Deja Vu stores the locations of wifi APs and cell towers on your phone. This allows for greater accuracy than using gps alone and allows you to do it without pinging google may times a day like stock android phones with location services turned on do.

This app requires MicroG’s UnifiedNlp to work which requires a ROM with signature spoofing enabled. The easiest way to get this is to use a custom ROM like Lineage with Microg or use NanoDroid with a custom ROM.

Important app for retaining functionality while degoogling your android phone.

Assembly

Printer showed up without critical parts so I had to wait another week for parts to arrive. The assembly guide is online only and is mediocre. I often found myself putting something together then having taking if off and putting it on correctly the second time. They forgot to mention certain parts like the bltouch connector holder. Most of the parts are labeled or obvious but many you have to compare against assembly instructions to figure it out. The printer is not designed for easy assembly. You will have to the frame together and continue working around tightening, loosening, adjusting until you get it square. I also had a lot of issues aligning the lead screws so that I had to remove the x gantry and run the lead screw nuts up and down while adjusting. The instructions had fan mounts for a different fan type so I had to go to the discord to get the proper ones that weren’t exactly right, had to stack 2 for clearance to carriage. The wiring is laid out with 2 pictures of a good looking layout and no detailed instructions. A 3D PDF model is available but not really useful as small parts are missing and it’s hard to manage all the assemblies so you can see what you want. There is support through Discord that typically has 1 or 2 of the main guys that can be very helpful and they are available a lot.

Software

They suggest MatterControl for host/slicing. MatterControl has unfixed bugs on Linux that made it unusable for me. I’ve been using PrintRun for host software and Slic3r PE for slicing which have been working fine.

Design

Design is simplistic and leaves options open for upgrading over time. The frame is rock solid. Control is through a RAMBO 1.3 board with configured Marlin 1.1 supplied. Motors are sized properly to move the heavy axes. The details is where everything goes downhill. The x idler mount is poorly designed and has come loose several times leading to failed prints and failed homing that nearly took out the bed. Bed mounting is not solid, making it an absolute chore to get it level and keep it level. The bltouch mount is not solid as assembled according to the instructions so it will be wildly inconsistent until you properly secure it. The extruder is simple, stiff and is designed to allow a second extruder to fit on the x carriage. The extruder is a liability because the drive gear is off by about 2.5mm from hole in the heatsink meaning the filament is forced sideways into heatsink leading to feed issues from the awkward angle and filament bending. The hotend is a e3d V6 and works great. The printer came with 2 40mm axial fans for print fans which are the absolute wrong choice. The printer needs directed cooling by the nozzle to print properly. The confusing part is that they used to provide blower fans and .stls for fan shrouds that worked fine and are what I ended up using.

Printing

I had tons of printing problems. The core issue is that they supplied axial fans and no base profile. The axial fans would not provide enough cooling or would cause thermal shutdowns by overpowering the bed or hotend heaters. I ended up having to buy blower fans from them and print fan shrouds from stls they provided. You’re supposed to print the fan mounts by somehow macgyvering the fans onto the axis using zipties so you can print the cable chain and fan mounts. The lack of wiring instructions lead to wires coming loose during printing causing further printer shutdowns.

Once everything is properly setup, you can get some really nice prints. The extrusion is very consistent and motion is rock solid.

Verdict

Printer has a lot good components and upgradability, but the missteps on the small things make this more of a project than a printer.

The place to go to find Prusa mods and the people who made them. Everybody is generally helpful and willing to answer questions.

Hub for several mods for the i3 MK3 including the Bear project and skelestruder.

Intro

Veracity filament from Filastruder that is manufactured by Keene Village Plastics and comes with access to average diameter stats on every roll. As of 12/21/18, $25 per kg for masterpool refill. All rolls came vacuum packed with desiccant and came with large zip ties for storage and an extra sticker to put on the spool to identify the material.

Quality

All 4 rolls I’ve inspected were typically 1.74 or 1.75 average which matched the online data for the roll. Looking up the data online was a pain that required you to create an account with KVP and then enter in several different codes, some off a piece of paper in the box and some off the sticker for each spool. No impurities were seen. Masterspool refills would sometimes feed awkwardly off the roll, but not to the point where it caused issues.

Print Settings

Prusa Generic PETG Settings 230C Extruder/85C Bed 1st layer, 240C/90C Bed after 1st layer
Higher temperatures will give parts glossier look.
Recommended print settings 230-260C Extruder/70-100C Bed

Verdict

My go to PETG.

Opensource ad blocker for Android that filters all outbound requests for ads and tracking using any combination of premade lists, whitelist and blacklist. You can also switch dns providers by selecting from a list or adding one. UI is simple and effective.

Blokada works by using Android’s vpn feature to route all outbound requests through it. This allows it to filter all requests that come from the device.

Long Term Update

After 6 months of usage, the only issue that came up is occasional issues with program staying alive. The app silently died so I didn’t notice for a while. Turning on the Keep alive option under advanced settings seems to fix the issue. This puts up an always on notification to keep Blokada alive. This means you’ll have 2 notifications up almost all the time for this app.

Verdict

This is a must have app for Android

Desktop thermal transfer printer with UPS Worldship support. These things are reliable, printed several labels a week for a few years after buying it used. Thermal transfer device can get dust on it and need to be wiped off occasionally.

Linux

2020 Update: CUPS has updated and the options below are no longer necessary. Simply setup with EPL2 driver and go.

Old info:
Linux support is frustating but completely fixable. The printer will print out of the box with Zebra ZPL print driver. The prints will look poor and barcodes will be terrible and likely unreadable. The fix is to use the CenterOfPixel option when printing :
lpr -P printer -o CenterOfPixel pathtofile.
Prints will look just like they do on Windows. You can add this option as default in the .ppd file in /etc/cups/ppd for this printer by adding

*OpenUI *CenterOfPixel/Center Of Pixel: PickOne
*OrderDependency: 20 AnySetup *CenterOfPixel
*DefaultCenterOfPixel: true
*CenterOfPixel true/true: “”
*CenterOfPixel false/false: “”
*CloseUI: *CenterOfPixel

to the .ppd file.
/oldinfo

UPS

Printing UPS labels from a browser using UPS Thermal Printing Script requires the printer is setup with a raw queue. When adding the printer, click on generic driver then raw. Print normally and the script will take care of the rest. Label prints perfectly.

Verdict

Printer is dead reliable, supported by Linux

Monoprice Maker Select V2 is a near direct copy of a Wanhao Duplicator i3. This printer optimizes the i3 design for mass production using steel sections for the frame and electronic housing. Notable for coming nearly assembled and the low price(269.99 as of 11/2018).

Assembly

Involves screwing the steel upright to the x axis and running some cables, quite easy.

Components

The steel frame is quite sturdy, better than Original Prusas on the Z axis. Bed works well at first, but you’ll find the adhesive surface on top wears out rather quickly and entire bed assembly is poorly designed. Spoolholder is basic and too small for spools from Monoprice.

Printing

Tested with Monoprice PLA, printing went well at first with suprisingly good print quality. Over time, printing becomes more frustrating. The bed surface will need to changed frequently if printing regularly. The bed has become less true forcing me to use rafts and only use a 2"x2" square in the middle of the bed to get quality parts. Dimensional accuracy in the X and Y axes seemed to suffer scaling issues where it would undershoot dimensions.

Software/Firmware

I used Cura and Repetier to slice and control the printer. I recall everything working fine once setup. I had to pull printing profiles from the gcode on the sd card that came with the printer. The printer size and connection details had to be filled in to the host software. Acceleration/jerk limits were terrible, the frame would develop z wobble sometimes even though the frame is overbuilt to the point this shouldn’t be an issue.

Tweaks

There are many suggested fixes included for the common bed leveling issue. Locknuts for the thumbscrews, sturdier x axis carrier and replacing the bed with a PEI build surface. Also, a I’ve seen a MOSFET mod recommended as there’s reports the bed heater can overload a connector and possibly start a fire. Reportedly, implementing these fixes will make this a good printer.

Verdict

This is a decent printer for playing with 3D printing at a low price. If you want it to be a reliable machine, you’ll need to tweak many things to get there.

Spool created by Slant 3D to optimize the masterspool idea of a 2 piece reusable spool that accepts spoolless filament refills. The Slant Spool’s main change is switching from a threaded locking mechanism to a 1/4 turn mechanism and it works exactly as advertised. The mechanism change also allows both sides to be identical which simplifies printing and upkeep. The solid portion on the outside of the reel is perfect for the filament id sticker that comes with the refills. Lastly, there’s filament sized holes in the outside of the reel to hold the loose end when you’re not using the filament.

Website for 3D printing files made by members of the RepRap project. Website is clean and usable. The selection is much smaller than thingiverse which limits its usefullness.

A large repository of mostly openly licensed files for 3D printing. Instructions for printing the objects or why the objects exist can often be spotty. Be aware that this website is owned by Makerbot who is owned by Stratasys. Uploading or remixing a thing requires a Makerbot account.