My Preferred Slicer Other Than Cura

[inventabuild 5]

Is it possible to use a slicer other than Cura in the Ultimaker 3?  I would like to buy an Ultimaker 3; however sometimes I get a better printed part with a different slicer, for example KISSlicer or Simplify3D, so I would like to be able to use those slicers as well.

For example, here is a post I made showing Cura is under extruding in small areas of some text I'm printing:

https://ultimaker.com/en/community/50035-cura-under-extruding?page=last

KISSlicer and Simplify3D print the letters perfectly so if I buy an Ultimaker 3 I will not be able to print this part if I'm locked into using Cura; hence the reason I would like to be able to use a slicer other than Cura with the Ultimaker 3.

One of the vendors selling the Ultimaker 3 told me I'm locked into using Cura. I'm hoping someone here can tell me otherwise. Please advise.

Edited July 26, 2017 by Guest

[DidierKlein 729]

You can use S3D but it's not really optimised for the Ultimaker 3. I think you get better results with Cura 2.6 with the UM3, but you are open to use other slicers, just know that somethings (like dual extrusion) will probably perform worse

[nallath 1,120]

What vendor told you that you are locked into Cura? That is definitely not the case. Granted, Cura is probably the best out of the box experience for UM machines, but locking in is always a bad idea imho.

[inventabuild 5]

Cool, thanks for the info; however I'm a little confused as to why other slicers might perform worse with dual extrusion?

1.  Can I use another slicer and still lift the unused head out of the way?

2.  If I use the correct settings for prime, retract, travel speed etc in the other slicers can I expect good results assuming the other slicers are good slicers?

3.  Can I just load the gcode from another slicer, including any required initial start gcode, into the Ultimaker 3 and hit print?

Edited July 29, 2017 by Guest