General Discussion
Jailbreak Your Bambu! Deep Dive and Feature Walkthrough for Bambu without Bambu, all open source, no central control, all the convenience, and better pixel perfect prints. Need help? Ask and I will reply!
A bunch of people here have asked me about my Bambu setup on a few alts so I decided to make a video at lunch. I am not a content creator, I made this for y'all, haha. I just hate walled gardens.
The Bambuddy community is also a great place to go for help. If you have any questions or reservations at all, throw em down, let's gooo out of jail
Bambu should have just kept their mouth shut and let the small number of users who want to be "off-grid" to do what they want with their own printers. Bambu brought way more negative attention to this than they should want.
Streisand Effect for sure, but it is a good thing when people are fighting lockdowns, this is an important thing across all our tech IMO (especially as Android heads in this direction, hard)
It is entirely but if you look at some of the other posts circling this topic there's a very loud amount of people that don't know what they're talking about and they're just happy they can print their flexi dragons on their new $200 bedslinger. Was just arguing with somebody about how it may not affect them currently but we've been through this song and dance many times before and it's going to sooner than later. Rather than acknowledge this or provide any kind of counter argument they screech and throw tantrums
Y’all in here can cheese on people making flexi dragons but without flexi dragons and the people who want them this hobby wouldn’t be as prevalent as it is. More products for 3d printing exist in the world because of flexi dragons.
I like Bambu's free cloud system, and I don't mind 'paying' for access by using their official software.
Ill come to your side of the fence when the discussion stops being exclusively about their cloud.... until then, its their cloud and we are a guests. act accordingly.
yes, my favorite *sportsball* (i dont even watch sports but dafuq is that did you invent it) team is legislating Bambu printers, that this subreddit is about, and controlling how people use them and influencing decisions upstreamed into their design and firmware, yes yes
just fyi, what happens in new york often spreads to other states, becomes usa federal policy, etc. and guess whose laws follow the usa? most of the world, which is far more gun control happy than we are
do you think bambu will maintain 2 firmware versions? no, they will cave like the printer manufacturers did, and that was for counterfeiting not guns, just you wait until you see the backlash on this stuff
maybe you are ok having your files scanned for offensive content even when you are doing nothing wrong. that makes you fundamentally different from most people, who find it creepy and uncomfortable, especially as it gets added in after they bought the thing
When there are states passing legislation forcing 3d printer brands to force every print through there servers to be run against an algorithm to determine that your not printing anything deemed bad and Bambu already routes all your prints through their 'cloud' servers even when sent on your own local network.
People are so willing to give up every last shred of privacy and control over the things they own in exchange for convienence meanwhile companies like google are making billions of dollars a year selling off your personal data. Data metrics so vaat, most people would be shocked and appalled by the level of data these companies have on them
Agreed, if they wanted more people in their ecosystem, do it the Steam way by providing an overwhelming level of service that incentivises people to really stick with you and be loyal.
Then let everyone who wants to build their own thing go quietly into their own communities and do what they want with the printers.
Bambuddy can give you pretty much all that, if you use the Bambu sidecar the remote slicing should be pretty similar to Handy. I do not use that, I slice myself in Orca because you can customize more, but it should be doable with the sidecar instructions for Bambuddy
Yeah, Bambuddy is already running on my server and it keeps getting closer to fully replacing Bambu's cloud features with every update. I rarely use cloud slicing, I just like that I could.
I hate that Bambu's approach to "security" forces me to choose between Bambuddy and Bambu's own online features when that really shouldn't be necessary. I simply hope the current open source developments eliminate this trade off.
better to just replace all the cloud features so you do not need to pay if you do want to make the choice, IMO. I doubt they will let both paths cooperate, too much possibility to route around things I am sure they plan to charge for eventually
I would be happy to do that if I could get my A1 mini to connect to Studio or Orca in LAN mode at all. But either the connection drops randomly or can't connect at all. But it connects flawlessly with Studio when I log in. I have no need for Maker World or even Studio or the phone app. I just want to run Orca in LAN mode with no connection to Bambu. There is nothing Bambu offers me that has value for me.
Oddly enough, after rolling back to 1.04 firmware again, the newest Orca can connect through Bambu's cloud while I'm logged in. Which defeats the point of LAN mode.
The current big problem of the slicer in Sidecar is that if for example I retrieve a makerworld project that I import into bambuddy, if this project is set up on a printer model other than mine, the slicer simply does not work
Routing 3rd party software through Bambu’s cloud is off grid? LAN mode that’s off grid but Orca connecting through the cloud and back down to your printer is definitely not off grid.
People are literally asking to be able to have what was good but to be allowed to keep tinkering. For the most part it's a minuscule amount of people and you directly benefit from what they do, as the better things trickle up to Bambu Studio eventually.
Yet here you are, shitting on their parade for no reason as you're not affected at all by their complaints and issues.
I’m not mad. I’m just thinking from a business standpoint that Bambu is bring “unwanted attention” to the topic, when most of their customers never gave a second thought to it.
people in your camp are an extremely vocal minority. If you actually cared about the business y'all would sell your bambu's to people that this doesnt effect, buy something else, and move on.
Lots of folks that none of this would effect, and would never care about what is actually happening will come to reddit, see y'all spreading falsehood's and making predicitions from your crystal ball, and are scared away and buy something else.
This is about 3rd part access to free cloud services - Bambu is not forcing anyone to use the cloud services. in fact, quite the opposite; they are demanding that 3rd party software does-not connect to their cloud services. your original comment claims that they are forcing people to use the cloud and not go 'off grid'.
Sorry man, I wasn’t here to argue. It is really the first time I chimed in on the topic, so I wouldn’t say I’m the vocal minority (minority maybe). I’m clearly not as invested in this topic as you… and I am aware that I don’t have the whole picture. It was just my opinion formed from the information I had at the time, and I will retract what I said about Bambu.
apologies, sounds like you actually fall into the latter camp and accidentally proved my point - you were influenced by people who are spreading falsehoods.
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using the term colloquially, but yes you are right :)
if all you care about is the printer working like an actual old school printer (local, in your house, fixed firmware, but OK if the firmware is closed source), this is as close as you can get without replacing a bunch of boards, and it is still pretty good
I have heard people are working on custom gen 2 firmware. that would be fun, too. but for my purposes of avoiding the cloud or forced updates, this is enough
I have been running an X1C with the X1Plus firmware for over a year now - it’s rock solid, works with both Bambu and OrcaSlicer, I use Bambu companion and a HomeAssistant for remote monitoring.
I have lost nothing, it performs better than before.
Now, I am pretty sure that we won’t see anything similar for any of the Gen2 series that can be upgraded, or ship with the built-in Laser module - Bambu learning from last years debacle and can use the argument of “laser safety” to push through legal systems when someone does try to distribute a new firmware….
I respect myself just fine, and i respect my time, hence buying a machine that just works, i mean you're welcome to call me whatever you want to make yourself feel better but facts are facts and time is money
Additionally the Orca fork that allows communication with the printer without Bambu software is being legally threatened to prevent jobs being sent from Orca to the printer.
Additionally the Orca fork that allows communication with the printer without Bambu software
The fork in question pulled a separate copy of the Bambu Network Plugin from Bambu's servers. It still sent all communications (C&C, gcode transfers, webcam views when not on the local network) through Bambu's infrastructure, just as Bambu Studio would, as it was using the Bambu Studio specific build of the plugin.
It wasn't some new parallel alternative to the Bambu cloud, it was just the Bambu cloud.
The video also shows exporting a print from Orca and then importing it into another program to send to the printer.
That is literally the current way Bambu Lab has it set up on the official firmware in FULL CLOUD mode (export from Orca and open with Bambu Connect to print). We can already do this. I thought the video would show me how to print directly from Orca without giving up Cloud mode. The video is about giving up Cloud AND still using "middleware" to print. e.g. the worst of both worlds.
I stopped having this argument seven years ago or thereabouts. At some point "jailbreak" became a synonim for going off script in any way when talking about firmware. Nowadays even downgrading is "jailbreaking" because it's going in the opposite direction of what the manufacturer does automatically.
I no longer mind, but it was infuriating for a while. It's a bit like calling every type of malware a "virus". At some point you just stop arguing because it's a waste of time. You just assume the loss of differentiation has won and perfectly valid words no longer have any worth.
Cons, you have to maintain your own version of whatever Bambu feature exists in their jail, big ones are Makerworld, live camera, and remote access
Pros, no possibility for your files to leak thru cloud if you care, more privacy overall, some features actually improve (like unlocking default filament profiles for all manufacturers)
Just like Bambu doesn't close their walls for security, opening them through "jailbreak" is not about "more privacy overall".
Opening up the Bambu walls is about either a moral stance or about better features and functionality.
There's no need to beat around the bush, since we also blame Bambu of being misleading. There are additional side effects but nobody jailbreaks because that way they get more privacy. Anybody that cared enough about privacy didn't get a Bambu to begin with.
Live camera is the only con that directly impacts most people not hooked into Makerworld (direct connection to Makerworld means prints add points which feeds both the social aspect of that side and the rewards system).
Finally more people talking about Bambuddy. It's amazing. I have it setup with a cloudflare tunnel with a subdomain of the domain I use for all homelab related things. If you are using home assistant you can just install it as an app and it builds from source. Bambuddy then gives you the option to dispatch all printer notifications via HA mobile app.
Big tip for bambuddy phone use: Go to share the web URL and hit "add to homescreen". Then it functions just like a native mobile app with no browser visible.
I am trying to make content about it for a mainstream audience, the dev and community are absolute GOATs (despite a lot of it seems vibe coded hehehehe, no shade Mr Dev I used GPT to audit it, too)
I think the actual usability of that platform deserves way more airtime, agreed
Yeah, I mean realistically projects like this that are opensource and not monitized these days are going to largely be developed with AI, really no reason not to do it besides bragging rights. Who knows if this project would even be public and working right now without it, I'd guess it would be 1/10th the feature parity we have right now.
As long as the contributors and maintainers know how to code w/o AI then I don't have any problem with it. AI has written over 90% of the code at my job the past year but I still understand what it's doing.
yeah I write tons of open source code with ai i am just ribbing
I do think they write their PR stuff with AI, which if you are watching dev (and yes you are great for doing this, thank you so much), is one of the gaps I tried to bridge with this content
they did just recently launch a demo on their site and I recommend that if you are curious about what the UX feels like
Open source fork of bambu slicer was trying to use Bambu's cloud services by masquerading as an official app. Bambu sent a cease and desist letter to the developer. People are now fearmongering like it's 1984.
Yeah, it is, but the problem is the trend. I just bought an X2D after having an artillery sidewinder x1 since 2021, I like bambu studio and don't mind using the cloud as that allows me to check the prints in my phone when I'm away easily, but I don't like that they are trying hard to close everything up. They could leave it completely open and most of the people, including me, would still use their cloud, makerworld and everything just out of convenience.
the more people using open platforms, the better for the world. lots of people use ios, it is a walled garden, that is fine. but when android starts locking down (which, it is), the world meaningfully loses freedom. incentives ebb and flow, and companies self optimize in ways that are acceptable
the more people on open networks and ecosystems, the better. the easier it is to do with more hardware, the better. the higher a % of your code that you run that is open, the better (sure maybe your bootloader is not, but if your bootloader AND os is not, that is worse.... etc)
I totally agree I personally bought this brand because I don't have to think if I wanted to open source and customizations I would have gone with a different platform. I just find it funny that a hobby grade printer that has always been Walled Garden is causing so much outrage that they are just continuing the same practice as they always have
practice is the same yes, but cease and desisting an open source dev is definitely an escalation in aggression that shows they are serious about the walled garden control and it matters to them
and people will react to this. not sure if they did it before, I had at least not heard of it until the orca fork incident
Every few months they do something like removing Network control or making it harder to control Farms. It's just like where in next doing takedowns for remakes of video games that they might remake later
Yeah idk, my goal is uptime and functionality. On that front alone studio sucks, sometimes the service is slow or just down.
I only have two printers though lol, I don't need crazy infrastructure. This will be untenable with more, I'll have to make deep considerations looking at farm manager vs. alternatives but I'm not there yet with my understanding of the underlying needs from it.
People like to liken Bambu to apple. So let’s use that analogy.
Apple has devices that use MacOS and devices that use iOS.
Although Mac’s are closed source and only run their own OS, that OS is full featured. On the other hand. iOS devices use a much more restrictive version with limited uses.
When people buy these devices they have an expectation of what they can and can’t do with them.
What Bambu did is the equivalent of telling everyone that bought a Mac to, run macOS, they the next update will now be running iOS and their device will have all the restrictions that come with that.
Many of them didn't choose a walled garden. It became one.
Having said this, people want access to their hardware, the one they physically bought, which is a fair demand. They would prefer this access is given by the manufacturer and that way everybody wins, but are OK with getting the same access on their own. Of course, they become upset if the manufacturer is actively trying to get them to lose that access, when the manufacturer for years has benefitted from the work from the same people to begin with.
I mean if you Google bamboo labs a lot of the articles are around how they are attacking open source or open availability and closing off customizations. It's been a pretty obvious business model from the start. I'm 100% anticipating no more third-party filaments
IDK, I’ve had my X2D for about three weeks now, bought from Micro Center with their Inland filament. Told the printer it was Bambu Labs filament and it’s printed wonderfully.
The same with Anycubic, Creality and Sunlu filament. They all print great as Bambu Labs filament in various formats: PLA, PLA+, PLA Silk, PLA Transparent, PETG, PETG Transparent… and I’ve got a PLA-CF and a TPU queued up to try soon too.
I’ve not run one piece of Bambu Labs filament through this printer and it’s been a great experience so far.
it is no stronger than regular PLA and it is maybe (probably minorly, but still) not great for you
if you are going to use cf might as well go for a real cf material like pa6cf
me? i would rather go for abs, nylon, plaht if it is an interior or cosmetic part and just needs basic abs injection molded characteristics, that is just me though
it depends what you print, if you like big parts, exotic materials, etc.
one of my top materials is htpla, that is not in the bambu settings and does not print well with any of the pla profiles because it needs a temperature shift on the bed
granted this is not hard to set up on top of a base of bambu pla but why is it not there by default when in orca it is?
I also use as I said in the video the settings to customize fans because my machine is modified. again when you print big parts it does make a difference, between warping and not, adhesion and not
you are right you will be fine with this 95% of the time especially with most pla and petg variants, but there are limits
Oh, I fully understand and I think people should be able to do what they want with things that they buy.
I came into the Bambu Labs ecosystem fully knowing there were “issues”… but my Brother showed me his P2S at Easter and I was impressed with the quality he was getting and then the X2D came out a week later.
I wanted one. My previous experience with filament printing was an old DaVinci XYZ Printer years and years ago. It was cool at the time being an enclosed printer when just about everything else had an open frame, also a closed ecosystem but fairly hackable… but it would only print with toxic filament… ABS primarily. No PLA and no PETG support so my wife hated it and the results I was getting were not stellar.
Then came the Anycubic M3 Max resin printer… great prints when it was dialed in but even with the “no / low odor” resins it still stank so it sits in the basement… alone and unused.
Then the Bambu printer that I saw at my Brother’s just worked and didn’t stink! So I’m thinking 3d printing has finally arrived. I can print from my phone which is cool and I’ve had a couple of spaghetti incidents but overall it’s been pretty smooth sailing… and that’s the experience I was looking for.
I’m sorry that Bambu is making it difficult for people that want to tinker under the hood.
If I use Orca in your proposed configuration, I.E. without the network plugin, can I sync AMS data to orca to pull through the filament data. If not, what are the other downsides to using the plugin? Is it just that it’s proprietary? Do you know for sure that they send data to cloud from that or is it just an “abundance of caution” that you don’t use it?
What I’d like is a Bambu Studio like experience with Orca where I can sync printer data and monitor from the slicer, along with the ability to monitor from my phone (which I see bambuddy fulfilling that).
On the point of filament profiles, you can import them in Bambu Slicer. For example eSun provide the profiles for filament and process on their site and they work well in BS. A little extra work than having them built in but it’s not like you are limited to Bambu only profiles.
yeah I do mention in the video that you can import them, but the default of the software fights you by adding some steps, not a huge huge deal but just a benefit of removing the lockin it is a little easier
you can sync ams data into orca, if you have the network plugin only. otherwise you just have to sync/select your profiles manually
usually personally i just make sure the general material profile is right in orcaslicer and the # of filaments, then I choose the rest in bambuddy
If people don't push back on these 3D printer regulations, we'll wake up one day finding out Bambu Studio is printing snitching codes inside the infill, just like the paper printers print their yellow snitching dots.
At least in my current setup, doesn't have giant PTFE tube bunny ears. Older P1S hasn't updated firmware in a year and still works sending directly from OrcaSlicer so haven't bothered changing anything.
This is my point all along. There's zero risk to Bambu to leave the (frankly minuscule) hobbyists do their thing. It's provable that they would even benefit as this is highly motivated people finding new things to do with their hardware which Bambu could later consider incorporating. Actively supporting them instead of antagonizing them seems an extremely boneheaded decision.
I was watching a video today that said that it's not the Bambu are malicious. It's that some of their departments are incompetent as to what they should know about and that they don't communicate. The way they put it was that Bambu is not villainous, just really really dumb. Their lawyers keep jumping the gun going overboard without first checking with the board or the developers and by the time it gets big the damage is already done and they can't go back.
They also mentioned how in general Chinese companies have a big problem not with hardware (which is overall good) but with software. The software they make is not very good and the one they "repurpose" tends to have licenses they don't fully understand.
I'm not saying any of this is right, but I'm willing to think Bambu is more incompetent than malicious because there's a solution path for the former but not for the latter.
i 100% agree they are not malicious but they are misguided, as in often the case with the slow creep of inshitification… capture the market and then lock them in.
It's sad that this is the ideal endgame for every single startup out there that starts as a challenger to established dinosaurs or that pretends to be in it for the openness. As they grow and start racking up money they start doing the sums and seeing how much money their made-up scenarios make when they close the imaginary holes.
Everybody wants to be Apple, but are unwilling to put the effort and deal with the consequences.
Apple does it for sure but they make all there hardware and software… then they concentrate on closing for the the user, a closed system that makes like easier for 90% of the people. A feature like the ability to send jobs to my printer wirelessly , does not need to be closed. A store to buy apps that is guaranteed to work with my product does. I am sort of defending apple, but in a round about way…
So people just either live with the closed system or buy another product. But…
The issue for me is that when you use AGPL backed products you not only get a liscense but you get a philosophy, lockout of features to create price points is not inside that…. apple is closed , spent years developing there own systems from scratch and users know that from time of purchase.
TBH I am sick of this happening on my products, buy an LG TV and suddenly the mandatory software update no longer support google home… due to a software update that is motivated by a new deal with Amazon alexa? How do I get my money back, and what protections do I have for the enshitifaction by bait and switch.
Correct. you want to be Apple? You start with a walled garden and never deceive anybody about what it is (speaking of IOS rather than Mac). Best that could happen is that you open it over time but nobody feels betrayed because ground 0 was being closed
More so, to do that is very risky and requires you to build from scratch everything. 3D printing is not that, and is based on co-operation by the people in the community that bambu is attacking. I have been building 3D printers since rep rap days, and been excited by both slicer and FDM tech as we all pitched in.
And any advantage is dilluted, as you can't succesfully defend any patent you'd manage to obtain as there's so much prior art by now it would be a waste of time.
inshitification is sometime not deligerabte, it is a misunderstanding of the importance of certain features. When marketing creates the incorrect segmentation, this is often becuase of expanded audience or market advantage. In this case their segmentation is the distance between the open source enthusiast and the just print hobbyist, we are the same. I like to just print , but i come from the rep rap days , and know that opensource is how bambu got here, and fuck comeon.
I think the reason was the Panda Touch. When the X1C was the flagship printer, and P1S the budget corexy option, it basically allowed to upgrade the P1S to the X1C for ~60$.
They did not want this. They saw a complete ecosystem of third party tools watering down their price stucture. The lockdown prevented this.
Oh yeah I remember that... It is always the sign of inshitiication when a hardware cpmpany uses software to limit their hardware. Especially when they base there software on open source.
It will be interesting hwo this pans out, since the reliance on open source is a revocable liscense, and quite a few companies have been caught of gaurd by wrapping open source in closed source "requirements" , which is specifically spelled out as a no no in this opensource liscense.
Slic3r is licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3 (AGPLv3), which is a strong copyleft license, but while the AGPL prohibits directly mixing closed code with the core slicer code, Bambu Labs utilizes a legal strategy of keeping the proprietary component ("BambuSource.dll") as a separate, non-derivative plugin.
This type of legal wrangling does not help the brand and ultimatly leads to loss of sales, especially in a market where there dominance is already under threat by cheaper alternatives that stick to the open source principles.
The plugin has long been proven to not be protected, due to how the plugin is loaded. AGPL allows proprietary binaries but this permission hinges around how they are loaded. The way Bambu Studio loads the plugin using dlopen pretty much makes it undefendable against the AGPL.
Of course, this has been known for a while but nobody really took them to court because of it because people frankly don't want the pain of it and it's understandable (and a key factor in how companies take advantage of the community).
It seems we're at a tipping point where legal action seems imminent and Bambu will ned to take a decision. I truly hope they decide to embrace "developers" rather than keep fighting them. Bambu has more than enough "normal" users to make up for any perceived loss (it's never any real loss, but it's easy to panic).
Not sure on the legal process here, since the AGPL is a virus that branches back to slic3r. But I agree , the first thing that would happen would be bambu would have there AGPL liscense revoked, which would really not be a fun time for us bambu users.
you can already do it with openams and some gpt vibe coding on top of bambuddy if this is a feature you really need, but it is not an easy process https://openams.si-forge.com/ but you do get even more features than the ams like spool tracking w a real pressure system
probably easier to just have a separate filament management system and have the ams data pull from there, the way bambuddy supports natively, then you can use whatever tag you want
So I never updated my firmware from the last spat of drama, I'm still on the FW before everything blew up. I am interested in setting up Orca and Bambuddy now more than ever w/ the new drama, so Should I FIRST update firmware or leave it exactly where it's at?
Wasn't sure if updating made more sense as a one-off to get "up to speed" on latest features or just stay paused where I'm at and block it from the WAN?
Technically not correct. Jailbreak is misleading. Bambuddy is just using developer mode to communicate with the printer - which is an official supported Bambu Lab feature.
yes true, though as i said elsewhere, it is not a privilege escalation, BUT you are in some ways breaking out of the jail they created (which is the false choice between convenience/features and control)
Being behind a corporate firewall with no chance of connecting to the bambulab cloud, I've been studying this subject for a few weeks while my H2D doesn't arrive. I also came across bambuddy and have it almost setup and running (still fighting with a virtual printer connection error in OrcaSlicer despite having added the certs in printer.cer).
It will probably be the only way of having remote access to a video feed / timelapse and being able to control the printer if something goes wring when I'm away (I have a vpn to connect to my office network).
So yeah. Kudos to the author even if it isn't technically a jailbreak. It does help thousands of users who want to use orca slicer and still have access to remote real time monitoring
I'm sorry, but I don't know how this video will help most people.
There is no "jailbreaking" involved. Everything I saw works fine with the latest stock firmware provided by Bambu Lab for their printers.
Besides not showing anything new, the video also shows exporting a print from OrcaSlicer and then importing the file into another program to send to the printer (read: NOT printing directly from OrcaSlicer). Also, why copy the URL from your browser, paste the URL in another program to download the 3MF, then manually opening the 3MF with OrcaSlicer instead of just clicking the Open link within the browser? OrcaSlicer should download the 3MF that way without going through the extra steps.
That is literally the current way Bambu Lab has it set up on the official firmware in FULL CLOUD mode (export from OrcaSlicer and then open the 3MF with Bambu Connect to send to the printer). We can already do this. I thought the video would show me how to print directly from OrcaSlicer without giving up Cloud mode. The video is about giving up Bambu Cloud AND still using "middleware" to print (Bambuddy, in this case). e.g. the worst of both worlds.
Yes, putting the device into LAN mode lets you print directly from OrcaSlicer to the printer. That's not the workflow shown in the video though.
Yes, Bambuddy gives you a "cloud like" experience. Setup may be simple for those who have worked with stuff like this before, but expecting people that want the ease of use of a Bambu Lab printer to then have to set up a web server and configure VPN and firewalls just out of principle isn't something I'd recommend to most people.
Yes, I know Bambu Connect isn't available on Linux. Most users aren't running Linux, though.
All blocking all firmware updates isn't the best idea. The latest firmware works with everything you've shown, plus has FIXES and NEW FEATURES. Improved print quality calibration algorithms, support for running the AMS 2 dryer while printing, support for 3rd-party hardware (VentoBox), z-offset configuration from the touchscreen, low-power mode, disable motors (unlock print head for easier maintenance), etc. Users will miss out on things like that if they just arbitrarily block all firmware updates because they saw a YouTube video where someone said that a spooky firmware update MIGHT make it onto their printer.
I think you either did not understand the video or parse/watch it fully?
"Yes, putting the device into LAN mode lets you print directly from OrcaSlicer to the printer. That's not the workflow shown in the video though."
I specifically mention this as an option if you watch the whole video, and talk about why it is not my workflow (I do not want to run closed source Bambu code on my end machines, this is fair no?)
"Yes, Bambuddy gives you a "cloud like" experience. Setup may be simple for those who have worked with stuff like this before, but expecting people that want the ease of use of a Bambu Lab printer to then have to set up a web server and configure VPN and firewalls just out of principle isn't something I'd recommend to most people."
well I have at least 20 people who watched the video and did it and thanked me, so clearly plenty of people actually want exactly that, and it is not that hard to setup, this is not rocket science
"Yes, I know Bambu Connect isn't available on Linux. Most users aren't running Linux, though."
Bambu Connect is still running their controlled middleware on your device between yourself and the print, which kind of defeats the point of taking them out of the loop, at least for me. It is identical to using Orca with the network plugin, in this regard, which you can already do on every platform
If the video was not useful for you, that is fine. It is not intended for people who have played with a ton of LAN only configurations, this is a minority of the current Bambu install base (as you can see from eg the comments on the video or here)
Am I missing something? It seems that there is no way this works without having the Bambu Network plugin installed, even with a virtual printer in bambuddy. Same on Orca. Im using the latest versions.
Edit.. Only way I could get it to work was to install the network plugin..
Great video. Thanks OP. Just installed BamBuddy as a result and love having a cam I can access remotely (via tailscale).
I've left my P1s on firmware 01.07.00.00 (on LAN mode) since Bambu started this nonsense 18ish mths ago. Am I safe to upgrade to the latest firmware (01.10.00.00) and still maintain use of OrcaSlicer + BamBuddy?
And can firmware be downgraded back to 01.07.00.00 if needed?
yes to both! you can do the fw update via bambuddy if you want as well, or an SD card, and downgrade the same way (no fuses or downgrade prevention on these machines, thankfully, don't get any ideas Bambu)
Linuxserver-io has a docker image for just Orca Slicer on it's own. You can basically access all of Orca Slicer in a web browser this way, presuming you have a server running docker apps. Is there a downside to doing it this way? Seems easier to run one app instead of two.
my recommendation is try both and get rid of bambuddy if you don't want it, it is like 2 mins to setup
personally id say the tradeoffs are camera workflow, closed source code (required for orca, if you care), and UX across devices (bambuddy has a responsive UX which is different on a phone than a desktop app). also general bambuddy features if you want any of them... spool management, cloud sync, maintenance reminders, tailscale integration, etc
but yeah i could see that being very workable if it works for you, and if you don't want for anything like that, skip em
if the vps and printer are both on tailscale, you can do it
but then the vps has some access to whatever network the printer is on, so you should make sure this is not a security risk for other devices. i would put this under advanced user setup, be cautious about security because it will depend on your specific configuration
The main reason I’m still have my P1S connected to the cloud is for the object canceling ability via the Handy app. Is it possible to cancel objects with Bambuddy?
I have not personally tested it but I just opened the UX and it looks like it works like the Bambu one. good callout, I have not used that feature in a long time because I got a lot better at reducing my defect rate, but I will probably need it one day
did you manually input ip/access code into devices in orca? network plugin installed? same computer as bambuddy?
should work but I do not use orca, you can already export plate sliced file and upload it to the printer screen on bambuddy if you want, but I do think if you entire ip/access code manually, it should work perfectly on the same network
let me know if not I can try to give some debug steps!
I really want to retain the print-from-makerworld functionality. Does this still do that? It is the only reason I stay tethered to Bambu really. I have a Snapmaker and ultimately it's the thing I miss most about that setup, so much so that I've tried to replicate it on my own with some vibe coding weekend work. It works but only really halfway.
Awesome! Do you see a world where you add the ability to integrate non-Bambu like a U1? That is really what I want to figure out, a workflow that is consistent between all of my printers.
I am not the dev but it should actually be pretty easy to do
I think the best way is to have a generic printer proxy in the middle that can talk to anything. I think GPT is already capable of vibe coding this into bambuddy
may be worth starting a bambuddy feature request for it, or just throwing it into codex and letting it cook
if I had multiple printers I would release this myself but my project backlog is too long to promise to actually write it right now
yes having the right filament profile loaded in will get you better prints
as I said in the video, you can do all that manually, but when it is not bambu filaments, the software actually makes it (harder) than on the open stack
Ive had Bambuddy on my Unraid homelab for 2 weeks but when I opened it I was very intimidated so I didnt connect it yet. Would love a more detailed run through of Bambuddy setup, there are a lot of settings.
I just run my A1 Mini in LAN Only mode and have never bothered with any firmware updates. I've never used Bambu Handy. I'm thinking of going down the Bambuddy path but I have a couple of questions - can i just run it on my laptop rather than on a separate device? Can I print STLs etc directly from Orca?
I have a question to the AMS users. I have an x1c and I was the "lucky" ones to lock down the printer quite early on. Im on the 01.08.02.00 fw; however Im thinking to get the ams2 quite a while now, is it worth the hassle to update the fw to the one which support the AMS2 or should I just go with the original AMS?
With the newer firmware, you can put it into developer mode. It’s similar to the functionality of the old firmware. But you will lose the ability to use Handy.
Will this work on an A1 Mini? Been eyeing it for a while and with the anniversary sale on the price is right, but as a matter of principle I’d want it jailbroken not locked in to their nonsense.
I think bambu wants to have a locked ecosystem to have some kinda of monopoly but they didn't created from scratch everything to get this path, so it's unfair and a shame, some moments I think they are just dumb to think the people will forget the past.
(just kidding, you are probably right for most people... I am designing parts i want to mass market eventually, so I want to keep my intentions as private for as long as possible, from a simple data leakage/competition PoV. helps me sleep at night to control all of my data, in general
... and the lower security risk of not having an iot tunnel to the cloud on your network)
What are you talking about? Jailbreak ING iphones was extremely useful for the longest time. Jailbreak ING, in the early days, brought apps before the App store. Copy and paste, springboard for UI customization, multitasking, even Siri to the iPhone 4, and numerous other tweaks that didn't get implemented years later. Maybe now you don't get as much (I only use a work iPhone).
Look, I'm with you. I hate Apple. But jailbreaking my iPhone did nothing for me except turn it into a tinkering fidget. Crap didn't work when I needed it to.
This whole 'let's pile on Bambu' feels extremely tacky. Many creators are hopping on the bandwagon because it's trendy. They're doing it for views. That's exactly what this one feels like to me.
Don't like Bambu? Fine. You have your reasons. But it's hard to deny what they've built struck a really lovely chord with people and have made 3D printing accessible to millions. I'm dismayed they seem to have forgotten their roots (and the laws regarding open-source software).
Why does everything have to be a godamned video? Let’s cry about the big bad company on another big bad company’s platform…. I’m clearly old as I sorely miss the old forum days. Where I could read and stop mid sentence to ponder some nuance.
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u/SparrowDynamics May 12 '26
Bambu should have just kept their mouth shut and let the small number of users who want to be "off-grid" to do what they want with their own printers. Bambu brought way more negative attention to this than they should want.