Downgraded from my old X1C to the New X2D

Bambu Lab X Series Bambu Lab X2D
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I’ll start this off by saying that I got the x1c on the promise of “Set and Forget.”

It worked out of the box, but the thing I took for granted is that every single filament I ran worked perfectly. I never had to do any calibrations in the entire time I owned that beautiful machine.

The X2D is a different animal. I’m sitting here at midnight trying to calibrate my generic PETG profile because, I am slowly realizing that I will need to calibrate and tune or whatever it’s called, every single filament I own.

Why does the printer not do the flow dynamics calibration? The x1c seemed to be able to figure out exactly how any filament worked by doing the little lines. The x2 squirts a little blobby line, says “Good enough” and then prints out trash.

Anyway, this is mostly a vent, but also my question is, why does the x2d not run a flow dynamics calibration like the x1c?

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It does, but nowadays everything happens in the toolhead (using an eddy current sensor and the servo motor), so there is no reason to print all these lines.
You are not the only one with trashy prints:

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Not trying to defend BL (I don’t even own one, yet), but if you look at the poll nearly two thirds of respondents think its either the same or better quality.

How many X2Ds do people think have been sold versus the 14 “complaints” here?

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I think lidar equipped x1c is superior in calibration to any of the printers bambu released.

I’ve realized that for best results I need to re run calibration after I’ve swapped them. I’ve calibrated petg with 0.4. then swapped to 0.6 to print some CF filled filament and then back to same 0.4 and same roll of petg and I had to re-calibrate as result wasn’t the same. I know many factors could be at play but I also think that way the hotend is mounted on new printers has an effect on the results.

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I think that one third of users comparing X2D results to older or lower tier machines and complaining about print quality is quite a significant number.

Anyway, I believe these quality issues will eventually be solved by a firmware update. Such cases are not abnormal and many brands improve various aspects and add new functionality over time.

What is not acceptable, however, is the impression that we received unfinished machines and have been beta testing them. Again, while that is unfortunately common in many consumer markets, it does not mean it is acceptable or that users should be expected to tolerate it.

We shouldn’t accept quality issues if they exist. One way to force Bambu to take these problems seriously and act on them is to highlight our concerns on the forum and directly via support tickets. If they address these issues, all of us will benefit, even those who haven’t noticed any flaws.

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Compared to the (expected) total number of printers sold, that poll is statistically insignificant, so no conclusions can be drawn from it.

How many new consumer FDM printers work with zero issues out of the box anyway? There are people in this forum saying their x1c was crap initially too.

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You are right. Let’s better keep quiet then, it’s all good.

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LOL you are funny. Never said anything about keeping quiet, whatever that means. Just pointing out a few facts that I’ve gleaned from my short time on this forum.

The reason I haven’t ordered one is I’m waiting to see if BL responds to any of the concerns raised. Apparently they have responded regarding the AMS issue, and supposedly fixed that, which is positive.

Many, if not all, of the other issues seem to relate to firmware, so I’m waiting to see if any of them get addressed in newer versions, just like you !

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My theory is that the X2D is mechanically very different than the X1C and requires different parameter settings than the X1C.

The X1C probably had considerably more engineering time fine tuning those parameters, whereas the X2D has not had the same attention to detail.

At some point these details will be worked out and people can spend more time printing and less time ranting.

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The POLL says “How does the print quality of your X2D compare to the model you used previously?” It says nothing about the previous printer being old or lower tier… therefore, I find the poll interesting but not really meaningful. Maybe the poll should have said “Are you satisfied with your X2D and would you buy it again based on function and print quality”. If the majority of people are dissatisfied with he X2D, well that would be worth knowing!

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It’s dangerous to question anything on this forum, you’ll often get a brand loyalist trying to silence you or someone trying to condescendingly suggest it’s a skill issue lol. I post my true experiences, nothing else, if that hurts someone’s feelings I apologise in advance. When I buy a product I expect to receive the product I am sold. I beta tested the X1C and it ended up a fantastic machine, but I didn’t expect to have to do this again with its successor.

Apparenlty it has an auto-calibrating nozzle and AI scanning. So how is it worse at calibration than the good ole tramlines and lidar on the X1C? I have no idea.

Controlled chamber for less warping? I have had more warping than I ever got on the X1C. I have no idea.

I’m a designer at heart, I just want a printer that will bring my ideas to life in the best possible quality, that’s why I went for the X1C back in 2023. With all the technology in these things why are they worse than their predecessors? It really makes you wonder if they save money on quality of build and try and make up for it with algorithms. This sort of thing is happening a lot in the audiophile industry too.

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It uses the servo-based extruder [h2*, p2s] on left, and bowden [unique] on right, yeah, its definitely different.

Im giving up on the x2d slow-and-perfect profile for now, and tuning it for fast-and-ok. I can’t get rid of the z banding surface appearance w/ the tools provided in bambu studio. A1, P1S, Qidi +4, and kobra x all give better surface quality to me. X2D does lots of stuff better [multimaterial, overhangs, detection] but sadly not surface quality

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Maybe not. I originally had my eye on the H2S, but concerned about fitment in my office (very crammed) and when the X2D was announced I thought this was a better solution and leaped. I did not consider that the final product needs further grooming. So, I am reluctantly content to see how things play out for a month or so. Even the H2S had its issues at its introduction and seems to have some lingering problems.

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I think there’s a lot of people with the expectation that a completely new printer will print exactly the same as their old one. It’s a reasonable expectation in many ways.

But, it would be impossible for a company to release a new product that prints perfectly for all the types of filaments / scenarios out there especially when the only thing you get with the printer is some very basic printing profiles.

Several of the complaints even mentioned that as time went on with their older machines, print quality etc., massively improved.., undoubtedly due to updates in profiles etc., as many more thousands of print hours / experience with the machines happened over time.

With that said, I have quite a few X2Ds. It printed “decently” out of the box but took some tuning to get the the same level of quality from same parts on the H2Cs / H2Ds.

As you can imagine, it also took quite a bit of tuning on the H2Cs / H2Ds back then to get the products printing to a level I wanted as well.

I only do high temp stuff, and if I were to use only the profiles that Bambu came with 1/2 the stuff I printed would look mediocre at best.

I think the expectation that every thing you throw at it will be perfect out of the box is not realistic until it has enough time / hours / experience to have had input changes / solutions etc., for the various filaments / filament manufacturers.

That’s the way I thought about it when I purchased it. That’s exactly the way the H2C still is tbh, and that’s their flagshit model. I’m fortunate enought that I only use a few different types of filaments and the changes I need to make for high quality prints do scale over to other models for the most part.

But there is most definitely changes needed. None would give me a perfect print just slicing with a default profile.

So I suppose it has to do with expecations. If you expect perfection for everything you throw at it, you should stick to a machine that’s been around for years with 10’s of thousands of hours of fine tuning filament profiles / settings / updates in order to get that perfection.

If you are ok with dialing in your settings for best quality, and you need the features of the newest machine, the new machine is the way to go. Once dialed in, print quality has been repeatable 100% of the time. These are machines running 24/7 and printing wonderfully.

I love the X2Ds. The only point of contention for me is the buffer should be in line with the internal feeders and not making the PTFE do another unessessary 180 loop to route filament to the toolhead. I do get random AMS feed errors (resistence too high) but none has caused a failure yet.

I would bet a huge some of money if I relocated the buffer, extended the wiring, and made it have a straight run inside the machine instead of the 180 degree loop it has to do now, there would never be another feeding error / warning. Hoping this is looked into. It happens across the board (randomly) on all X2Ds I have.

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Lets see side by side photos?

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Great points and I believe you are spot on about the print quality.

My gripes are not so much about print quality as the apparent signs of this being a bit of a hurry-up development. When I see things like feed issues, afterthought track switches (that should have been part of the buffer unit), TPU filament modules, and having to reenter IP address, access codes, serial number, and model number each time I restart the machine, this speaks of either a lack of clear vision for requirements or a rush to market stampede (or both).

In all fairness I don’t have a good handle on the 3D printer market and it seems Bambu tries to be a leader rather than a fast follower, so I understand the pressure that generates.

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Is this due to an add on module? I’ve never done any of that for any of the X2D’s or any Bambu machines tbh.

Any new printer I get I link with the handy app and the QR code, slicing at the desktop with BS / device tab. The only thing I do is name them in bambu studios so I know which one I’m sending a job to.

That sounds crazy. Curious why you have to do this or what the deal is??

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I use LAN mode only. This seems to be a characteristic of the latest firmware I installed.

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Interesting comment for me personally, as that is my intent for this printer as well.

Will you be sharing any of the changes you made? :wink:

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That may very well be a reason? Or perhaps another reason is that the x2d isn’t what everyone was expecting, and it is actually fairly unique in its design, so more teething problems?

Or perhaps it’s just jinxed :rofl:

But again, if the x1c (for example) was also a “bit of a dog” when it first came out, I would’ve thought expectations would’ve been the same for the x2d. Not perfect by any means, but in time will get closer.