$499 3-D Printer Drew Plenty of Attention at CES (Video)

3-D printing is far from new, but a $499 3-D printer is new enough to get a bunch of people to write about it, including someone whose headline read, CES 2014: Could 3D printing change the world? XYZPrinting, the company behind the da Vinci 1.0 printer, has some happy-looking executives in the wake of CES. They won an award, and their booth got lots of attention. This is what trade shows are all about for small and/or new companies. Now the XYZprinting people can go home and pump out some product -- assuming they got a lot of orders (and not just attention) at CES.

Comments

Yeah yeah

[NaughtyNimitz]

But what will the cartridges cost? And will they 'expire' each time I unwrap and insert one?

("Nudge nudge, wink wink HP?")

Re:Yeah yeah

[CastrTroy]

Same thoughts about why I don't own a color printer at home. I got a cheap ($55) black and white laser a couple years back, and I couldn't be happier. The toner is cheap (relatively), and I don't have to worry about the ink drying up, or print heads clogging before I've even had a chance to use up all the ink. I very seldom if ever need color printing, and when I do it's cheaper and easier to head over to the photo printer (Walmart) or print shop (UPS Store) when I actually need color prints. 3D printers have the opportunity to really change things, but only if I can obtain plastic for really cheap, preferably by recycling plastic from products I've already bought.

Re:Yeah yeah

[GameMaster]

Ink cartridges that expire each time you unwrap them? Where are you from, the '90's? Welcome to the future my friend, today we have ink cartridges that expire while sitting, un-opened, on the shelf.

I'm not really joking, we have an HP plotter where I work that does exactly this. When they went to replace the ink cartridge, they found that the entire stock of back-up cartridges had already "expired" according to a pre-set date built into a chip in the cartridge. Thankfully, HP was nice enough to provide a setting hidden away in the firmware that lets you over-ride that check. My guess is that they think the pro-market might not be willing to put up with their crap if they pushed it that far.

"So you buy the filaments from us...."

[macraig]

Proprietary consumables? Seriously? When are we gonna get past this crap? Ever?

Not one link to the company in summary

[Anonymous Coward]

Nice going, "editor". You managed not to provide a single direct link to the company that makes the product you're talking about.

Shoes?

[jklovanc]

In the future, users may be able to print shoes that are tailored to the exact size of their feet, among many possibilities.

Have they looked at the different materials that go into shoes these days? The different parts need to have different qualities. The sole needs to be grippy. The uppers need to be flexible and porous. The insole needs to be cushioning yet supportive. This is done today by using many different materials. Sorry but materials that come out of thermal printers don't have all those qualities and generally don't hold up under the stress shoe are put through. Let's try to be realistic about what this technology can do.

Re:Why is it so cheap?

[Kenja]

By comparison, their filament is around three times as expensive as others (more if you just get bulk rolls) at ~$46.67/kg.

I looked at it @ CES

[Anonymous Coward]

The overall construction was in line with a cheap 2D printer. The rails where thin, the structure in general seemed to be flimsy in comparison to the other 3D printers that were there. The proprietary print medium and the cheap-ish construction were enough to put me off and I was ready and willing to buy.