Your CAD software generally has some rudimentary tools for rending images of your parts, from simply-textured models to more photo-realistic options. However, those renders are of the geometry you created—not how that geometry would look after it was sent to a 3D printer. Extrudio is a tool that aims to create more realistic renders for 3D printed parts.
Rather than rendering from the geometry of your model, such as by using an STL file, Extrudio uses G-Code instead. It creates its render based on the instructions your 3D printer uses to produce your part, sweeping a virtual bead of plastic along the toolpaths in the code. In doing so, it can realistically display layer lines in a 3D print and other artifacts of the printing process, like stair-stepping on spheres and curves. It can display the render in various contexts, from blank studio backgrounds to a number of “sets” like a bench or kitchen.
The tool’s website notes that this could be useful for generating images for those selling 3D printed parts online, though obviously the realism of actually printing and photographing a part would still be superior. Still, it could prove a useful tool for quickly pitching realistic images of a 3D printed part, particularly if it’s desirable to model different colors or print techniques without putting in the hours to actually produce them.
We’ve featured some other great 3D printing hacks lately, like this nifty trick for doing overhangs without supports.
Game consoles tend to have a weak spot or two that will take certain units out sooner than they would due to normal parts aging. In the case of the Wii U it’s the eMMC storage IC with the console’s firmware and any user data that likes to keel over, with the SK Hynix variant reportedly developing faulty cells much sooner than the Samsung and Toshiba chips. If you want to check the health of these eMMC ICs in your Wii U, you can do so easily now with the 
