Bambu Lab’s H2S – 250 hours and counting…
The Bambu H2S came to me a few months ago with the H2D already in full service for about five months. So I was not coming in blind, being already fully acquainted with the overall package, including the platform, the touchscreen interface, and the overall footprint, not to mention my past with the X1 Carbon and A1 mini. I was thrilled to finally see the inevitable single nozzle offering that was sure to be a classic hit among the print farm operators who had been inkling for Bambu speed and quality in the workhorse P1S in a larger volume. The H2S is in many ways the cheaper, nearly as capable follow-up to the H2D that rounds out the family and closes the price gap that the Creality K2 Plus was trying to undercut. The H2S can print just as large and a teeny bit larger single-nozzle prints (340mm×320mm×340mm versus 325mm×320mm×325mm) as the H2D and it has nearly all the bells and whistles of its kinglier kin: laser support albeit capped at 10 watts, vision encoder plate support, same nozzle support, and the rest of the goods.
So what makes the S in H2S mean not just single nozzle but special in the singular sense (say that twice as fast!)? Consider the analogy of the Ryzen 9 9800X3D and Ryzen 9 9950X3D from the CPU market. Both perform virtually identically in most user needs. The 9950X3D’s extra horsepower only really matters in multithreaded scenarios where you are doing work and not gaming or doing content consumption that relies on responsiveness, not mere muscle. And the 9800X3D’s having a single core chiplet means the 3D V-Cache is directly accessible to all cores and means no corner case slowdowns if an active process happened to slip into the secondary CPU chiplet, as is the case with the 9950X3D. Here too we see a similar situation with the Bambu Lab H2S and Bambu Lab H2D.
In some cases, from the lighter toolhead with less moving mass, the H2S’s realized higher acceleration allows for slightly faster print times overall. Multifilament prints are often touted in reviews as the ultimate torture test. But if I were to be brutally honest and take a guess at the current worldwide users in aggregate, the vast majority of prints are single material. This is why understandably the print farm operators, noted earlier, have been chomping at the bit for this bigger single-nozzle beast to finally hit store shelves. The bulk of their customers and jobs encompass single material parts which makes more specialized printers like the Bambu Lab H2D and Prusa XL a niche and not a necessity.
Where does the H2S fall short of the H2D? First, it lacks the more robust part cooling of the H2D. Though I never experienced any sort of stringing issues with my own prints (see the linked images of two quick torture tests), I have read and seen this reported on occasion. So keep that in mind if you have a filament that is particularly sensitive and especially if your printer is located in a hotter, potentially non-climate controlled area (like a garage or work shed), this may be more problematic. Bear in mind too that if you are a stickler for stringing and need that extra peace of mind and cooling, the toolhead is not compatible with the Toolhead Enhanced Cooling Fan, which works exclusively with the larger dual nozzle toolhead of the H2C and H2D.
Second, as touched on earlier in this review, laser support is partial. The H2S only supports up to the 10-watt laser with no support for the more powerful 40-watt laser. I personally am of the mindset that if I were to do lasering, I would keep that separate from my 3D printer given the filthy buildup that is well-known to latch onto the insides of a laser engraver. Plus if I am running a shop, I would probably want to have full use of both a laser and printer at all times and not have to wait on a print job to complete in order to do a lasering job next. However, for those in tighter quarters or who value the convenience of convergence in a one-stop shop, this means necessarily stepping up to the H2D or H2C for the higher wattage laser.
Outside of those two key shortfalls, the H2S represents a serious step forward for most 3D printing users. Nozzle temperatures are up to 350 degrees Celsius and there is a built-in heater which can increase chamber temperatures up to 65 degrees, both of which together enhance and expand the use of more robust engineering grade filaments. The print volume is larger as described earlier at a full guaranteed 340mm×320mm×340mm, opening the door to large scale models. I can especially hear squeals of joy in the audience from those who love printing helmets who have been blessed with larger cranial cavities and found the X1 and P1 series platform cramped quarters. These two features taken together make it a natural fit for someone who was pampered by an X1 Carbon or nursed on a P1S and is looking to take their 3D printing journey a step further.
One last item of mention that deserves particular callout: the nozzle camera. Just like the H2D, you can find this on the H2S toolhead. To date, it is just used for the vision encoder plate. While we have yet to get any sort of confirmation or acknowledgement on this, there have been theories afloat that this could be used eventually for automatic flow rate calibration. Yes, you heard right! As you may notice, Bambu Lab has quietly removed lidar from their offerings. Beginning with the A1 series, they shifted to an eddy sensor for automatic linear or pressure advance, what Bambu Lab dubs “flow dynamics.” Yet we see missing the automatic flow rate calibration the X1 series uniquely had. As some astute makers have pointed out, Creality uses a nozzle camera for automatic flow rate calibration on their K2 series. Could the same come here? Time will tell. Bambu Lab, please be listening (though I suspect you are already well on the chase)!
All in all, you may have noticed no mention of issues or performance problems. That is not by accident. Bambu Lab has taken the market by storm and is the market leader in consumer 3D printing and with good reason: at no time did I ever experience any issues with my H2S and it surpassed my expectations to the fullest. From their humble Kickstarter beginnings, Bambu Lab’s engineering team is truly doing a top-tier, slam-bang job of listening to their customers’ feedback and observing their usage and sparing no effort to ensure a seamless and speedy, top-class system. It is nearly “Easy Bake” like for newbies and oozes with performant class for diehard enthusiasts. No matter what printer you choose in their pantheon of products, you are certain to get a winner, and the H2S followed that pattern of success, studied up and knew the assignment for its target market, and showed up and aced it like a champ. The H2S gets an unreserved and well-earned two thumbs up from me!
