot for
sending me their PrintPen and huge thanks to GeekBuying.com for sending me
the MBrush as always all the links will be down below first let's start
with the pricing the M brush which looks just like the print cube I'm not sure if
it's a rebranding model or something it's currently priced at only hundred
bucks on geek bine plus there free shipping though as a heads up depending
on your location the shipping time might take a little while the print pen on the
other hand is two hundred and fifty dollars quite a bit more as for ink
cartridges another win for the M brush the cartridge that it came with had this
little sticker attached that said replaceable with 62 XL so when I look
those up on Amazon that tricolor is going for around 40 bucks and you heard
that right it's tricolor so the M brush can print and basically full color
they also say a single cartridge is good for around 415 full pages of printing so
that should last me a pretty long time as for the print pen while they sell
these proprietary designed cartridges for $60 which not only means it's more
expensive but we can't buy third party replacements and it's only single color
right now no full-color printing which is kind of stinky they currently offer a
skin friendly navy blue but they told me they are working on a non removable ink
which could result in semi-permanent tattoos and such which seems sort of
cool maybe like a henna tattoo I'm sure but there's cool potential there I
really want tricolor permanent ink for this and brush here so I can print on
t-shirts cuz as it currently is it looks pretty cool but it can wash away with
just simple water I see that the Print Cube sells these permanent ink
cartridges that uses eco solvent ink this might even work on metal glass and
plastic but I've seen a lot of shipping delays and complaints from backers so
I'm not sure what's going on over there let me know if you have info or ideas on
a water resistant ink option for me let me know down in the comments under
product design and what's in the box each are well packaged both come with a
user manual and the EM brush includes these two paper ruler templates for
multi-line alignment and that's right the EM brush can also print multiple
lines of text or large scale graphics and photos again a very cool and fun
option to play with the print pen does not seem to support multi-line printing
yet but note the printhead on the print pen is 26 millimeters in height which is
almost double that of the M brush which I believe is about fourteen point three
millimeters in height as for width while the M brush wins again in a single pass
it can print up to around ten feet or three meters the print pen looks to be
limited a little over three feet or one meter
both are small and portable and I actually like the ergonomics of the
print pen better it sort of feels like I'm holding a marker or a large pen in
my hand where the M brush is of course a little bit more blocky and wide but
honestly not a big deal both are rechargeable via USB type-c and
brush has this convenient rubber brush built into the cover for cleaning and
nozzle though it seems to dry out easily more on that in a second the print pen
uses a roller sensor while the M brush uses an optical sensor the print pens
roller sensor I found is actually a little bit better for rolling onto skin
since it can keep that print head hovering just slightly above the surface
and you can almost watch the ink shooting out of those microscopic
nozzles that's kind of amazing the M brush was harder to slide across while
hovering above my skin and it didn't seem like the ink could shoot out as
crisp or clear now I think this little plastic piece is meant to attach to the
Derwin sliding across your skin might help prevent smudging but I found it
still did be a bit smudgy so I bet maybe with some practice
it might get easier next is probably the biggest deal in my book and that's the
usability of each printer the print ban had great potential but one major flaw I
connect to the pen via Wi-Fi on my phone while using their app I spent hours and
hours trying to connect to the Wi-Fi and it constantly timeout or say incorrect
password even though it was the correct default one I tried my iPhone 11 pro
iPad Galaxy Note 2 n plus Google pixel Shamim e9 everything I could think of
and with some back-and-forth emails with the company it turns out the print pen
has an own Wi-Fi issue I think it's very easily interfered with other Wi-Fi
signals and it won't allow me to connect to the pen with a lot of those signals
going on either way I had a walk like five blocks south and my neighborhood
away from all the houses and then I was finally able to connect it to my phone
and now even today the janky little trick I found that works in my home is
that I pinched the pen between my legs to try to block out all the Wi-Fi
interference and then only once in a blue moon I can actually get a connect
to my phone for just a couple seconds to quick shoot over a text or image and
then it quickly disconnects so that really stings but I gotta remain honest
with you guys and that's why I can't recommend the print pen today I hope
they're working on an updated model because again it has nice potential in a
breath of fresh air while the M brush is miles ahead in terms of usability three
major factors that I prefer first there is no app needed to download to your
phone or computer instead we connect directly to the M brushes Wi-Fi hotspot
default password the same one two three four five six seven eight and then scan
the QR code on the base cover or enter the address of 192.168.0.0 in the
browser I can even push over a new design keep it connected
swipe across dick pushover a new file rinse and
repeat another major win to the EM brush I like their app design better the print
pen had nice potential being a simple single line editor but I found it
glitchy even with dealing simple graphics and photos and their editors
kind of janky looking at the EM brush in comparison it has a little steeper
learning curve I'd say but once I finally understood how it worked it's
much faster and easier to whip up some text graphics or even photos crop them
in size then duplicate the print lines over and over for the multi-line
function just hit print sends it over to the unit then I can disconnect and sort
of saved in the memory of the device so I can print it over and over turn the
device off then back on and it remembers my last saved print the print pen sadly
does not work the same after I turn it off and turn it back on it does not
allow me to reprint what I last pushed over as for quality of the print
surprisingly I have to give some points to the print pen as it almost created
these more crispy looking text and graphics and I'm not sure if it's
because maybe it's single color only or maybe the DPI is slightly lower on the M
brush cartridge that I received in this box or maybe it's just because the print
pen nozzle height is taller creating these larger looking graphics I'm not
sure the M brush allowed me a lot more control though over density brightness
and saturation and we can dial it in just right for each print I found it
takes a bit more finessing around but once I find good settings it looks
pretty sweet and again pretty major deal but to have a tricolor ink gent over a
single color opens up a lot more fun printing possibilities there's plenty of
device settings to tinker with on the M brush and I bet dialling these ink could
result in even better prints as well one major negative I found on the M brush
okay so if I don't use it very often it gets dried out so as a quick test print
we hold that button it'll give us three stripes and there's nothing even in the
instructions it says if nozzle is dry please put a little water on the table
remove the cartridge and soak the nozzle in water for about a minute
Google set timer for one minute the best solution I found even though they
suggest soaking it in water I didn't think that worked that well and said
maybe a wet paper towel rubbing in wiping it getting those juices flowing
again on the ink cartridge now interestingly the print pen has this
stamp pad like insert on its cap not sure if maybe that's doing a better job
at preventing dry out while the EM brush has this little rubber gasket thing but
maybe it doesn't work as well I don't know another random guess of mine but
maybe the cartridge used here in the box was old or janky and maybe a new fresh
higher quality HP cartridge could work better we'll see so who is this little
gadget made for well besides it being a fun tech toy for me to play with if I
can get that permanent ink to work maybe I'll create my own custom authentic
shirts at home that would be awesome I could also seen this being really fun
for lots of different arts and crafts it could be used for branding and
advertising labeling shipping barcodes and QR codes if I had an Etsy shop this
thing could be a lot of fun to experiment with overall I'm fascinated
by this thermal inkjet technology and I'm excited to see where it goes my
dream gadget would allow multi-line printing without needing to lift the
printer off the surface allowing me to paint back and forth on the surface and
that optical sensor would know exactly where it's at now I think I saw the
print brush XDR can possibly do this but I couldn't get my hands on one to test
and as price at 300 bucks which is pretty steep maybe a firmware update
will unlock this feature on the end brush all links will be down below let
me know of other clever uses you can think of in the comments and until I see
you next time let's