Hello all, I am considering on getting a 3D printer. I want to print some stuff for a project. I am relatively new to this. I need the slicer software to be compatible (preferably open source) with linux since that’s what I am using. I have only found the stuff from Prusa to be compatible but they are expensive. I have heard of ender 3 but it is the only os printer by creality and saw the repo is 3yo without updates.
Can I get some suggestions?
Most slicer software is cross platform, free and open source. The biggest ones are PrusaSlicer, Cura and OrcaSlicer. You can use all of these with lots of different brands of printers. Creality’s own slicer used to just be a slightly modified version of Cura (Not sure if their new “Creality Print” software is, but it doesn’t matter, you’re rarely tied to any specific software, at least with FDM printers). Bambu Lab Studio is not available for Linux, but OrcaSlicer is, and as far as I know it’s just an open source community edition of Studio.
In other words, you’ll have plenty of options on Linux.
Your OS doesn’t matter. Printers are dumb and only understand Gcode, which is basically a series of steps to follow for printing your part (move the head this amount in that direction while extruding that much etc.). Producing that code is the slicer’s job. What you want is a slicer that works perfectly on Linux. And good news, all open-source slicers work perfectly on Linux. What you need tho is a slicer that includes your printer’s profile.
Try Cura or Prusaslicer (available as Flatpaks) or Orcaslicer (Appimage for now but will move to Flatpak eventually).
