8 Bit VS 32 Bit Motherboard
As of 2022, many brands have launched 32bit motherboards one after another. This means that 32bit 3D printer motherboards will gradually become mainstream.
A few years ago we thought 32bit motherboards seemed like a gimmick, we thought it was just to "rob" our wallets.
However, now we have found that 32bit motherboards can allow our printers to build a rich ecosystem. This ecology includes local area network control, and the colorful UI control interface and it can provide more efficient motion algorithms for 3D printing and provides effective computing power support for high-speed printing of 3D printing.
There are two very interesting printer models in 2022, one is the Anker make m5 and the other is the Bambu lab x1. They are all using a 32bit motherboards, with the hardware support of a 32bit CPU, which can achieve more functions. What impressed me the most was the modal analysis of Bambu lab x1. With this technique, it can roughly calculate the acceleration, velocity, and state of the various components of the machine itself. This is undoubtedly very clever for subsequent printing preparation steps.
Through this detection step, all subsequent movements will be kept within the limit, reducing a lot of trouble.
Here I need to mention the firmware of the 3d printed motherboard: Klipper. It's taking off, it's getting more popular than marlin.
Because it strictly follows the design standards of CNC machines, it is undoubtedly more suitable for 3D printing which requires a lot of movement. Since the motherboard of our 3D printer used an 8bit motherboard in the early days, we need to flash a part of the firmware to the Raspberry Pi to help us. The printers share some of the computing tasks.
The new printers basically use 32bit motherboards, we can directly run with Klipper on our motherboards without needing a Raspberry Pi helps the printer to offload this part of the computation. The trend that 32bit will become mainstream is already an established fact, and there are even some crazy players considering a 64bit motherboard now.
In addition to knowing that the motherboard is 8bit, we also need to know that the performance of the 32bit motherboard is also very different.
For example, the main frequency speed of stm32f103 and stm32f407 is more than 2 times different. So when you need to consider a 32bit motherboard,
Please don't ignore this.
