New to 3D printing

[5coutm0m 0]

I had gotten my daughter a egeloo 4 pro to begin using. And we have had difficulty with getting the software right for cura and the machine is no longer accepting the usb drive.  
 

I have done some more research and she had asked for a ender to begin with. I am looking at the ender 3 v3 KE.  I am trying to find out if the cura software will work with it.  My daughter has purchased so files to print and they are all cura based and I want to make sure they will slice appropriately to be used for the ender.  I looks like most creators use cura for their designs and I want to make sure all is compatible.   
 

I am new to all of this and google hasn’t been super helpful for topics.  
 

Thank you for helping!!

[Slashee_the_Cow 438]

I don't think there's currently a profile for the Ender-3 V3 KE in Cura but it's basically just a faster version of the V3 SE which does have a profile, so you could use that and it'd work fine.

 

Personally though: I'd save some cash and get the SE instead of the KE. You lose the fancy touchscreen interface and it can't print as fast, but I never print anywhere near as fast as my SE can, I don't know why Creality made a faster version other than bragging rights. The KE's hot end can go a little hotter which allows you to print more different kinds of filament but if you're just starting out then you probably won't want to use anything other than PLA (which the SE handles fine) anyway. In case you're planning on printing anything really giant, the SE also has a slightly bigger build volume... a whole 10mm higher 😄

 

But either the KE or SE will work fine in Cura, and if you get the KE, just pick the profile for the SE and it'll work perfectly.

[5coutm0m 0]

Thank you so much.  This has definitely been a cash new adventure for someone who isn’t computer savvy. 

[GregValiant 1,355]

"... for someone who isn’t computer savvy. " 

That's going to change.  Bear in mind that you have purchased a 4 axis robot that squirts molten plastic around.  Knowing at least a smattering of the Gcode language will go a long way.

Gcode files are text files and you can open them in any text editor.  I suggest that the two of you do that and take a look at the actual commands that the printer is going to see.

 

Marlin firmware has a page HERE of their gcode commands.  You don't need to memorize it or anything, but knowing the common ones like G0, G1, M106, M104, etc. can help you understand what's going on when things get wonky (and they will).  I would guess there are only about 10 or 12 that come up a lot.

Everyone does better when the "magic" is taken out of it.

Edited January 5 by GregValiant

[Slashee_the_Cow 438]

Please don't let Greg scare you off. Thanks to how user friendly a lot of printers are these days you can have quite a lot of fun before you need to worry about getting technical. It is worth knowing the code like he says, but doing that when you're getting started is like jumping in at the deep end. Just enjoy your printer and you'll find the situations when you need to start going into deeper waters.