On today's episode we're gonna take another look at the ender 3 clone the
GeeeTECH a10 but it's evolved I'll explain it all and today's Filament Friday. Filament
Friday is brought to you by these patreon supporters. Now these may look
similar but they're actually three generations of the Geeetech A10 the first
generation I did a review of back in October 2018 I'll put a link to that
video up here and also in the description below. this is the next
generation of this machine and then this is the latest generation with some other
upgrades that just came out within the last two or three months. back when I did
my review of this machine and compared it to ender 3 there were some features I
really liked. it's got a filament run out sensor it's very easy to add Auto level
to this its got the bracket most of the wiring you just have to add the sensor
and then the firmware and they also have 256 K memory on their board so there's
plenty of room for the full Marlin. now a few of the things I didn't like is the
cable they use between the LCD and the control board is an edge connector and
it's a very weak I actually broke one on a different GeeeTECH machine. All you have to do
is set this down on something that stretches the cable and it broke so I
recommended that they improve that. they also put single bearings on all the
wheels instead of a double bearing a lot of people complained about that because
it can collect dirt and everything else in there.
that it wasn't a problem for me but that's something that a lot of people
wanted them to fix. now I also had some reliability issues with this. I had a
driver burned out because the current was sent to high and the motor was
really getting hot but there socketed so I could easily change that driver so
that's a nice feature. but overall just the general quality of the GEEETECH
machines just don't seem as good after talking to a lot of people who have had
a lot of different problems but they seem to be trying to improve that. their
machines seem to be getting better and I witnessed it in this guy right here. this
is the next generation and basically they just made improvements on what they
heard from the community. first off they improve that cable it's now a pure
ribbon cable a real good flexible strong ribbon cable with IDC connectors that
lock down. so it's much stronger. they went to two bearings on
the wheels. good move. and they also changed from a glass bed that was stuck
to the aluminum to a build tak type material. it's easy to peel off. it's like
a post-it note you can pull it off but it stays in place while you print. and
the top surface loves PLA. PLA sticks to it. it's amazing how well it sticks to
it. in fact even if your nozzle isn't perfectly level the PLA seems to still
stick to it. I I set it up and I couldn't get my prints off it was sticking so
well. so I lowered the bed, a little bit lower than the nozzle than I normally
would. it's working beautifully so I'm trying to get more of these sheets for
my Ender 3. other than that it's been pretty solid. the motors aren't getting
too hot the driver is, still 256 memory, and still socketed driver so I think
they've listened the community and improved this machine. I really really like it.
they have this machine on the GEEETECH website for $179 so it competes well
with the Ender 3 with some nice added features so it's definitely something to
consider as long as they can keep the quality up. I think they're gonna give
Creality a run for their money with this. but then they want to step further
from this guy we go to this guy and this is only been out I think for a couple
months. I noticed it because it's got a case right here. where there is an open slot
on these two guys. so I wondered what was different. I got a hold of it, tore it apart
and saw that there's a bigger motherboard in this thing. and that's
what they advertise a new motherboard. but it's also got an external FET for
driving the heated bed. the heated bed in both these and even the Ender 3 is
driven from the FET on the motherboard. this has an external FET so that it can
handle more power or more current so it's more reliable. this is the setup you
would see on a bigger like CR 10. so this is a much more reliable electronic setup
and also a bigger fan to cool everything. this machine also has a microSD card
with the new motherboard and now has a microSD card right here in the front but
it still has the larger SD card behind the LCD like these two have. so if you
want a micro SD you have a slot for it if you like the larger SD card you have
a slot for it. but you have to pick one or the other because I notice if I
try to plug them both in its gonna read the larger one first it appears, but
whichever one you have in first that's the one that's going to continue to read
until you shut the Machine off and turn it back on. and then it's gonna read the
first one. but it seems to default to the larger SD card first and then the micro
SD card so I've been printed with the micro SD card on this guy and it's been
working really well. but it does cost more. they're charging $30 more for this
over this guy so is it worth the extra $30. it's more reliable in the long run
but I'm not sure you're really getting anymore as far as a 3d printer. this is
an early unit and I did find one issue and it relates to the firmware they're
using. the same marlin one point one point eight firmware on this that they
use in here which is fine but when this one Homes the nozzle is actually off
the bed and the XY coordinates are minus 15 X minus 8 Y but once it starts
printing it comes to zero zero which is right at the corner of the bed and
prints fine. well this one they added a little knob here to the bracket so it
hits the stop switch sooner so the nozzle lines up right at the corner but
it still says minus 15 minus 8 so when it starts printing it shifts over there
15 millimeters so every print on this machine is shifted over. nothing is
centered. I tried different g-code to kind of offset it but nothing really
worked so it's something in the firmware. I'm told there's a firmware update for
this I just haven't installed it but that's the problem with getting one of
these newer machines. that's the only real issue I have with this other than
that both these machines have been printing a lot of small prints, big
prints and printing them really well so the quality I'm getting is fantastic. not
as good as my Ender 3 but close because I'm using my cura 4.4
profile that I tuned to the Ender 3. the hot ends on these guys are very
similar. PTFE tube goes all the way down to the nozzle and it's very similar but
a little bit different cooling because the cooling fan is on the side and the
fins are a little bit different design so I'm getting a little bit different
flow. I'm gonna have to tweak the settings a little bit for the a-10s.
but I'm probably getting about 90 to 95% the quality I'm getting on my Ender 3 so
pretty good. what I like most about this and this is not go buy this
instead of an Ender 3, my point is it just keeps getting better and I'm hoping
Ender 3 does the same thing. I mean this went from a cheap Ender 3 clone
with you know cut corners, single bearings and crappy cable, to a better
cable the dual bearings and in general more features thanender 3 has and
then they took it further and made the electronics better. so this is kind of
like an Ender 3 pro you know with better electronics. they've got the flat
rail like the Ender 3 pro so the beds more stable. I love this, you know,
build material but it's pushing the envelope. it's making the sub $200
printer market even better. so I'm hoping this pushes Creality Ender 3 to
maybe start releasing Ender 3 with the silent board installed, with a metal
extruder and maybe some capricorn tubing. so I love the direction and the fact
that they're pushing this it's fantastic. so if you're looking for a second
printer and you know you got about two hundred dollar budget, I think this is a
good option. especially if you want to, you know, try some different firmware
with the 256k memory. you can add a lot more features like say linear advance
which would be tougher to do on an Ender 3 with the limited memory or maybe
as new features come out in Marli. you'll be able to do it here which you
probably won't be able to do on the limited memory of an Ender 3 so I
still love the Ender 3 but this is definitely a good competitor and if
you're looking for something easier to assemble this is it because this whole
upper portion comes fully assembled it's basically four bolts to mount this to
the base mount the LCD mount the spool holder connect the wires and you're
running. so it's even easier to install or assemble for say a kid or a family
just getting started with 3d printing. so I like this. I still am a fan of Ender 3
but I like where this is going. I like that we're pushing the envelope and
making the sub $200 printer market even better. I'll put links to all these in
the description below if you want to buy one it really does help the channel but
make sure you know what you're buying because I found at gearbest, which I got
this one from, has it with this metal front when you say a10. also banggood had
the same thing but on Amazon some of them were selling
this one as a10. I haven't seen this one on Amazon yet and if you go to the Geeetech
website they have both of them 209 and 179 so that way you know exactly
what you're getting so just double check before you purchase. I'll put the links
to the a10 for all of them but just double check what you're getting. so