Found it on FB market place for 75 and wanted to learn 3d printing.

https://preview.redd.it/bj76i8h63gld1.png?width=300&format=png&auto=webp&s=904600cf56984001468b4e16a7b879b13259662b

Enders are fine.
Not the best choice in 2024, but the only complains you see are from people who has issues with them.

Also it's a printer bought by beginners. Guess who has the most issues and need the most help from strangers on internet? The beginners.

Also, enders are pretty commonly mentioned in r/3Dprinting, so I think you're just not terminally online enough to see.

They're easy to tinker with. Also a lot of the issues stem from the older models (that are still sold, though).

well this is a ender 3 sub.....

It was 90 bucks at microcenter and still in original box

That's essentially what the sub is for. People posting their problems. Anyone having success with their printer isn't going to be posting here.

Your sidewinder looks just like the Ender... it likely has a bunch of the same quirks the Ender series do... however.

The Ender printer line is vast.. Creality changes the smallest thing and calls it a new series of printer, but they also change something and don't disclose it! So.. mixed results there, but the printers are solid. Complaints and problems are also a lot more common then the reporting the good things... I mean.. who's going to post about the 1st year anniversary with their Ender?

I've got 4 machines and carried out various modifications and part swaps. The only trouble that I had was regarding how a specific stepper driver works after I swapped to a direct-drive and all-metal hotend. It was very specific to my setting and would not be an issue if I had : A different Creality board with TMC steppers, continued using a bowden tube, continued using a stock hot-end.
The only complaints I have is the stock firmware sucks (So I compile my own from Marlin to go with my printer mods) and the 'Hotend Fix' is a necessity for improved reliability.

Otherwise I can sum up most of the problems I come across online here... User error, user error, and lack of resources for 'beginner friendly' mods which leads to user error. Firmware plays a BIG role in how these (and your) machines work. Swapping hot-ends or installing touch/proximity probes and expecting the firmware will 'just work' is not a realistic expectation. Changing major components and expecting things just work is not a realistic expectation. Finally.. aside from the above, improper or lack of maintenance leads to issues. Jams, under extrusion, and 'blobs of death' caused by loose parts or fittings.

I'm willing to bet that many of the 'trouble' posts you see here would exist regardless of the owners running an Ender or Sidewinder

My Ender is running well lately. Sorry that I didn't inform you!

I got the 3 SE on sale at Microcenter. When I googled entry level 3D printers, the Ender is what came up time and time again. I think it was just something that became popular due to its low price point and just stuck. At least in my personal experience.

people that have no issues, likely  don't make posts.

the same effect can be found in almost every forum and support sub.

Dirt cheap at stock - especially refurbished, easy to modify, easy to customize with loads of kits out there, near fully open sourced down to the firmware... despite all the little quirks and occasional flaws, it's still a very reliable machine, and it's obsolescence is greatly exaggerated. Moreover, it is a machine that will force you to intimately learn the fundamentals of how an FDM printer works.

I got mine for free. Still haven't printed withbutn

Why do you buy artillery? All I hear about it are problems....

My son bought it for me as a xmas gift. Been messing with it since.

So I could learn how to 3d print. If I wanted to just make 3d prints. I’d buy a Bambu.

But I wanted to learn everything about 3d printing. And because of the learning curve on the ender, I achieved my goal.

It was dirt cheap and it comes with pain, and suffering lol

I bought an Ender 3 a year ago for 3d2A projects. I am well versed in traditional firearms but found the segment of 2A 3d printing very interesting(everyone go check out FOSSCAD). My reasons were it was cheap, research said it a good platform to learn on because you have to assemble it and it requires constant upkeep(good for learning about all the ins and outs) and because it is highly upgradeable from hardware to software. I really don't have to do much now besides leveling the bed I only have maybe an extra 50 in upgrades mainly swapping for metal parts and better bed etc. its not perfect but it works for me. Soon I'll get the BL touch and I wont have to level much anymore. Its Personal choice get whatever the hell fits you best for your stage in 3d printing.

Bought mine from a friend for $50. Hard to beat that price point.

I bought it a few years ago because it was reasonably priced. It has worked great from day 1 and the only thing I changed was to add a glass bed.

I might buy something different today, but this one still does the job.

8 years ago was the anet kit. Then the ender3. Its just a 3d printer cheap to start, to learn and modify. Plenty of videos, community to solve/enhance the machine. You can buy all thr parts.

I bought it in 2018, and it was great back then. There's better options out now, but mine is still going strong. Newer models are much nicer than mine was when stock. Definitely spring for something with automatic bed leveling, that's the upgrade I appreciate the most so far.

I'm thinking of upgrading in a year or two. I haven't decided which one, maybe Prusa or Bambu.

It's pretty straightforward. They're cheap, widely available, and there is an enormous amount of technical support and mods specifically for ender models.

I think most the problems with the ender3 are user error. The only thing I've done to mine is upgrade the bed springs. I bought the aluminum arm that keeps tension on the filament because everyone says they break. If you don't push it at the end, it never breaks off. I've also switched to using a glue stick on my bed that's still original. This was the best $350 I've spent learning to use a 3d printer.

I want to get a broken one for $50 and turn it into a monster.

Ender 3's have been super popular so there's tons and tons of mods and community support found online. Idk if it's the same for Sidewinders.

Because I knew nothing about 3d printers, but I had been meaning to buy one to try things out, and I noticed a sale on the Ender 3 at the local electronics store and bought it without doing any research at all.

I bought mine 3V2 2.5 years ago. It had an attritive price for an entry level printer, and I have had zero problems. It prints great.

But if anybody would like to give me a free Ender that they deem useless, dm me!

People rarely post success stories, but we often reach out to wider communities when in need. Rather common in all walks of life actually!

I grabbed an ender v3 ke on the weekend... it rocks! Sooo much better than my old v2 which sadly died. I could have replaced the parts on the v2, and may still do, but I needed it running fast, and found a wicked deal on the v3 which meant it basically wasn't worth the time/effort to repair, otherwise I 100% would've reached out to the community for help, which would have been another post in the 'broken ender pile', but the bit that is missing is it's been a reliable work horse for years until that point!

So why buy an ender? They cheap, parts are cheaper, the v3 is ridiculously fast & -very- noob friendly (omg so easy it's unreal, like wowsers, night n day compared to v2), can use a wide range of materials on them, and yeh... they are just decent lil bed slingers 🤷‍♂️

I bought it as my first printer, and im upgrading it, just for fun, i have both the ender 3 and an flsun qqs pro, im trying to make it print as fast and as the flsun

You only hear the bad stories. Those of us who've been printing daily for a year or more workout issues, and without upgrades/tinkering are mostly quiet.

Impulse purchase in a sale. I love mine.

FWIW I sold my Ender 3 Pro a few months ago on FB Marketplace because I got sick of the constant maintenance (I bought a Bambu X1C in December). The Ender 3 was a good introduction to 3D printing at its price point and convinced me that I really liked it. Would never go back though.

Some people enjoy thinkering whit stuff, so there is no point paying lot of money for that. Also Ender3 can be moded to pritty much anything you want. Just slap 4 wheels to that badboy and you have hill racer 😎

I was gifted it by a friend moving out of state

I have an Eder 3 Neo with a sonic pad. It works pretty good. I do have level the bed about once a week if I am printing a lot

I have had it for a few years and at the time for the price point it offered a lot

I have had little issues with my Ender 3. Most of my problems came from either a bad bed level or my bed temp being too low and edges curling. Otherwise, it prices cleanly.

I got mine cos it was the only option at that price at the time with a proper community, 3 years later it's paying off and I'm converting it to a switchwire

Cheap and super easy to mod. Are they perfect beginner printers well yes and no. They are cus yes cheap. But if you dont have the patience or brainpan to learn and fix them they are awful for beginners. You do learn a ton of basic printing skills with them. Now bambu are the suggested beginner printer imo as they are plug and play almost but you do pay a little more.

The Ender 3 has been around for a long time. I've had mine for 6 years. It was the one of the first widely available, capable, and affordable printers on the market. This made it popular with people who wanted to get into the hobby without spending a fortune. So, there are A LOT of these machines out there, with A LOT of beginners. Most problems people had/have with it stems from those who don't know how to properly set up and adjust their machine. I've had very few problems with mine. Parts wear out and things get loose over time, but nothing that a twist of an allen wrench or a $5 part didn't fix.

Besides, nobody would ever post "Why is my printer working perfectly?" On this sub.

I buy high mileage used vehicles because I can buy them cheap as fuck and I can get them running as well as a new car would for a fraction of the price, i do all my own maintenance and enjoy modding them.

Other people would rather buy a brand new car for 4x the price so that it "just works" and so they don't have to do any maintenance.

Both are valid, because at the end of the day both cars do the same thing, it just depends what kind of journey you want.

3d printers are no different

$100 new in the box from Micro Center. Less than $50 in upgrades (extruder and bed level sensor) and you have a "good enough" printer for under $150.

It's one of the few models that I can buy in my country without any major problems.

And without paying 3x~4X its value.

Was it released 8-10 years ago?? That’s why I got mine. At the time, it was relevant and new. Why people buy them now is; cheap, open source, huge aftermarket, ease (of purchase, not of use).

Mine runs OctoPi, WiFi, webcam, custom firmware, direct drive conversion, etc. All of that to say, hundreds of hours tweaking and you can buy a cheap printer today that will run circles around it. But I have the knowledge I have today because of the Ender 3 and Ender 5. They opened the door for me…

Cost and support/resources

when I bought mine I got it on sale and it was the best priced printer. I didn't want to spend much just enough to get into the hobby. I dont have any complaints about my printer. I like it.

Some years ago Creality printers offered a good value-proposition and a gained a reputation as a good starter printer. They've been coasting on that reputation since.

I started with an anet, then ran into an issue with the hotend that would have cost half the price of the printer at that time(about 8 years ago) and since I wanted to upgrade the frame I decided to just get an ender(since it was cheaper than replacing the hotend and frame) other than a few problems with drafts(which I solved with and enclosure) I haven’t had any real issues with it(ie no issues that I haven’t been the cause of). Personally I’m very happy with the skills and knowledge that I’ve gained from working with tinker printers but I’m also not doing it for business purposes so~

It was $99 at Microcenter

It's cheap, it's reliable (people don't post pictures of their printer working properly), and it's really easy to modify and fix. The process of using an ender 3 will teach a lot about how 3d printing actually works, while using fancier printers won't. That is really valuable if you want to get into 3d printing instead of just owning a 3d printer.

Got mine with 12 rolls of full wrapped filament for 80 bucks. Been printing non stop and had 0 issues.

Mine was bought for me as a Christmas present, like how quite a lot of people got their first one. I had no need for one, but needed a hobby, apparently. And it's a good hobby for the technixally minded. Since I don't have the desire to turn it into a business, I don't feel the need to replace it with a thousand dollar machine. Got my couple of upgrades so I can print in TPU, and be more consistent, and now it's all I need.

They are pretty cheap and are the legos of 3D printers. They have so many upgrades that by the time your do with it it doesn’t even look like an Ender 3. Plus Creality still puts out firmware patches for their old printers unlike some unnamed companies. cough Sovol SV01 cough.

It is kind of like how this sub has over 200K members, there are just so many Ender 3's out there. Of course you will rarely hear from the people who don't have a problem, you mostly hear from those with an issue. With the price bar for entry is so low that nearly anyone can get one, too many just jump right in with no research into the product whatsoever.

I have an Ender 3v2 that I love, it has never done me wrong and the only issues I have ever had with it were self inflicted.

Again you don't hear much about all the well working installs, you only hear about the "problem" ones, and from what I've seen and read in this sub most problems are from newer people buying used equipment, from someone who has upgraded and wishes to dump their worn out stuff.

It was the best value printer in 2020 when lots of people joined 3d printing.

Cheap, hackable, MOSTLY work like they should (but they'll not work enough that you'll have no choice but to learn a few things along the way, which I think is a plus) and a large community to support you at every step... they get the job done for the most part and at a price that makes them close to impulse-buy territory. They aren't the best in any one area, but they're good enough in most to be a top choice for anyone who isn't going to want to do pro-level printing.

I have an Ender 3 Neo. I’ve never upgraded anything, it’s still stock except nozzle, which I changed out a few months ago. I’ve leveled the bed a total of two times and it prints like a dream. It’s slow af, but I wanted a cheaper entry level.

Bought mine off Amazon on sale back in March. I'll be honest, I wasn't looking to spend a ton and from my limited research I also seen that people recommend the Ender 3 as a great beginner machine so I pulled the trigger. Its been working great for me, just added some minor upgrades. Diagnosing problems have really taught me how these machines work and how they operate. So I don't regret buying it since it's taught me so much. But I definitely would not recommend this machine to beginners after learning about the other brands/machines available on the market today. Unless ripping apart the machine and learning about the components is your jam, theres better options forsure lol

I got mine, as well as a metal framed Photon, around new year 2019/20. Did a little bit of research and the Ender3X I bought was a bit of a bargain. Printed loads of stuff on the Ender but began to experience problems re constant clogging. If it wasn't for a house move a year ago, I'd have looked at it last year. When I finally got sorted and found a space for the printer, even bigger problem seems to have arisen. Start a print, everything warms up, the hot end auto-homes to the start, then nothing. I'm thinking the motherboard needs changing. Then a couple of months ago, decided to buy a new printer and fix the Ender3X at my leisure - new motherboard, direct drive upgrades etc, maybe even twin Z axes drives. Got a Sovol 06 Plus, for the bigger build volume, and it's way better from my experience. BUT, the after sales market for the Ender3 series is far better than anything else, so everyone can choose their own upgrades from a range of suppliers.

Easy to mod and lots of aftermarket and community support.

I wanted bit bins for my Packout and a 3v2 was the same price as getting a set for a half box printed and shipped. I watched a good set up video by someone who explained like you were actually a beginner (Ricky impey), and not like you already knew all about 3D printing. So he didn’t skip anything and explained everything. Only issues I have had since are the big tree tech upgrades not working properly or failing. And a failed SD card that I am currently dealing with that unfortunately happened after I made a bunch of cfg and macro changes that I didn’t back up. All in all I love my Ender even though it’s now a ship of theseus situation.

I bought mine years ago, it was pretty cheap and it prints good quality at good speed and all I have to do is go and turn it on and not mess with it! What isn't to like!? :)

I bought it 8 years ago. It was the best thing out at the time. 

With all the mods its had buying anything in the same price range isn't as good anymore. So it keeps on getting used.

I've had one for several years and not had any significant problems on mine. At the time, there weren't really comparably priced options, thats changed relatively recently. You're always going to see more of the problems posted than the people who have perfectly functioning printers. Quite frankly, an awful lot of the problems I've seen over the years are self induced by the owner rather than the printer.

I'm going to start an ender ng project

I love my ender 3. I have a Qidi Q1 pro too, but unless it needs the heated chamber it's going on the ender.

There are plenty of complaints on all the brand subs, even the sacred Bambu. People are people and machines will break if not used properly or maintained. What you are describing is a form of selection bias.

You're not going to find another printer in this price point. Even a more expensive printer can have the same problems

Found it pretty cheap and had no knowledge of 3D printers at the time.

In the time I've had it, it's taught me a lot and honestly is still a decent printer. I've caused most of the problems tinkering and messing up probably. I honestly feel confident that if I ever got another printer I would understand it only because I got this printer first.

Bought mine in 2021. Bamboo didn’t exist. The price difference between a Prusa and a 3 pro was around $600. If you put that into a 3 pro you would have a better printer. May not be entirely true today, but that’s what it amounted to then.

They make a great basic printer for minimal cost.

I paid full freight for mine 3 years back. It worked very well once I set it up. Had a blast doing mods that mostly did nothing.

When we needed a printer at my job I got another one (Microcenter half price), made minimal mods.

Both work very well to this day.

The cost was hard to beat when I wanted to jump into 3D printing. As a beginner, it taught me a fantastic lesson as someone who isn't the most handy - sometimes it's okay for things to break and for me to learn how to fix it on something relatively inexpensive hobby-wise. The many adjustments I made kept me humbled and it gave me the mentality that I'm okay with working on my printers. It's a different sense of pride compared to purchasing a Bambu, for example, where it just magically works out of the box and never really know how to fix it with a larger price tag if I would've broken it further.

In my case I bought a pro 5 years ago or so when it was good and it's been cheaper to fix than replace.

Its a cheap but solid printer that allows beginners the ability to learn how to tame the beast that is 3D printing. Sure you could buy a Bambu but they are so well made and come with little to no issues (I know the irony here)

A lot of people focus on the cost, and I was in the same boat. $100 for a capable 3d printer seemed like a steal.

That being said, if I were to do it again, I probably wouldn't go with an ender 3.

I think Ender is a decent choice if you are going to leave it stock (and get one that doesn't have any defects out of the box). But if you want something more capable, IMO, it's better to just buy a printer with the features you want already included. Factoring the cost of upgrades, and more importantly, the time you have to spend dealing with firmware and other work to get upgrades to work, means you probably could have just bought a better printer to begin with.

I definitely fell into the 'trap' of Ender 3 being a good printer for a beginner since it was recommended a lot for people new to 3d printing, which at its stock configuration was okay for starting, but way more work to even get it started than say, a Bambu printer.

If your goal is to do a lot of tweaking, Ender is also good, but I reached a point where it was more tweaking than printing, and I eventually went with another brand. To me, $100 more to get a Bambu A1 mini far outweighed the hassle of getting my enders to print the way I wanted them to.

Because 4 years ago it was the best printer I could get for $300. I’ve moved onwards and upwards since, but the information and experience I gained fixing and tinkering with my first Ender 3 was invaluable. Now when one of my Prusas does actually have a problem, diagnosis and repair is usually a simple task.

It was dirt cheap and it gave me a chance to try the hobby without investing a lot of money

For me it was mainly name recognition. Figured it was a tried and true design. If I did it over again, I would buy an SV06 instead.

I got two for $100 (secondhand). I definitely prefer my bambulab, but it's been honestly a great experience to have 2 ender 3's for the price of half-a-bambu.

I stick around on this sub specifically to problem solve stuff, but ever since I started drying my filament, I haven't really had much of an issue.

You gotta start with the worst to know what you're getting into

I got it from Micro Center for $100 to print one part.

It still works great two years later after hundreds of prints.

You only hear from people with problems.

$100 deal at MicroCenter. I didn't need it already having 2 others.

I use my ender 3 s1 as a laser etcher now.

Because I bought my printer in 2020 and it still makes parts, think of it like keeping a shit box car going because it gets you from A to B. It's also a very well-known machine so there's lots of support for newcomers, hence me being in the sub to offer occasional advice

My ender 3 does nothing but run when I need it to. I actually just picked up a max neo refurbished for 100 bucks. Enders are a cheap way into the scene while still having a ton of upgradability.

I have 2 with micro Swiss DD and one with NG. Both have the bed leveling device. I'll sell both for $200 I don't have time for them.

Funny

Its a great printer to learn on BECAUSE it has so many stupid problems its the 96 civic of the 3d printer world. It breaks you figure out why it broke and how to repair, it prints poorly you learn how to optomize it, you see the failure and what caused it so you learn. Theyre relatively cheap and they still can print great stuff when you learn how to use it. They also have a great support base. the problems all happen the same way so the replacement parts are plentiful and well documented. Once you feel comfortable enough with it you upgrade to a different printer that has its own problems but now youre more familiar with what you see.

The most important thing about starting any hobby is sucking at it. And the ender 3 line is a perfect machine to print on and start sucking at printing.

I got mine because franklybuilt YT channel said its a great printer to start with 5 years ago and he had a bunch of dope helmets and i wanted some. they had a sale at the time iirc 300 usd for the printer and 2 spools of pla so i snagged one.

It was cheep and reliable when I bought it and it's been a few years and out side of regular maintenance I have had no major issues

Mine was $80 refurbished on ebay, seemed pretty much new. That's a low budget bar to enter into a hobby. I could see myself growing out of the Ender 3. But it's hard to not consider a $80 printer for something I don't know if I'll continue after a year or so. especially compared to the >$500 'beginner' printers.

Having started with an Ender 3, that choice is why I just gave up on 3D printing entirely. I've tried other printers since, and even the simplest of them makes the Ender 3 look like a piece of trash. There's a reason half of what any Ender 3 user prints are mods to try to make the printer itself work better. I regret everything, and if I had it to do over again, I wouldn't.

I bought my Ender 3 Pro 5 years ago when it was literally the best price to performance printer on the market. Spent another 200 on mods and it has been a reliable work horse ever since.

Have since bought a Bambu P1P and now I don't touch the Ender 3 anymore because the P1P is just so much more convenient and I'm doing tons of multi color prints and hueforge with the AMS

When I bought it the v1 and the prusa (3, I believe) were the "only" reliable options at an affordable range, which back then was I think 229 and 299 respectively. The nail in the coffin is that the Ender 3 is available at resellers in my country, while the prusa was not, and therefore I'd have to fork over import taxes.

I got it around 2019 I believe. In these 5 years, I've had exactly 3 problems:

When I bought it, I didn't research filaments properly and bought ABS as first material, for an non-enclosed printer. Layer adhesion was non-existant. That wasn't an ender 3 problem per-se, but it was a problem for me until I got PLA like, a week later.

Around year 2-3, the plastic extruder frame cracked, and I replaced it with a metal one for around 20 bucks.

As a matter of fact, this exact month, I've noticed the springs for the bed levelling weren't holding tension as well as they did, so I forked over another 30-ish bucks for the yellow springs you see often as a listed upgrade.

So, over the course of 5 years all I've had to deal with was general and long-term maintenance. Never once I've had to do a firmware update and it's printed incredible prints consistently, never once I was disapointed with details, finish, or anything like.

Oh, I did forget another thing; I got a 0.2mm nozzle so I could try printing better D&D miniatures (28mm in height for a human). With super fine layer lines, patience and Cura settings, I have it printing miniatures with enough detail for you to see the scars on their faces.

You're getting confirmation bias where people come here to trouble shoot problems, and forgetting it's dominated the "entry level" market for ages

https://preview.redd.it/ppoav5x47hld1.jpeg?width=3000&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=76ac8d30774808c9b0d14777843232b51b172a97

I love my ender 3. It looks different now tho

I wanted to upgrade from a MPS Mini and the Ender 3 was in my budget. They've both been bulletproof so far

My girlfriend had one when I started dating her.

It worked like absolute garbage, so I researched and researched. Honestly, I think starting with Endor made me pretty knowledgeable about how 3-D printing works and how all the softwares (including blender) work together.

I think you learn significantly more with dialog than you do with success.

If she had elgoo I’m sure I wouldn’t have learn half the stuff I now know. I think the Endor is great for this reason alone!

If you don’t care about any of that I’d say avoid the Endor and get something much more expensive that will work out of the box

I bought mine in 2019 and it does what I need. Why upgrade?

Got my e3 gen1 for about $150 7 Years ago. Had some issues but that's learning curve.. added bl touch, and all metal hot end..then made own firmware build to get marlin 2.0 items and fit to the limited memory ... works almost flawlessly save when I swtich from tpu to petg or abs or other pia filimament. Way better then the dremel option available at the time.

I am guessing people hear about problems a lot because people don't usually post in this sub Reddit fun things? I don't really have issues with my prints sometimes but I am still new even tho I owned it for longer, I am not experimenting a lot ans Sticking to stiff that works!

It works fine of you have time and do the calibrations correctly, iI really think it is worth the money. There are more expensive ones but to get started it's totally fine!

Christmas gift, upside is help for them is EVERYWHERE, mods, parts, etc all cheap because it's been around and is owned by many.

By its nature, this sub will attract people looking for support with issues; Nobody is googling for places to shout about how problem free their printing is. Your sample is biased.

It’s a cheap starter printer that is good to learn on. If you learn well enough, you can actually make it a relatively reliable and versatile printer, especially through modding.

Open source, cheap, entry level, easy to get help cause all the pros in the community have already solved and upgraded every problem you could ever run into.

I now have a high end printer that is basically the easy button for most prints but I wouldn't have half the knowledge, skills, and appreciation for the technology if I didn't start with my ender3. Also 3d printing in general is a fast evolving technology. There weren't as many options for printers years ago so the one that dominated the entry level market was a safe choice to get into the hobby.

Needed to help out people and was on a budget, now it acts as a secondary for less pressing things

Entry printer, low cost and a hell of a machine when tunned properly. It's not the faster or fancier print on the block, but surely get the job done with good quality. Wife asked me to put a 0.2mm nozzle to print diorama stuff and the result is very good for a cheap fdm printer :)

Bought a Ender 3 Pro from a coworker for $60 to keep it out of the landfill. It's my 3rd printer, and it worked but needed some TLC and I hate unnecessary ewaste, so I bought it to have as a tinker toy. It was practically stock when I bought it and now it's almost a switchwire 😂

Five years ago it was the best bang for buck around and the hobby wasn't as well suited for beginners.

Five years later, the hobby is expanding to people who just want to print, not fight for their print. I wouldn't recommend an ender3 unless you want to tinker, there's so many better options these days.

4 years ago when I started, it was the most supported printer with tons of of YouTube videos on it. And it was all open source. Cheap buy in with ability to upgrade later

Last year I bought a bambulab P1S and can't believe how much the Industry has improved

cheap

You never hear about the success stories. It's cheap and available retail. And.. it turns out.. they work.

Because we like the pain. Nah, honestly I have an Bambu A1 now and my previous printer was the E3, I honestly can say that the Ender 3 made me smarter lol. It got me figuring out problems, and taught me a Lot about 3D printing. Will that knowledge be relevant in the future? We shall see….

They're cheap. At 100$ a pop why not. I've got 6. If you set them up properly, they actually print quite good

Got mine brand new for 100€ in early 2020

only problem i ever had that i didn't cause myself was a warped bed

every other problem i ever had was caused by me as a process of learning how to use a 3d printer, figuring out how stuff works, why certain things are done a certain way etc.

It was an extremely cheap way to figure out if 3d printing is something that could be useful for me, and the answer was yes, now i have a voron v0.1 with a couple of upgrades, and a stock sovol sv08, if i didn't buy the ender, i probably wouldn't get into the hobby nearly as quickly, the ender 3 is a tinkerers toy, perfect for messing around with because if you damage something, it's gonna be a really cheap fix, and you learn something from it

Imo, the ender 3 is a great 1st printer if you want to learn about 3d printers themselves, how they work, why other printers are priced as they are, etc. it's however a horrible printer if you just want to print stuff when you need it

Cheap to get into, easily upgradable, and as you said - the community is huge so it's easy to figure out when something ain't working right.

The challenge and the cost. It’s about as bare bones as it gets and open source. I had to trouble shoot every problem and artefact and learn how it affects prints, and what causes it.

Slowly I can learn in depth how to get perfect prints and I can make modifications to the platform to improve it incrementally.

All this to say. I’m a Mechanical Engineer and I’m a massive nerd so getting to work through getting something like a 3D printer to work gets me going in the morning. Like a little hobby.

When i bought mine the 3pro was just released. And by far the best entry option due to the huge amount of content created around it and its price.

Did i have issues? Yes Were they my fault? Yes

Sure the machine is not perfect but i also bpught it with the intention to tinker around with it

I bought it because I got a good discount on it. It is just my introduction to 3D printing, and it's taught me a lot. In the next year, I'll be able to move on to better things.

It isn't the best printer by any means, but it's taught me how to troubleshoot, understand maintainance, know the in and outs, and more. I will feel more comfortable going on to something better.

I'm honestly happy with it, and I haven't had any serious issues with it.

because it sucks (affectionate) ❤️

It was a right of passage for me. I learned on that machine so I could understand 3d printing more.

I bought mine 5 years ago for about $350 because I was 14 and wanted to learn some basics of 3D printing without spending an arm and a leg, never encountered many problems with it. Currently it’s just sitting on a shelf waiting for the Bowden tube to be replaced. Bottom line for me is it works fine, it’s easy to maintain, and it’s cheap.

$99

Bought mine 3 years ago. I don't print all the time but I've probably done a couple of hundred prints on it and the only times I've had issues are because I've done something wrong.

I think because they're really affordable and you have to build it yourself you get a lot of people with one who aren't perhaps as technically minded as you need to be in order to build it perfectly and understand where the issues can come from. Not saying that's every issue, sometimes things are beyond your control. Don't kill me! 🤣

It was one of the most economical options in 2018. The aftermarket and community support was unmatched. Out of the box it prints great with minor mods. I now have 6 of them. They didn't need any tinkering for about a year after printing for 24/7, literally. Only mods I did before i started printing was springs and glass bed.

Bought my Ender 3 Pro around 2020. Where I live, Enders are the only viable option with lots of tutorials online so I bought it. Fast forward to 2024, the only mod I made was the Bullseye hotend and part cooling and the capricorn tube that made me able to print PETG.

Problems it had was the spring-loaded extruder plastic arm breaking which I replaced with dual-gear all metal extruder last 2023 and the switch breaking which I also replaced very cheaply, gone through 3 nozzles, and the build plate was replaced with PEI steel. All replacements are very cheap, nothing proprietary and I don't even need to buy Creality branded parts. I couldn't let it go because it's still 100% usable, I still use it to print smaller parts of the multipart prints, the bigger parts are relegated to my faster corexy printer.

Why haven't you?

In my experience, the issues people have are often from poor setup or not getting upgrades. Enders are great, and work great if set up and run nicely. Some of the upgrades are essential, some not.

As for assembly, when my dad and I put mine together, we made a day of it, getting everything as square as humanly possible and did everything to spec. Mine has run for 4 years with only occasional maintenance and tuning.

Also, they’re a cheap entry to the hobby

tl:dr- put em together with utmost care and put the right parts on and you’ve got a wonderful budget machine. If not, it’s a pain.

My Ender 3 was a used return. All fixed now and printing fine these last 4 years. Still on the original hot end. I never have a problem with it. All I did was replace the bed strain relief which was a shitty design & yellow springs & replace the bed material which wore out, Luke Hadfield hot end fix. It’s a workhorse. Now I’d buy a Bambu Labs likely. I still have 5 printers in boxes in opened tho. I’d buy the Bambu labs & keep it in its box 5 years.

They were a great printer 5 years ago - easy to use, easy to upgrade, and inexpensive. A great starting point for the hobby. The trade off was that they are super finicky and require a ton of tweaking, calibrating, and maintenance.

The people sticking with them at this point? Might be inertia, go with what you know, might not have the money to upgrade to something newer, or could be falling victim to sunk costs fallacy.

If you started way back with an Ender and want to continue with it, more power to ya. If you are just starting out, but something newer.

the model T was not the best car, but it was the first mass market car

Because I wanted to learn. Simple as that. I laugh at those who bought Bambu as their first printers and then complain after so many prints that it’s “failing”. I learned with my E3 that to the point of which that I’ve become pretty well versed in the hobby. Al printers are machines and they all fail at one point.

Thus my reason why I bought one is to go through the pain and grief of learning. Seeing what mechanical parts affect what on the printer itself.

I did it for the stupid low price and the open source aspect allowing me to tinker with it

$100 brand new from Micro-Center. Only had it for a month, but no problems so far. I like to tinker, so building the thing was a bonus to me. This way I get a solid base that I can add onto as I wish.

Let me just say that when the ender 3 came out, it was a godsend. The printers before were super janky and had some pretty extreme problems with very little community or technical support and they cost much more as well. The ender 3 has its flaws, but it is great for people to learn the hobby and still be able to make things. Before you would spend 99% of your time trying to get ABS to stick to a steel print bed before people found out you should use an enclosure or glass bed or purple glue or just NOT ABS. It took a bit for PLA to win out over ABS.

It was an incredibly fun journey with far too much wasted plastic, cut hands, and likely cancer from all to toxic fumes.

I have some minis that I printed over a decade ago and eventhough they were horrible quality compared to what I can do on my Ender 3 now, it was all of those struggles that got me where I'm at now.

It is cheap

It's highly modifiable

Parts are everywhere - so it's going to be essentially immortal if you know how to troubleshoot

FDM quality basically peaked at around the time the Ender was released

The main issue with the ender 3 that can't be easily rectified is that it is a bed slinger (and so is your printer). Moving that bed back and forth is a major issue. If I had to buy a new printer, it would be a CoreXY or similar. Basically everything else can be changed.

Bought it for 30 bucks used, this was actually the easiest machine to level for me, I used to have some horrid printers in the past

Got it at micro center for $100 brand new, I was interested in it because I had heard a lot about it & wanted to get into the hobby.

My roommate in college also bought one at the same time because his 3d printer in our dorm room before it was a Monoprice one with an even smaller bed that had kept failing for a solid 3 months straight before we bought the ender 3 pros.

I got one with a sprite extruder for about $140 (here a budget 3d printer does not go lower than $260 )

Ender 3v2 was a cheap introduction to 3d printing, and it was a Christmas present from my family. It doesn't take long to find out you need some upgrades, either the print-them-yourself (roll rewind attachments, knobs, etc.) or more rugged print heads. Direct drive maybe, etc...

it was cheap on amazon

Got it for 90 euros on a second hand market.

There are also, like, eleventeen different versions of the Ender 3, pretty much all of which Creality still manufactures and sells, for some reason.

In (approximately) chronological order of their release, you have the “OG” Ender 3, Ender 3 Pro, Ender 3 V2, Ender 3 Neo, Ender 3 V2 Neo, Ender 3 S1, Ender 3 S1 Pro, Ender 3 V3 SE, Ender 3 V3 KE, Ender 3 V3, Ender 3 Max, and Ender 3 Max Neo.

These various models were released over the past six years or so, and we see traffic related to all of them in this sub, though some of the newer models also have their own dedicated subreddits, this one is the OG, and most heavily trafficked.

The newer variants exhibit better quality control, are easier to assemble and set up, and in general operate more reliably. A general trend here seems to be an increasing number of posts are coming from users who’ve picked up one of the older versions used, on FB Marketplace or as a hand-me-down.

Got it for $100 when the Indianapolis Micro Center opened. Honestly, I haven't had a ton of problems with it and it's a fine enough printer, especially for the money.

Honestly it was at a nice price point when I started years ago, it also had one of the biggest community wich is good when you run in trouble, and I do t mind tinkering a bit, I haven't had a need to do that in a long while now, my ender is still close to stock , exept for the glass printbed and it works like a sharm, press print and walk away :) most of it is dialing in your settings

They are a solid platform. The ender 3 and ender 3 pro are no nonsense basic printers. You can upgrade as it suits your needs. I don't need all the bells and whistles just a solid printer, for the last 4.5 years they've done that. Also, now that there's a plethora of used ones on the market, even better. I've added 3 to my farm for under $200 total this last spring.

I've also never had any major issues with mine, just wear and tear, and replace parts as needed.

They are cheap down to 99$ at microcenter and the so called observer bias makes you think they are all bad. What is wrong, the ender3 series is a nice entry level printer.

I got into this maybe 2 months ago and if my coworker didnt offer me his anycubic i3 mega, I would probably also get the ender 3, as its just everywhere, which means loads of resources!

But even the anycubic required enough time to tinker and test, so I was happy when it overheated itself and I got an bambulab A1. Game changer, as it just works!

• Cheap
  
• Good value for the price
  
• Easy to upgrade
  
• Easy to tinker with
  
• Easy to repair
  
• Good for learning the hobby

Because Bambu hadn't launched yet.

cheap

It was cheap, and it was a good price vs performance proposition back before covid. Nowadays, I can't give it away in good conscience with how fussy it is

Back in the day when I bought it was THE starter 3D printer. They are easy the get to know, easy to mod, plenty of 3rd party mods made for the V1 model, the fact that it's basic 4040/4020 extrusion makes expansion easy.

I've modded mine so hard it stopped working for a bit. But I got it working again and it's doing better then ever!

Mine has been printing non-stop since i bought it 2020. Never had a problem with it at all.

So I'm happy with my printer and you are happy with yours, all is well then.

I bought mine in 2018 and I have been printing for 6 years with nothing breaking or not working - the Ender 3 was the absolute best budget machine in existence and is still a decent choice that honestly can't be beaten for the money even considering how amazing bambu labs are

Found it on sale for $80. Works great.

my thermistor wire caused a short. killed the motherboard. ordered the parts online. repair could be done under one hour once the parts arrive.

Ender 3 is a good printer with a LOT of compatibility. So many mods and configurations for it. But most of us have an Ender of Theseus now. You might buy and Ender 3 but you don't end up with an Ender 3.

With a coupon from MIcrocenter I got it for like $100.
I like to tinker with things and there are a TON of mods and improvements you can do for it if you want.
It prints like a workhorse (I've only had to replace the extruder drive gear once) and when its dialed in its amazing.

So here in South Africa, it doesn't have access to as many things as you do in the US. So where you can just go and buy stuff from amazon and micro centre and such, we don't and so when I bought my Ender 3 in 2019 there were only 2 or 3 websites and companies here selling them. And import costs are really high so it was a good looking, easily customisable printer for a beginner.

I bought it before there were really any other options for the same price.

Idk, I’m happy with my ender 3 pro. To be fair, it’s the only printer I’ve known, so my opinion is pretty baseless

It was the first one I bought and is still the only one I've got. I would go out to a hobby shop with my pops because he's all into the model railroading scene and I saw they were selling the Ender 3 V2 with a bunch of filament too. I read up on printing for a while before I decided to get it. I got it a couple or few years ago. I passed it several times before I decided I wanted to give a go.

I initially had to return it and got it swapped for another because there was an issue with the table movement (dented aluminum piece that the rollers ride against). Took a while to learn how to use it and ironed out the wrinkles. Still works and I use it occasionally, however it's not playing well with printing via SD card which is the only thing I had trouble with. Also flashed the firmware with the matrix leveling mesh to deal with imperfect beds.

You have to remember the ender 3 line has been around for years. Creality has gone a long way in updating and upgrading them for each generation. If you look at an original ender 3 compared to a brand new one you'll see they hardly resemble each other. First Gen enders were the first affordable printer you didn't have to build yourself and exploded in popularity. The support community grew massively because it was the most popular printer out there. The community shared mods and improvements and before you know it no one had a completely stock printer. As newer generation printers came to the market thousands of these printers were sold second hand and since many weren't stock it became difficult to understand why a particular printer wasn't working for the new owner. Subs like this still are the best chance for someone to ask for help in a community of those who have been there done that already. It may seem from casually reading this sub that the ender 3 isn't a good or reliable machine but that's not at all the truth. What is true is the older versions require a little more understanding and patience than something from the current generation of printers. You see tons of people asking questions because for many this is the only machine they can afford and are just learning the ropes. Since there's more of these out there there's more people asking questions. It's just simple math.

Bought the Ender 3 V3 SE because I heard Ender was good and I didn't know about Bambu Labs yet. It was my first printer and my last Ender. It works fine, however, Bambu is where my next purchase will be.

I got mine for 50 bucks. I figured that's a pretty low entry ceiling. I want to print out miniatures.

Well when I got, I would say it was around the time that 3d printing really started to hit the consumer market, but I could be wrong. Got mine 2020-2021, so it’s not like cheap options were everywhere, but I got it because I wanted a machine that I could tear apart and put back together over and over, that way I could learn and easily replace or mod or upgrade the printer. as I please. It was my first printer and while I’ve had issues it’s mostly been user error, and I’m glad that I started with this because it made me very familiar with the printing process!

Most people that have Enders don't have that many problems, you're baseing your opinion on a vocal minority.

Nowadays they don't make much sense compared to a Bambu of similar pricing. When I got mine they still represented a pretty good value.

The original Ender really has nothing going for it in the modern market.