I bought an Ultimaker yesterday as it seems the most sturdy and elegant reprap available at the moment (I really love the bowden cable idea) but really, my choice was mostly based on looks and a course grasp of which concept would work best.
So here I am, trying to justify my purchase after the fact :-)
I've looked into some other printers and added my amateur thoughts:
Printrbot (elegant, sleek, decomplicated design, poor stiffness as far as I can judge) Prusa (moving heavy extruder, does not look as nice as the Ultimaker, much cheaper though, heated bed) Makerbot (Same pretty and stiff boxed design, however a moving extruder and Z-axis traveling upwards, does have a heated bed though)
The ultimaker looks best and has a very nice axis system, but no heated bed for instance. Judging from low-res youtube video's the print quality seems to be best on the ultimaker as well)
Could anyone explain the main differences between these? What am I missing out on? A collegue of mine bought a Makerbot as soon as I told him about the Ultimaker, how can I mock him? Why will I not get a heated bed? What kind of resolution can I expect?
Thanks,
Thomix
/edit: I actually managed to miss the first bit of the FAQ:
http://wiki.ultimaker.com/Frequently_asked_Questions
which answers some questions about the comparison, but I am still wondering about what accuracies other printers can achieve and what the purpose of a heated bed is (or rather, why the Ultimaker does not have one)
