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After tuning my vref, the printer was missing steps still. I pulled the trigger and am swapping from the 4.2.2 to the 4.2.7 creality board to see if that resolves the issue.
While i was in there, I figured I’d put another z axis motor on there.
Do you guys have any recommendations on firmware or should I just stick with creality’s?
The marlin build from creality is fine but klipper is another option if you've got a raspberry pi or an unused PC lying around.
I think there's also some marlin forks around for ender 3s but I've never looked into those.
Thank you!
I have a pi 4b running octoprint hooked up. Is there any advantage to going the klipper route?
In theory it shouldn’t mater if i use 4.2.2 firmware on the 4.2.7 board right?
The advantages are innumerable of you are a tinkerer (it looks like you are). If you just want your printer to print stuff and that's that, marlin is fine, but if you want to get serious about tuning and modifying your printer, Klipper is an inevitability.
Think about the QOL improvement that octoprint provided over running your SD card back and forth from PC to printer. Klipper is that x1000. Write macros to automate things like filament swaps, chamber heating, build plate clearing. Change every aspect of any behavior of the printer by modifying a .cfg file (rather than recompiling marlin firmware.bin files). There's plugins for Cura to send your g-code directly to the printer (with octoprint you save the file to your PC then upload to octo, with Klipper there's just a button in Cura to send directly to the printer and start printing).
In short, the only reason to use marlin is "it came on the printer and I don't have the knowledge to set up Klipper". Klipper is just better in every way. It'll take you a couple hours to set up (you have a popular with lots of premade configurations available online), and from the moment you get it going, you'll wonder what took you so long.
PM me if you have any questions.
I appreciate the info! I’ll be honest, I understand wiring and hardware but I get out of my depth once we start getting into firmware and software.
I’m thanking my lucky stars that Octoprint was as easy as it was. That being said, if that open source ams makes any progress, I might just reach out since it seems like klipper is the only thing it’ll work with. If you don’t mind, I may reach out when I get the courage up to give it a shot.
Sounds like a plan!
If you have the time, check out a "intro to Klipper" video or something similar, just to get an idea of how useable it is, see if you're interested. I'm here if you have any questions 👍🏽
Thank you! I’ll take a peak at it!
Klipper is a different beast but once you get it going it’s leaps and bounds ahead.
No more compiling and editing firmware. Since the Klipper firmware itself is built and deployed to the board so the logic of what features, pins, etc can be controlled by your pi.
E.g. the board is no longer the “brains” of the printer but the brain stem. Where the brain (the pi) tells it on pin A “tell this stepper motor to turn this”, on pin J “tell the heater to cycle on” etc.
Basically you download Klipper, look at a printer.cfg for the board you have, and then just use that as a starting point.
Here’s the generic printer.cfg for your new board
https://github.com/Klipper3d/klipper/blob/master/config/generic-creality-v4.2.7.cfg
The real power comes from having the option to use macros for things like START_PRINT and END_PRINT.
For example, when I added a Nevermore fan on an skr mini e3v3 board I just had to wire it, find the “pins for the plug” on the board and then add the necessary config change.
Didn’t work? Comment it out and restart firmware and you’re no worse than it not being there. Adjust, restart, and go.
So where I’d avoid a marlin update because of the hassle of building and updating I now just check for updates, ssh in and build it with a command and update the board over USB.
And that’s just to update the Klipper firmware on the board for whatever fixes/changes are needed for Klipper. For things like new macros or existing items changed around you just update the config and “restart” and it does the rest.
The only thing that you lose with an ender is the screen. Their screens aren’t dumb… they have their own weird firmware. Personally I just use the website and now the moonraker mobile app to control everything and I don’t bother with a screen at all.