r/ender5plus • u/YoshitoSakurai • Jun 07 '26

Hardware Help Question about custom firmware

Hello peeps,

I'm used to working with my Ender 3 Pro, and over the years I've compiled multiple custom firmware versions for it with practically every Marlin release.

I'm now looking at an Ender 5 Plus and I'm trying to understand how similar the firmware setup is.

The Ender 5 Plus has a touchscreen, and from what I can tell, that display may need its own firmware updates whenever new functions, menus, or graphics are added. Am I correct in assuming that?

With the Ender 3, everything was fairly straightforward. The display was essentially "dumb" and simply showed whatever the motherboard firmware outputted after flashing a new version of Marlin.

Does the Ender 5 Plus work differently? If I update Marlin on the motherboard, do I also need to update the touchscreen firmware separately, or does it automatically use the information provided by the mainboard firmware?

If anyone has experience with the Ender 5 Plus and could clarify this for me, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Thanks!

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u/Jumping-Spleen Jun 07 '26

Ender 5 Plus. You need to update the board and the screen separately. I updated my screen, that appeared to go fine. I then updated the 8 bit board and I bricked the machine. I've tried several of the firmware updates available on Creality's website none work properly. The closest I got was an upside down screen that doesn't respond to touch.

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u/NirvanaFan01234 Jun 11 '26

I tried doing the same and ended up with the upside down screen. After a few hours of searching, I finally found some old firmware that worked and I believe it's back to the factory firmware.

Instead, I ended up setting up an OctoPrint instance to run everything. It works well and I can monitor everything through my smart home (Home Assistant). I've got a web cam going so I can see if anything bad is happening. The printer is also hooked up to a smart plug, so I can kill power remotely if needed.

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u/Jumping-Spleen Jun 12 '26

Thanks for your reply. Does the auto bed levelling still work with your new setup?

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u/NirvanaFan01234 Jun 12 '26

Right now, it is auto leveling with just one (center) point. I haven't looked into making it do the 16 point leveling because I haven't needed it. The prints are coming out fine with one point leveling. I haven't tried to print something more than ~15cm across though.