Mark

537 orders since Jun 25, 2019

Shenzhen, Guangdong, China

Ships from China.

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Overall Rating:

Review Breakdown

Average Ratings

Product: (3.92)

Documentation: (3.38)

Shipping: (4.00)

Communication: (3.46)

All Reviews

Luke | March 23, 2024

Wonderfully accurate!

For Bed Distance Sensor

This is a really great sensor Mark has produced and continues to develop. Meshing a 400x400mm bed with this sensor takes less than 20 seconds. It is also very precise. In my experience it is able to accurately and repeatedly measure to 0.005mm (5 microns). I have had a few problems integrating this sensor, Mark has very graciously helped me work through them in separate github issues and I have not had any further problems over several hundred hours of printing. Thanks again Mark!

Response from Mark | March 24, 2024

Thanks for review and feedback . you are right, I also find this sensor has many potentials in more accuracy and other new features.

Christopher | Aug. 26, 2023

Never got the product

For Bed Distance Sensor

Unfortunately never received the sensor checked on the tracking this morning to find out it was supposed to be delivered 4 days ago. So I can't really rate the product l.

Response from Mark | Aug. 26, 2023

Hi Christopher , do not worry, we will send new one to customer if the package was lost or not delivered for long time.
I will send new one to you and then send the track number to your email on the Monday. sorry for that inconvenience.

John | Nov. 27, 2021

PandaZHU 3D Printer controller

For PandaZHU,ALL in one Wifi,Marlin,Grbl

I had always thought that the Espressif ESP32 MCU would make an interesting controller for a 3D printer and when I ran across an ad for the PandaZHU board it seemed like it was worth a try.
The board sports a ESP32 WROOM-32 mcu module with built-in Wifi and BLE connectivity. Additionally it has an I/O expander to provide enough I/O's for up to 8 TMC2209 stepper driver's.
Generally speaking it is a good design with all the features that a high end 3D printer controller should have.
I ordered the PandaZHU board with 5 TMC2209 stepper drivers and the 3D Touch (BL Touch knockoff) bed level sensor.

Upon receiving the board I found that only 4 heatsinks were provided for the 5 stepper drivers. Additionally I noticed that jumpers on the X stepper driver were damaged. As an aside, the limited documentation available for this board does not describe the TMC2209 jumper functionality and one is left to study the schematic and TMC2209 datasheets.
Next I found that the board had an internal short on the E0 stepper driver connector so obviously the board had never been tested beyond a possible power up.

The documentation also ignores any mention of the wiring for the 3D Touch sensor. This is not a huge issue but is telling about the quality of the documentation.

The Marlin source code for this board is based on release 2.0.8 but I couldn't find any documentation that discussed migration to future releases. This is significant because the PandaZHU control of stepper drivers is proprietary and is not directly supported by Marlin firmware so moving to another release would be a real challenge without any instruction.
Maybe the maker of this board will supply future source code bundles but it doesn't seem likely given the lack of attention for detail.

Also worthy of note, the ESP32 module's built-in antenna is located next to one of the boards mounting screws which reduces the antenna performance if using metal screws. Best to use nylon screws for mounting.
I emailed the maker of these boards with my list of issues but received no response.

Summary: Design is OK and general build quality is average but the lack of product testing, lack of customer support, and very poor documentation is a serious detractor. I gave it 2 stars but I was in a good mood.

Response from Mark | Nov. 27, 2021

Hi John, Thanks for those feedback! help me to improve.
the esp32 as the printer controller is very convenience that I like to print with it normally.
and sorry for that issues about the hardware,but I have not received your email maybe there is some problem in my this personal email.We have a facebook group and forum in www.pandapi3d.com there too,
every board have done a simply test by me with wiring to my 3D printer,including heating, auto Home,but not test other E motors, so that the reason of not found the E motor short problem.
if there is hardware problem which customer can not fix I will send one more new board or refund the money back to customer.
The marlin now have support those PandaZHU and PandaM4 boards that I have pull them 2 months ago. https://github.com/MarlinFirmware/Marlin/pull/22644

and thanks again for those feedback and this is the first review in Tindie for PandaZHU which I am waiting for a long time that let me know how people like this esp32 and where I need to improve.

Hugo | Aug. 25, 2021

Loved the product.

For Smoke alarm for 3D printer

I have several 3D printers and worry that these machines can cause a dangerous fire in my home. I don't drop my guard and still monitor them for safety but I rest easier with this in place. I gave the product a 5 for communication because I was not able to submit the rating without adding a star. Please note that I never reached out so I do not know if this company provides good support. It would have been unfair of me to rate the company poorly but I feel like I am cheating people that use ratings to make decisions. Again, be advised that I NEVER communicated with the company.

Hari | July 29, 2020

Half cooked, Not reliable. Needs lot of improvement

For 64bit 3D printer board PandaPi V2.9

I purchased this board and tested on my printer.
Updating and flashing firmware is a never-ending process, no proper documentation,
We don't know whether updates and printer necessary settings have flashed to the board or not, it may be working for designers printer
but not with all.
Not recommended, stick to Octoprint if required you better upgrade you printers motherboard to make it usable with Octoprint.

S | July 10, 2020

Honest nightmare

For 64bit 3D printer board PandaPi V2.9

If you want a real honest review and none of the faked ones then read this.

Bought this after reading up and github. in principle it sounds amazing, good concept, hardware is well built with lots of IO ports. Good design overall.
Now where this product fails is the software side, unfortunately the main part of it.
I can understand Mark has created a good product, and no doubt is busy developing the product. But unfortunately you cannot have a product without a good functioning software.
Firstly, going into this i didn't expect it to be easy as plug and play. I thought i would support a maker, and at the least get a not so terrible printer controller, but i didn't expect it to not work at all!
I downloaded the released software from github + precompiled image from the link, followed the instruction to the letter.
Now i may not be as smart as mark, but i know my Linux, 3D printer, marlin and a little luck. built numerous 3d printers from scratch with no problem.
But this has been a nightmare, no active forums, no actual answers, no information anywhere. Dont expect it to work straight out of the box. Like literally, you'll have to write your own software from scratch to get this to work. there were some updates recently, but it broke whatever precompiled image it came with.
the forums have little to no replies, None of the issues raised have been solved.

If i were to give you any advice, stick with whatever 32bit board you can get, and use Klipper + Raspberry pi (or whatever SBC). Pi will still do everything, with a lot better community support.

In summary, I bought a very expensive Raspberry pi power supply, atleast it can handle 12-24V. (Unfortunately all pin headers are occupied)

Gabriel | March 1, 2020

Panda Delta Pi

For 64bit 3D printer board PandaPi V2.9

I'm working on a upgrade off my printer to a Custom one and found this Panda pi
i wired it, work well do what he need to do. Now i have to figure out Marlin and is Delta config
So happy with it and easy to program too with is web config
*note i'm on first attemp on Marlin Software*

Daniel | Feb. 26, 2020

Nearly Perfekt

For 64bit 3D printer board PandaPi V2.9

The first shipping got returned by crappy PostNL (problems every time).
Second shipping 5-6 days to my door that was fast.
So i got the V2 version instead of the V1 in the first shipping.

Board looks good, but i think i will re-solder the power terminals they are not sooo straight.

I don't have tested it yet but "its a shield" ;-)
and the documentation is great so it should be no problem on the horizon.

Thanks Mark

Adolf | Feb. 8, 2020

i am happy ;-)

For 64bit 3D printer board PandaPi V2.9

Nice board, if you follow the instructions, it starts immediately and does what it should, i am happy

Ronald | Jan. 13, 2020

No documentation but it seems to work as advertised.

For Smoke alarm for 3D printer

The only documentation provided was in Chinese, and even Google couldn’t help me translate that. So I had no idea how it was all supposed to work. However, the two pieces (detector and outlet) appeared to have already have been paired. When I test the smoke detector, it does shut off the outlet, so it seems to work OK.
I found a comment online from the seller (on Thingiverse.com, which is where I first heard of the device) saying how one could re-pair the system if needed.
It wouldn’t have taken much to provide either some English documentation in print, or at least a link to a .PDF file online.
But the bottom line is that it seems to do what it’s supposed to do. So I guess that’s what matters.

Response from Mark | Jan. 13, 2020

Hi Ronald, thank you for your comment, this made me decide to do better and write a manual file in the package.

Patrick | Jan. 13, 2020

Seems to work

For Smoke alarm for 3D printer

This is an item I hope to never use. Short of attempting to burn down my house it is hard to provide a through review.

What I do know is that the item came in reasonable time (considering the distance it traveled) and it functions as advertised. As others have mentioned, it really could use some better documentation. It would be nice to know the button functionality! Seems like a self test button, and a pairing button. But can it be a silence button as well?

I did plug it in to my printer and ran a short 15 minute print. It did seem to handle the load without issues and without getting noticeably warm. On a second test I did trigger the alarm and the printer did shutdown. So far so good.

What I do NOT know is if your printing material PLA/ABS/PETG starts to produce smoke, is it already too late? Will shutting of the power stop the flames? Will the smoke from those materials trigger this detector?

But the way I figure it, this device is just one level of insurance. I have multiple levels of protection including a fire resistant enclosure, temperature shutoff, and and automatic fire extinguisher. I do not want to become another "example to others" as to how not to use a 3D printer.

Response from Mark | Jan. 13, 2020

I totally agree with you. we don’t want a fire, and the probability is very small, but once it happens, the consequences are unimaginable. it will alarm beep and shut down the power, that is very useful for me and someone like me so I made it.Like you said,this device is just one level of insurance.
Optical beam smoke detectors work on the principle of light obscuration, where the presence of smoke blocks some of the light from the beam,[5] typically through either absorbance or light scattering. Once a certain percentage of the transmitted light has been blocked by the smoke, a fire is signalled.

Irawan Tri | Jan. 10, 2020

Great Product - Make your mind in peace

For Smoke alarm for 3D printer

I am always worrying about all my printers catch in fire. Now, with this product I have a peace in mind when my printer still printing and I need to go to sleep.
I bought 3, now I am ordering 3 more.

Response from Mark | Jan. 10, 2020

Thank you very much! I also put one on the wall near my printer, which made me feel safe.

Dyllon | Aug. 24, 2019

Good safety measure.

For Smoke alarm for 3D printer

Seems like a good saftey measure for your printer, tested it a bunch before attaching it, worked everytime. Hopefully I never have to rely on it.

Response from Mark | Aug. 24, 2019

Hi Dyllon,Thanks a lot! you can contact me anytime. I am a printer fan. my other project https://hackaday.io/project/166466-3dprinter-firmware-run-on-raspberrypi