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I've scraped the money together to buy a new 3d printer. As usual, I've got analysis paralysis bout which one. I've got it narrowed down to 2 (or 3). I will go with the anycubic D2 dlp or the m3 premium (maybe the phrzoen sonic mighty). It's come down to this... the print quality is basically equal but the m3 has a bigger build plate. The D2 is attractive for the crisp lines and the longevity and the M3 for its size. I don't know that size is a huge issue, I don't NEED to build an army that fast.really.

So does anybody have one or the other (or both) and could offer anything to help me break my mental stalemate here? I have a.phrozem sonic mini 4k and love it so I feel obligated to at least consider.the 8k mighty. Its just more expensive I think. I jear GREAT things about the D2 and love the notion that it's quiet. I have never owned an anycubic but it has a huge community so, there's that.

So... any thoughts about any of these 2 (or 3) options? I really do get stuck over analyzing these.

Thanks all

First DLP is old technology, not something new. My first resin printer, I bought in 2013, was a DLP printer. But MSLA allowed for much more affordable printers and larger build space.

What I (wouldn't dare to say what you want) want from a printer is print quality and build space - and if I can get it speed.
Build space is nice, because there will be the time when you want to print that tank, flyer or warlord and you realise that you will not be able to print it without changing the stl file, if the build space is too small.

Print quality. There are two different kinds of objects. Those with sharp 90 degree angles parallel or perpendicular to the build plane and the other ones. But there is barely a model that has not some angles that are not perpendicular or parallel to the build plate.
So in many probably most cases very crisp lines are not wanted. You will have seen many pictures with layer lines and lego block effects in curved surfaces, making that evident.
On a computer screen or 2D printer you can fight this with antialiasing. Antialiasing has the disadvantage that it smoothes all curves and edges, not only those you want to have smoothed. The alternative on screen and 2D printer is to increase the pixel density. The pixels are so close together that you can't see the edges anymore or that you have to look really hard. In '84 a screen had 72 ppi, today often more than 200 ppi.
The same is true for 3D printers. Crispness without the pixel density is often unwanted and you resort to antialiasing or special resins to smooth out the print.
As with screens and 2D printers the best way to get best quality, is to increase voxel density.
The Premium has a density of 28.5µm, the D2 one of 51 µm. The D2 is more silent and saves power, the Premium has more build space. For me the decision is easy, Higher density and larger build space.
By the way I have printed models on DLP (not the D2) and MSLA printers in 50µm and 35 µm. The 35µm model is always better looking than the 50µm model, but I can't see any noticeable difference between models of the same density printed on DLP or MSLA.

I plan on waiting for the D2 to come down in price. Anycubic update their printers every year or so, the D2 only just came out so the discounts aren't significant, but I think (no guarantees of course) in 6 to 12 months the D2 will drop in price (or see deeper discounts during AnyCubic's endless sales they have going on). The D2 is only 15% off in the winter sale versus 52% off for the Ultra.

Consumer level printer technology is moving fast, so my thought is that I don't expect any printer I buy in the next few years to last me a long period.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

brumbaer wrote:
First DLP is old technology, not something new. My first resin printer, I bought in 2013, was a DLP printer. But MSLA allowed for much more affordable printers and larger build space.

What I (wouldn't dare to say what you want) want from a printer is print quality and build space - and if I can get it speed.
Build space is nice, because there will be the time when you want to print that tank, flyer or warlord and you realise that you will not be able to print it without changing the stl file, if the build space is too small.

Print quality. There are two different kinds of objects. Those with sharp 90 degree angles parallel or perpendicular to the build plane and the other ones. But there is barely a model that has not some angles that are not perpendicular or parallel to the build plate.
So in many probably most cases very crisp lines are not wanted. You will have seen many pictures with layer lines and lego block effects in curved surfaces, making that evident.
On a computer screen or 2D printer you can fight this with antialiasing. Antialiasing has the disadvantage that it smoothes all curves and edges, not only those you want to have smoothed. The alternative on screen and 2D printer is to increase the pixel density. The pixels are so close together that you can't see the edges anymore or that you have to look really hard. In '84 a screen had 72 ppi, today often more than 200 ppi.
The same is true for 3D printers. Crispness without the pixel density is often unwanted and you resort to antialiasing or special resins to smooth out the print.
As with screens and 2D printers the best way to get best quality, is to increase voxel density.
The Premium has a density of 28.5µm, the D2 one of 51 µm. The D2 is more silent and saves power, the Premium has more build space. For me the decision is easy, Higher density and larger build space.
By the way I have printed models on DLP (not the D2) and MSLA printers in 50µm and 35 µm. The 35µm model is always better looking than the 50µm model, but I can't see any noticeable difference between models of the same density printed on DLP or MSLA.

All you said makes sense, but the D2 has been reviewed quite favourably to higher density MSLA printers like the mini 4k and mini 8k. The latter producing smoother surfaces with less lines, but at the cost of dulled edges and crevices compared to the sharper detail of the D2.

You'd probably have to hold the models in your hands to decide, on my 50um printer I hate the layer lines I get on flat surfaces like vehicles, the layer lines on curved surfaces I find much less noticeable. So I'd love to see a vehicle printed and painted on a D2 versus a 35 or 22um MSLA printer.

I just had fun looking at a video with a "honest review". The resumee is if you look from far enough, you don't see any voxels (he calls them pixels, but anyway).
That is as true as it is for 2D printers. Why have more than 50dpi, when I look at an A4 print from 15 meters afar.

At arm length I do not see voxelation on any 50µm print. That being the oldest argument used by 3D printers "when on the tabletop you will not see the difference to a plastic mini".
With the "sharpness" or "crispness" it is the other way round. When close the edges will stand out (looking worse) at arm length it looks sharper (looking better). Just as a over-sharpened image looks bad close up, but at arm length it appears sharper, unless something gets sharpened that shouldn't and if so people complain about artefacts.

Anyway it would be nice to see a real comparison, with comparable resin, the same perfectness of exposure and cleaning, the same orientation and layer height. I often see miniatures that are soft, because of those factors. Viscose resin, overexposure or superficial cleaning. Layerheight and orientation might be changed to get less voxelation.
Or let's say I want to see two specialist who try to get the best from their machines and compare the results.

What do you mean with layer lines ? You shouldn't see any in surfaces perpendicular or parallel to the build plate.
If there are lines in vertical parts stepped farther apart than a layer it might be a problem with the z axis. In horizontal surfaces, might be the screen or light source.

If you mean steps in other surfaces that's voxelation. The Lego block problem. You can try a different orientation and depending on the orientation layer height. But DLP will not help with it. And if it is indeed "sharper", it will sharpen the voxelation lines making them more obvious.

I couldn't let it rest. So I bought the Thor Hammer pendant file (which was probably his plan any way) and printed it on my Anycubic M3 Plus. I printed flat first. This showed more voxelation that what I could see on his print. So I assume he did print it at an angle - which is a natural choice with a model like that. After angling it the voxelation seems comparable. Having said that, it is very difficult to compare. The video seems a bit soft, which is understandable, but makes comparison difficult. So I took a 1080 video of my print and compared them. My print seems a bit sharper to me especially in the top barrel, but this might be camera related ... or not. Also the resin I use seems to be a bit more translucent which reduces contrast, so it might be in fact sharper looking with a different resin.
I will look at it again tomorrow morning, but I'm not expecting to get more conclusive results. Anyway if the results are about the same, the decision will be build space vs power-consumption and longevity.

I guess I'd just like to see an in the hand comparison, which is probably not going to happen unless I buy a D2 myself, lol.

It seems logical to me that high pixel density would trump everything else, but it also makes sense that it's better to have a printer where you cure resin at the focal length of a projector versus sitting on top of an LCD screen where the light is diffusing through the LCD and you have some gap between the LCD and the actual resin (caused by the screen protector and the FEP, the LCD lies some distance below the resin).

But I'm not experienced in printers, I have more experience in machining, so in my head I'm likening it to how using different cutters to execute the same CNC program in a mill can produce different results. Maybe the light diffusion through the LCD is not significant enough to make a difference.

Keep in mind that our field in particular has an aspect to it other than simply stepping resolvable to the naked eye, and that's how paint behaves on the model. I've noticed stark differences between 50um and 30um myself in wash/glaze flow in particular.

No clue which technology, if either, is preferable regarding this, but I'm guessing sharper lines mean more paint gets stuck in each layer step.

This guy did print the models on a D2 and an 22µm, and shows them side by side.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vncgc5o0yaQ
What you will see is that the D2 prints are sharper, but less smooth e.e. more visible lines. Which was to be expected, with less resolution and sharper edges.
His solution is to switch antialiasing x16 on. Hmmmh.

@AllSeeingSkink
Please buy one and give us an user's and not a reviewer's view

I'm personally interested in seeing some reviews on this, TBH, but I also feel like it will only get better with further iteration.

Well, it seems like this is still a bit of an undecided issue overall. I appreciate all of the input from everyone. TBH and, no offense intended, it didn't help me decide : )

That's ok though. Honestly, I think I understand enough of both sides of the argument to roll the dice and make a decision (as hard as that can be for me). I'll let you all know which way I went. Especially if I opt for the D2. It seems like there is still some reluctance out there and the "honest reviews" we've seen aren't completely trusted. Maybe I would like a D2 a lot more if Anycubic gave me one .. lol....

Thanks again, all

 Solid_jr wrote:
Well, it seems like this is still a bit of an undecided issue overall. I appreciate all of the input from everyone. TBH and, no offense intended, it didn't help me decide : )

That's ok though. Honestly, I think I understand enough of both sides of the argument to roll the dice and make a decision (as hard as that can be for me). I'll let you all know which way I went. Especially if I opt for the D2. It seems like there is still some reluctance out there and the "honest reviews" we've seen aren't completely trusted. Maybe I would like a D2 a lot more if Anycubic gave me one .. lol....

Thanks again, all

I think it's more a case of whether the reviewers are looking at them in the same way we do. If we're printing off a 6mm scale tank and throwing a Contrast paint over it, voxel lines are going to be terrible, whereas for the guy printing off rings to be cast in metal, perhaps he cares more about accurately representing the ridges and crevices in the 3D model.

I do wish more reviewers would throw a coat of paint over their models.

But yeah, personally size isn't a big issue for me because I mostly paint models in the 6mm to 15mm range. The biggest things I've printed I could still fit 2 on the tiny build plate of my Mono SE, lol.

I don't have a big printer to compare to, but a few people now have told me to beware when printing on larger printers that things need to be slowed down because the bigger build plate displaces more resin and so needs slower movement speeds and longer settling times. So that's something to keep in mind, though once you've got it dialled in it's not like you're sitting there watching it, so maybe that's not important to you.

Space is a thing I don't think everyone considers at first. You will need space for your printer, for your washing and curing stations, and they should be ventilated. You also need room to clean and post process. I went a bit overboard and ended up getting a Phrozen Mega Sonic 8k. I went this route solely for the super large build plate knowing prints take hours to complete. Also after many deep dives into printers this exact printer is also use commercially to print dental stuff, but really I just wanted a large build plate because my Filament printer would take like 30+ hours to print one large thing and I always wished I could print more.

My buddy has the smaller version the mega 8k, and another buddy has an equivalent anycubic. To the naked eye they all seem pretty much the same quality to me. So I think they all print very great quality miniatures. So with that being said i would suggest folks think about the following for their setup:

If you know what resin you want to use, look up the spec. Resin needs to be with in a specific ambient temperature range. For example, the resin I am using (Phrozen Aqua Gray 8k) has a suggested ambient use temperature of like 75F (which I think is like 24C??? too lazy to google conversion sorry folks ) and each resin can be quite different. This might impact your workspace where you can print if you cannot control the temperature properly.

As for DLP vs LCD I don't think there is going to be a major difference to the human eye. DLP tech has been around in projectors for a long time, as well as I think TVs back in the day. I think this could be a factor, but my opinion is, only as a tie breaker sorta thing. 3D printing takes up a lot of space when you get into the printer, cleaning materials, work bench space, cleaning station, curing station, and waste management of your excess resin and failed prints. If space is not an issue where you will print then I guess skip that, but if it is I would look at printer size and orientation for how easy it will be for you to work on it. Like I also have IPA alcohol tubs that I soak my build plate in between prints to clean off excess partially cured or cured resin. This takes up space, and I prefer this as I want to clean my printer thoroughly when it is time to clean it.

Just thought I would add a few things in that maybe aren't always thought of, otherwise this thread has the standard good advice in it so I won't repeat that