As you may have noticed, it can be hard to buy a Raspberry Pi at the moment. In this article, we will share some places where we have seen success purchasing a Raspberry pi without paying the astronomical prices seen on secondary retailers like Amazon. Today, many of them are over $100 for just the board and over $200 for a kit!
Can't find a Raspberry Pi? Check out Orange Pi for OctoPrint. Boards and complete kits are available now!
Prusa, a leading 3D printing company, is the inventor of DIY desktop FDM (and, more recently, SLA) 3D printers. It is a well-known brand in the industry, synonymous with dependability and quality.
Prusa has produced numerous award-winning 3D printers over the years, none more so than the Prusa i3. The Prusa i3 is the company's most popular printer, and the MK3S+ is the most recent variation on the i3 model.
The Prusa is a solid 3D printer, but it lacks some features that OctoPrint can provide. OctoPrint gives you the ability to remotely monitor and control your 3D printer. And this is one feature that improves your printing experience regardless of how good your 3D printer is.
If you want to know which 3D printers are the best from a data-driven standpoint, you can take a breather and read our unbiased and data-driven 3D printer review.
Regardless of the best 3D printer, in this article, we will walk you through the process of installing Octoprint on your Prusa i3.
Let me introduce myself first. I’m Mitch, a team member of Obico and I’m in this world for 25 years now. I live in Belgium and I like longboarding, riding with my motorcycle and hanging out with my friends. I’m also interested in formula one, MotoGP, DnD and 3D printing. I am very into technology to make my life easier. You could call me a geek although my friends prefer the word nerd because I’m also a big superhero fan. The word nerd isn’t as offensively used anymore then back in the days anyway so I’m cool with that.
As some of you might be aware at this time, The Spaghetti Detective is now Obico.
If you have previously installed The Spaghetti Detective mobile app, we have made moving to Obico extremely easy for you.
So when you see the new Obico app icon on your phone, don't be surprised!
Since releasing The Spaghetti Detective in 2019, it has grown to become the most popular software for 3D printing failure detection. If you have been using The Spaghetti Detective for some time, you already know we do much more than failure detection.
Over the past couple of years, failure detection has remained at our core, but we have also added new features driven by user feedback such as a mobile app for monitoring and controlling your 3D printer from anywhere, OctoPrint Tunneling, and more. As we have expanded the software, we felt that our name, “The Spaghetti Detective” wasn’t quite able to describe all of the great features that our users have come to appreciate.
We think Obico will better reflect our mission to build software that makes 3D printers smarter and empowers makers like you to use 3D printers to their fullest potential.
Say hello to Obico the open-source, community-built, smart 3D printing platform!
Obico has similar characteristics to The Spaghetti Detective, but there are also some differences. We will explain some of the differences below.
Call it what you want, but we are talking about connected devices. Speakers, watches, and even toasters are smart devices these days. We think 3D printers should work for you not against you, and making them smarter is a great way to start! In that regard, not much has changed. Part of our mission has always been to make 3D printers easier and more accessible for makers and hobbyists, and we will continue with that mission.
Our goal is to make the best 3D printing software available to as many makers as possible. In the past, we focused on making The Spaghetti Detective compatible with OctoPrint, but many users told us that they were now using Klipper.
A few months ago, we released the alpha version of our moonraker integration, and despite how raw it was, many users let us know that we were headed in the right direction. So, we are excited to announce that with the launch of Obico, also comes the launch of our Obico for Klipper Beta. You can now remotely monitor and control your Klipper-connected 3D printer from anywhere and get 3D printing peace of mind with AI failure detection.
Some of you may not already know that much of The Spaghetti Detective was already open-source since day one. Obico will remain 100% open-source, and because we are huge believers that the open-source model and community-built projects are the best way to make 3D printers better, we are putting open-source upfront. We have completely revamped our open-source documentation and added new features such as a public API, a customizable user interface, and more.
Many of you have asked us if/when we will open-source the mobile app. We are working on it! Open-sourcing a mobile app is trickier than a web app because mobile apps don’t have an easy way to separate API keys and other credentials from the code the way that web apps do. But we are pretty close. Add support@obico.io to your contact list When the open-source mobile app is ready, we will announce it in our monthly newsletter.
Many hardworking, 3D printing lovers in our community have already contributed to the project in the past. We are hoping more of you will contribute as the Obico smart 3D printing platform grows. Learn more about how to contribute.
As a community, you have communicated your message loud and clear: you want us to open the public APIs so you can build fun projects by talking directly to the server or automating your print farm workflow. Now you've got it!
For those of you who have been itching to self-host your own Obico Server, but struggled to do so because of a lack of good documentation, we’ve got good news for you. We have rewritten many of the documents for self-hosting and reorganized them so they are easier to follow.
Yes! You heard it right. The Obico Server now supports plugins! This means the maximum flexibility to customize your self-hosted server. It also makes it easier for everyone to contribute to the source code. Win-Win!
The Obico Cloud keeps the same Pro pricing as The Spaghetti Detective. The only change we made was to remove the “Shop Plan”. Although the Shop Plan would deliver more revenue per customer for us, it has distracted us from making the app better for hobbyists. Plus, most print farms are perfectly happy with the Pro plan.
We have done the plumbing work to make moving to Obico as smooth as possible for you. All your current settings in your The Spaghetti Detective account have been migrated to Obico. Based on your current setup, you may need to make the following changes:
You can sign into the Obico Cloud web app at app.obico.io or obico.io. Don’t worry, if you forget and go to thespaghettidetective.com or app.thespaghettidetective.com by accident, we will point you in the right direction!
No changes are needed: The Spaghetti Detective mobile app has been transitioned to the Obico App for both iOS and Android. If you haven’t already, update The Spaghetti Detective app in the Apple App Store or the Google Play Store, and you will have the sleek new Obico mobile app.
No changes are needed: We have seamlessly transitioned your account and payment processing information. Payments are processed by Chargebee as they have been in the past.
If you are using OctoPrint, you will need to uninstall The Spaghetti Detective Plugin (keep data) and install the new Obico Plugin. Once you restart OctoPrint, your curent settings in The Spaghetti Detective Plugin will be automatically migrated to the new Obico plugin.
Find more details in this guide in case you run into problems.
If you are using Klipper with Mainsail and Fluidd, you can follow this guide to get started with Obico for Klipper. Remember, it is a beta release, so providing feedback and reporting any bugs is greatly appreciated!
cd TheSpaghettiDetective
git remote remove origin
git remote add origin https://github.com/TheSpaghettiDetective/obico-server.git
git fetch
git checkout release
docker-compose up --build -d
We have deferred some of your feature requests because Obico is still a tiny team. The good news is our users’ enthusiasm has allowed us to grow at a rapid clip. Now our cash flow is at a point that allows us to hire 1 full-time engineer or 2 part-time ones.
If you are a talented programmer, and you feel that you are wasting your time being a cog in a big wheel, come join us!
What you will get:
What you won't get:
Write to us if you feel this is the right calling. Don't send us your resume. We don't read those things.
Over the past couple of years, we have grown from a community of a couple of thousand 3D printing hobbyists into a much larger one with over 100,000. We are extremely grateful to everyone that has supported the project up until this point, and we are excited to continue to grow Obico into a powerful all in one smart 3D printing platform. As always, we welcome any and all feedback and suggestions from the community, so if you have any feedback or anything else to say, please let us know!
Creality Ender 3 desktop FDM 3D printer/Courtesy: Creality
The Creality Ender 3 is a fantastic 3D printer. It is the ideal balance of quality and affordability. The Ender 3 has many features, but there is one that can make it even more feature-rich. The addition of OctoPrint (OctoPi) has the potential to take it to the next level.
OctoPrint empowers you by allowing you to control your 3D printer from a remote location. If your Ender 3 is linked to OctoPrint, you will be able to extract even more value from this already great machine.
If you're not sure how to set up OctoPrint on the Ender 3, follow this step-by-step guide to get started.
Prefer to watch a video to guide you through the process? Check out our video on setting up OctoPrint and getting started with OctoPrint plugins!
OctoPod is a popular iOS mobile app for accessing your OctoPrint connected printer with your phone so you can now use the app from anywhere for free! Learn more about the integration below:
Source: OctoPod Github
Creality Ender 3/Courtesy: Creality
The Creality Ender 3 is a popular and widely used desktop FDM 3D printer. It is ideal for beginners, students, hobbyists, and makers, especially given the features it offers for the price. It consistently produces high-quality prints with dependable precision.
However, there is a significant disadvantage to this printer. It is not a powerful 3D printer right out of the box. To compensate, you can upgrade your Ender 3 with the appropriate mods that will improve your 3D printing experience. The mods are an excellent way to boost overall performance and bring your 3D printer up to the level of premium printers at a fraction of the cost.
In this article, we'll discuss the following Ender 3 upgrades:
We will also answer some of the most frequently asked questions about the Ender 3 3D printer.
OctoPrint interface/Courtesy: The Spaghetti Detective
OctoPrint is widely known in the maker community as one of the best 3D printer remote monitoring, management, and control software applications. It was created in 2012 by Gina Häußge, a German software engineer, and has since been improved by its devoted community to include a plethora of advanced features.
With over 277 plugins available in OctoPrint, the features are limitless, as are the ways you can use the software to improve your 3D printing experience. OctoPrint provides a plethora of advantages to its users.
It is difficult to find a single plugin that stands out in this vast library of plugins, but there is one that is likely the most advanced and probably the best OctoPrint plugin – The Spaghetti Detective. This OctoPrint plugin is ahead of its time, with powerful and one-of-a-kind features that no other plugin provides.
You can experience 3D printing like never before by combining your OctoPrint applications with The Spaghetti Detective. But don't just take our word for it; let us paint a picture for you of why it's the best OctoPrint plugin.
OctoPrint has a huge user base that has already realized the benefits of the software, but many people have yet to be introduced to OctoPrint and are unaware of what the software can do for them.
Those who want to learn how to install and use OctoPrint can do so by reading our guide on how to set up OctoPrint and experience the ease of 3D printing.
Failed 3D print/Source: The Spaghetti Detective
3D printing is still a technology that relies heavily on trial and error. It's nearly impossible to master the technology without getting your hands dirty. As there are no globally recognized standards in the 3D printer, material, or software manufacturing, it is vulnerable to a variety of printing problems. A multitude of 3D printer issues results in failed prints, which leads to a loss of business, if not your interest in the technology.
To make sure you don’t feel bogged down by the problems and abandon this revolutionary technology, we list down the most popular 3D printer problems and ways to troubleshoot them.