Prusa Vs the rest
This isn't to inform a decision - its more out of interest...
As a 3d printer newbie (who went down the prusa route due a recommendation of a colleague) I'm wondering whether you grizzled and experienced veterans of multiple printer types think the Prusa printers are more/less user friendly than the other offering on the market or whether its just a bit different. (i.e. is a Prusa the best place for a newbie to begin).
I'm loving mine btw. I read a lot of the posts here before it arrived - so I got it dialed in quickly and I haven't had any real issues 🙂
RE: Prusa Vs the rest
As a non Prusa owner (I won't pay £700 for a kit nor wait till I'm old and grey for a Mini) I think you are mainly paying for the infrastructure, which by the way is wonderful. There's this forum, the great tech support, PrusaSlicer with all those well crafted profiles etc. etc. whereas most printer manufactures leach of open source projects, give nothing back and provide zero tech support to boot.
RE: Prusa Vs the rest
My first printer was a Tevo nereus pre-productioin unit sent for review to a local youtuber.
So i got it at a really good price, with a basic lesson in how it worked.
It's set up with a large nozzle and have it tuned great for petg. Still ptfe-lined all cloned partes (except for the genuine titan extruder).
This was mid-2018.
2019 i got a Flsun delta. Got it for 50% on a flash-sale 11/11.
Worked great for PLA and for smaller details in easy abs/asa. Also large nozzle, all cloned partes.
Next i went for the mini-kit (as i was not in a hurry) to be able to do more high-temp filaments reliably.
The mini+ was intended to replaced my flsun and i have since sold the delta.
So for me, i guess the "buy local with a lesson" for a reasonable price was most important as the first printer was concerned.
Now i have experience in how printer works, how to swap nozzles, ptfe-tubes, clean extruders etc.
That was when i decided on the mini as a kit. I would have liked the mk3s but could not justify the price-difference between mk3s/mini for my use of the printers. I don't use engineering-grade filaments, but i do print for outside use.
Prusa Mini+ kit. BondTech extruder. FW 5.1.2
Prusa MK3S+ kit. Stock. FW 3.11.0
Prusa MK3S+, used. Stock. FW 3.13.3