Solved Fix for connecting Creality Ender-3 Neo to Mac via USB

[Sovenger 4]

This fix is for connecting an Ender-3 Neo to a Mac over USB using Cura 5.2.1. This might work for other Ender printers too.

 

• I did not have to install any custom drivers since MacOS comes with them preinstalled.
• Plug in the printer via USB and open Terminal.app, type in ls /dev (that will list the contents of the /dev folder, which is where all connected devices are listed). Look in the output list for tty.usbserial-10 or cu.usbserial-10. If they are there, then the printer is connected to the OS.
• Right click on the Ultimaker-Cura.app > Show Package Contents. 
• Navigate to Contents > Resources > share > cura > plugins > USBPrinting and open USBPrinterOutputDeviceManager.py in your favorite text editor (I use Visual Studio Code since it is free).
• Edit line 86 and change it from port_list = self.getSerialPortList(only_list_usb=True) to port_list = self.getSerialPortList(only_list_usb=False)
• Save the file and close it.
• Now open Cura and go to the Monitor tab. You should see a bunch of new menu items that indicate that your printer is now connected.

 

So, what did you change? You edited the only_list_usb parameter from True to False, allowing the serial port scanner to check for usb serial ports that are not listed with the name starting with USB (all caps). Ours start with tty and cu.

 

Hope this helps someone! Happy printing.

[MariMakes 208]

Oh! This is wonderful! 
I've seen some other people being stuck on something similar on Github.
I hope this really helps them.

 

Thanks for sharing 💕

[MariMakes 208]

Hey @Sovenger,

 

Just wanted to let you know that a version of this fix will be available in the new Cura release.

You can read more about it here: https://github.com/Ultimaker/Cura/pull/14202

 

Can we contribute the fix to @Sovenger on GitHub aswell? 

[MariMakes 208]

You can find a version of this fix in the new release of Cura. 
Thank you so much 💕

[flight-commander 0]

So this works on the the MacBook Air, just fine - any solution to get this working on the Macbook Pro running Cura 5.6.0 on Sonoma 14.2.1?

 

Ender 3 S1 Pro

Edited February 19, 2024 by flight-commander

[Slashee_the_Cow 541]

6 hours ago, flight-commander said:

So this works on the the MacBook Air, just fine - any solution to get this working on the Macbook Pro running Cura 5.6.0 on Sonoma 14.2.1?

 

Ender 3 S1 Pro

Unfortunately the formula isn't as simple as Mac + Ender + Cura = solution.

 

Printer manufacturers often start using components like different motherboards in different models, and sometimes different motherboards in the same model, depending on availability, These will often behave differently to connect over USB, and it can be hard to do anything about it on a more closed system like macOS (as opposed to Windows or Linux where you can tinker with drivers and such easily).

 

If you want to download a program like OctoPrint that is more likely to succeed because it gets updated with all the latest tricks to try and connect to printers (I run it on a dedicated Raspberry Pi). USB support in Cura isn't actively maintained because it's mostly a legacy feature from when printers were too stupid to do anything by themselves, including print off an SD card, so needed to be fed instructions like by line.

 

It's also not recommended to run any USB printing solution (whether it's working in Cura or something like OctoPrint) from your main computer. Your main computer is more likely crash while you're doing other things, or if you're stressing the CPU doing something else it might cause delays in sending out the commands which can affect the quality of your print.