On January 10th Bambu Lab published a blog post in which they address the issue of installing custom firmware on your Bambu Lab X1 3D printer. This comes hot on the heels of a number of YouTube channels for the first time showing off the X1Plus firmware that a number of X1 users have been working on as an open source alternative to the closed, proprietary firmware. Per the Bambu Lab blog post, there is good and bad news for those wanting to use X1Plus and similar projects that may pop up in the future.
After Bambu Lab consulted with the people behind X1Plus it was decided that X1 users would be provided with the opportunity to install such firmware without complaints from Bambu Lab. They would however have to sign a waiver that declares that they agree to relinquish their rights to warranty and support with the printer. Although some details are left somewhat vague in the blog post, it appears that after signing this waiver, and with the target X1 printer known to Bambu Lab, it will have a special firmware update (‘Firmware R’) made available for it.
This special firmware then allows for third-party firmware to be installed, with the ability to revert to OEM firmware later on. The original exploit in pre-v1.7.1 firmware will also no longer be used by X1Plus. Hopefully Bambu Lab will soon clarify the remaining questions, as reading the Reddit discussion on the blog post makes it clear that many statements can be interpreted in a variety of ways, including whether or not this ‘Firmware R’ is a one-time offer only, or will remain available forever.
It’s not the first time we’ve seen a 3D printer manufacturer give users this sort of firmware ultimatum. Back in 2019 Prusa added a physical “appendix” to their new 32-bit control board that the user would have to snap off before they could install an unsigned firmware, which the company said signified the user was willing to waive their warranty for the privilege.
Thanks to [Aaron] for the tip.
Yea that post is so cringey and full of FUD for their target demographic of ‘average people’. Really its just Bambu putting up scarecrows on the borders of their walled garden trying to keep people from jumping the fence.
Well, and who knows what kind of FOSS abuse is hidden in their garden. Did they develop the whole firmware from scratch ? did they illegally use open-source software ?
https://www.reddit.com/r/BambuLab/comments/12o4hm3/bambu_lab_x1_source_files_email/
Oh to clarify I’m talking the announcement by Bambu not this HaD article.
Does this differ from the warranty screw cover that we don’t allow companies to do here in the USA? I was under the impression that a warranty can’t be conditional; the user has to actually damage, not modify, the thing in order to void it.
Kinda? Depends on the nature. Problem with Firmware modification on a CNC machine like this, is that you can ignore/disable safety restrictions and render the device more likely to fail and damage itself or its surroundings.
If your warranty claim is on a mechanical part that has no relationship to the firmware. You could probably try to force them to still accept your warranty claim depending on your nation’s laws on it. If it is related to the firmware, then it gets really hard to argue it.
To me the difference is what your claim is against. If you are using a hammer to sink a nail and the hammer breaks, it’s entirely reasonable that they replace the hammer. If you use a saw to cut your hammer in half, and then complain that the hammer doesn’t function properly, your claim does not seem reasonable.
It’s worth noting too that a warranty is not a guarantee of anything. It’s a legal contract that lawyers will use to figure out if its more expensive to replace your thing than it is to deal with you (or other consequences) in court.
You always have warranty on manufacturing errors even if you modify the firmware if the laws in your country have good consumer protections. In Europe you have at least 2 years of warranty on electronics plus a reasonable expectation of its lifetime. If you receive a new replacement device the warranty starts to count from zero again. You only lose warranty of damage potentially caused by faulty third party firmware. So if the power supply fails due to faulty capacitors that should be covered under warranty regardless of what firmware you have installed(unless the firmware can somehow cause power supply failure) or what is written in the waver.
Apple faced lawsuits for trying claim their devices only have 1 year of warranty so they can sell “extended” warranty in Europe.
I think it is a good think they allow people to install their own firmware. And of course the consumer should bear the risks of that. But that doesn’t remove the responsibility from the manufacturer to make a good product.
Right. Say if the firmware ignores an end stop sensor and burns up a motor, or driver. This is the sort of thing that comes to mind when i try to see this from the manufacturer’s viewpoint.
I mean, if they could, some people would flash the OEM firmware back on and try to claim a failure under warranty. It’s not just corporations that are capable of being evil.
There’s also another problem: in some jurisdictions a manufacturer cannot force the customer to waive their rights, and if that’s done it can be declared null on court.
Agreed, no different if you mod your car and blow up the engine as a result and crash it.
On the face of it Bambu is simply protecting itself from such people as you describe but It needs to be seen what the terms of the “waiver” are before anyone start crying foul. Still one has to applaud them for even allowing people to do this.
If you blow up your car, you cannot claim warranty. Not because the car didn’t blow up, but because _you_ did it. The company still has to prove it was you who blew up the car (and in this example it doesn’t sound to be much of a challenge), but there is no blanket “because you broke this sticker, we can assume you did it”.
And that last part makes the Bambu statement extra cringe-worthy, they very much _pretend_ there’s a magic “sticker” that let’s them ignore any warranty claim, but in many countries that isn’t a valid tactic (and even illegal – as it’s seen as the company trying to FUD consumers).
As I said, let’s see what the actual waiver says before crying FUD.
No need to, even having a waiver _is_ FUD. That’s why it is illegal in some districts!
Bambu isn’t allowing anyone to do anything. This has already been done they don’t have a choice.
This is mostly smoke and mirrors at play here. Better off to simply not sign their stupid waiver and still install custom firmware.
Indeed. Burning the extruder by a faulty control algorithm, burning motors or drivers by ignoring end stops, short circuit by setting an input GPIO as an output, drawing too much current from the PSU.
But if LCD backlight driver is hardware limited to be within specs, regardless of a dimming signal from the CPU, then the failure of backlight or its driver should not be blamed on third party firmware.
If certain components are known to fail even with authentic firmware, then can they blame such a failure on third party firmware?
A better but more involved form of this would probably be Bambu making a list of things you can break only if you’ve modified the firmware, and saying “if you alter the firmware, those things specifically aren’t covered anymore”. I guess you could still get burned that way if your motor burns up due to a manufacturing defect after you’ve changed the firmware but still ran everything withing spec. They seem to sell replacement parts at not unreasonable prices though, so you could easily roll those dice.
Or they could set limits through permanently flippable switches in the hardware, like how you could overvolt a Raspberry Pi past what they advised in exchange for your warranty. That’d probably require a bunch more engineering though.
I never knew of these printers until earlier this week when searching a police auction site for Lenovo X1 Carbons this printer cropped up (used; currently @ $88 with 11hrs remaining). Since then, I’ve read stellar reviews and now two HaD articles.
Lenovo X1 = laptop.
*Bambu* X1 = 3D printer.
Caveat emptor.
I think it’s “X1 Carbon” that leads to the confusion. But either would be quite a deal for $88.
Giving up the warranty is a great exchange for being able to hack the device. I think this is a perfectly reasonable trade-off.
Depends. In general I think it sounds fair, but I am guessing they will also not honor the warranty on parts that are unrelated to the scope of the firmware.
If you’re in a region that provides statutory/implied warranties (basically all the english speaking world and the EU do), then Bambu can’t completely void a warranty, only their own stated terms. You’re still entitled to repair or replacement of a failed device where the failure is unrelated to your own actions or expected wear and tear.
BL also has local subsidiaries/warehouses in these markets, so they can’t just hide behind the great wall of China’s disregard for international law – local consumer authorities have some ability to hold them to account.
That said, BL has shown repeatedly that it’s trying to do the right thing by their customers so far, making fools of the usual lunatic fringe who take every opportunity to pre-emptively accuse them of bad faith.
Unfortunately it’s the nature of a computer-controlled mechanical device that many hardware failures can be a direct result of software error, and changing the software to something unsanctioned is going to remove even the statutory protections in many cases.
Can’t really say if this is good or bad…
Thing is that Bambu’s support is kind of bad in that typical chinese company kind of way where it will sometimes cost you an arm, a leg and a f-ton of patience to get some support for the defective product and sending it back & forth. Which isn’t a great thing for a machine like this cause it is big, heavy and unlike rival machines it is very hard to repair it yourself. You really do NOT want a Bambu breaking down on you! :/
So one hand: If the machine breaks you are partially s*** out of luck anyway so why care about that waiver? other hand: do you want to tempt fate with a 3rd party firmware?
If I had a Bambu Lab printer I might do the Firmware-R thing. But I would never bother with the previous hack unless I was the original hacker and just doing it as a challenge.
It’s too easy to just rip out the old board and stick in an open source one which is fully supported by open source firmware. Pick a popular one and you know you are supported for updates going forward a long time. And that last part.. you are never going to get that from a hack relying on a bug.
My vague understanding of how the X1 achieves its speed is through motion control algorithms that null out unwanted motion e.g. ringing. Are there off-the-shelf boards that support such tuning?
Yes, anything supported by modern Marlin and anything supported by Klipper.
You may have to compile your own firmware or use a 3rd party firmware for marlin but Klipper is supporting linear/pressure advance and input shaping out of the box.
It’s why you can now buy a creality Ender3 v3 KE and print at 300mm/s out of the box as it uses Klipper, SE version will print slower than this afaik but it’s still got access to linear advance and input shaping through marlin. Not too shabby for bed slingers.
I think it’s important to remember when comparing the two that Prusa’s approach didn’t require an exploit. They weren’t trying to keep you out like Bambu.
There’s still a few issues that they need to clarify for me.
– Will the “X1 Plus” firmwares be able to update? They make it seem like this new “Rooted” firmware where you accept the warranty void will be a one off, so you’ll be stuck on that version forever. I know it’d be up to the X1+ team to maintain compatibility with releases, but I’d hope that the rooted branch would be maintained alongside the official branch.
– How do these rules apply to those of us who caught their changes in 1.7.1 in time and reverted (or blocked the update)? We technically don’t have to agree to the warranty void to get the special firmware, we already have a rootable version.
A lot of this still seems iffy in terms of legality. Much like those screw cover labels that technically aren’t valid but companies still make you challenge them in court to uphold the warranty because everyone you interact with will just go off the stated policy. Or the auto industry who used to try to void entire warranties from one part change.