Simplify3D

[RDS02Stang]

I bought Simplify3D when the OEM software for my printer just seemed to have lots of problems and/or limitations to it's slicing capabilities. However, my initial experience was HORRIBLE - I selected my printer off their list and the software just would not print correctly to my printer - I have the PowerSpec and it seemed like I had to make a ton of configuration decisions at that point in my experience level, I did not know how to set these values.

I tried to contact their support; however, with ONLY email support I did not hear anything for several days, so I sent a few more requests - I finally heard from them and get this - I get 3 different solutions to my problem - none of which solved the problem. It was on another forum that someone suggested I try a process to which I did and all began to work.

Needless to say - I am not overly impressed with their support service - or the lack of.

There are a number of things with the software that appears to be buggy - most of them are just annoying while others have caused problems with printing. But, I am working around these at the time - I tried to send in some thoughts and ideas; however, it appears they are not overly open to suggestions either.

Being a Senior Technical Software Engineer for and developing for over 30 years - I would not run my company in this fashion - but that is my opinion.

Meant to ask - has anyone else noticed that the print time estimates seem to be way off - I get estimates of 5 hours to print that take like 9 hours. That is worse than the wonderful Microsoft Copy command estimated

Ok, case in point - I started a print at 3:30 pm this afternoon - that Simplify3D estimated would take 8 hours 45 minutes - it is now 11:40 pm - 8 hours and 10 minutes from start time and only 28% of the model is done - I mean come on - that is just pathetic. Based off this there original estimate should have been closer to 24 hours - sheesh.

[Grindeddown]

I bought Simplify3D when the OEM software for my printer just seemed to have lots of problems and/or limitations to it's slicing capabilities. However, my initial experience was HORRIBLE - I selected my printer off their list and the software just would not print correctly to my printer - I have the PowerSpec and it seemed like I had to make a ton of configuration decisions at that point in my experience level, I did not know how to set these values.

I tried to contact their support; however, with ONLY email support I did not hear anything for several days, so I sent a few more requests - I finally heard from them and get this - I get 3 different solutions to my problem - none of which solved the problem. It was on another forum that someone suggested I try a process to which I did and all began to work.

Needless to say - I am not overly impressed with their support service - or the lack of.

There are a number of things with the software that appears to be buggy - most of them are just annoying while others have caused problems with printing. But, I am working around these at the time - I tried to send in some thoughts and ideas; however, it appears they are not overly open to suggestions either.

Being a Senior Technical Software Engineer for and developing for over 30 years - I would not run my company in this fashion - but that is my opinion.

Meant to ask - has anyone else noticed that the print time estimates seem to be way off - I get estimates of 5 hours to print that take like 9 hours. That is worse than the wonderful Microsoft Copy command estimated

Ok, case in point - I started a print at 3:30 pm this afternoon - that Simplify3D estimated would take 8 hours 45 minutes - it is now 11:40 pm - 8 hours and 10 minutes from start time and only 28% of the model is done - I mean come on - that is just pathetic. Based off this there original estimate should have been closer to 24 hours - sheesh.

In regards to longer estimates, i have that problem as well and I have figured out why the software behaves this way, at least in my case. I changed the firmware acceleration settings on my flashforge and I lowered them pretty drastically. It seems that the estimates it spits out assumes certain acceleration speeds, but doesn't allow you to adjust the numbers used in the calculations. Basically, changing my accelerations speeds so they were lower, drastically increased the difference between my estimated print time and the actual print time. I will say though the even the time estimates given from the on-screen printer display are way off as a result of my changes to acceleration.

[RDS02Stang]

I have played with the print quality and also played with some of the firmware settings - I guess, printers do not send back any feedback once the print is started so the print estimate is probably only based on internal clock and not actual print. So when I am doing my job and using excessive cycles - the estimate gets messed up.

Like my sample last night - although it should have finished at around midnight - it did finish at 2:20 a.m. or about 10.5 hours or about 2 hours longer than original estimate. Still significantly off; however, not 3 times original estimate off.

As a Software engineer, I guess I expect more - this is just one of many things that plague the package - but as stated, these are minor things - the main thing of slicing and printing are still really good.

[Tinchus2009]

Well. I paid for S3D, and I requested a refund after testing. It has great features, it is fast for slicing. The manual supports option is really great (though it somehow but in automatic mode, it creates a lot of un needed support). But the surprised came when trying to print some models I downloaded from thingiverse. A lot of them could just not be sliced, and it is not a model problem, because the same models printed correctly in cura and slic3r. When contacting support, they just said that "those models are not correctly designed..." Well, again, those models were correctly sliced at cura and slic3r. In the forums people say the main problem of S3D is because it is unable to deal with thing walls. And I proved that: my last test before requesting the refund was designing a single 0.4mm walled object. Simplified 3D was unable to sliced it

[Guest]

I have seen similar things on thin walls, but it's usually due to my nozzle width and other similar parameters. Simplify will not slice a wall/feature that is thinner than the printer can physically create (based on the settings you give it) and will just remove the feature. You can tweak the settings to trick it, but you won't get an accurate feature.

[infinity3dprinting]

Simplify 3D is the one of the best slicer for 3D Printing. It is an "Integrated Software Solution" for 3D Printing. It has more capabilities than any other software. It is very powerful 3D Printing Software. It has all the features you need to control 3D Printer and individual print processes. It allows you to optimize a model for 3D Printing and to troubleshoot printing.

[RDS02Stang]

Well, it has been a year since I bought Simplify 3D; however due to major medical issues (coma for a few months) - I have not done any printing and ages. So in efforts to get back into things, I decided to first start with some 3D printing - I found a few STLs on the internet and been trying to print them. One problem - it seems that the USB connection seems faulty - now, I use the same port for another device with not problems, I use a different 3D printing software and none of the other software has issues with the port. I return to Simplify3D and nothing - it gets to the "Loading" screen and it just sits there.

So, I did more testing and now - it is taking an extremely long time for Simplify3D to launch - as in up to 20 minutes. I work with computers, software for a living and for over 35 years - as such I start doing a walk back debug process. It seems that if Simplify3D has a good connection via the USB then the app launches quickly; otherwise, it hangs.

Now, has anyone else had issues like these and if so do you have any thoughts
- There is a chance that the 5 foot cable may be causing a problem - but remember other apps print fine (except none have features like Simplify3D).
- No able to upload
- Also, there maybe something to the size of the model - could there be a size limit. It seems like I can only print small models.

Well, I will keep analyzing and post if anything comes up.

I appreciate any help, anyone can provide - Kind Regards - RDS.