The competition is going the other way

I would definitely expect soluble support at that price.  And the longer but not wider bed is a bit of a let down.  I like the solidoodles square print platform, but then again I guess it depends on the consumer and their needs.. x)

I agree better software is an improvement worth a little extra. However, I feel that with our community of devoted members adding their knowledge, we could pretty quickly make a very intuitive and efficient package pretty quickly. The work being done by Ian, Lawsy, and others is invaluable. The expertise and resources this community has could and are on there way to developing that right now with no incentive other than improving theirs' and others' end user experience. I think Solidoodle is sorting getting away way with crowd sourcing their software development for free. It is actually a pretty shrewd and effective way to give the users what they want, which I believe is impressive. Maybe a little bonus incentive to those that are doing all this pro bono development could lead to a fully integrated and end product that rivals the professional expensive packages. It seems that some of the price of the upper tier printers has to have some proprietary software development built in.

I did check out the maker software too. Pretty impressive!

i dont think their software is worth that much extra either maybe 50 bucks,have you guys looked at file2part? Coincidence that Bri was a backer?

I'm not going to lie, that new machine looks very impressive.  It's 4X the cost of what we have but the increased build platform and resolution have me drooling. 

I think the addition of a retail store is a sneaky smart move.  This one I could see sitting in engineering offices around the world and if the software is really that easy to use it could be a game changer. 

I love to see the industry moving forward though.  By the time it's mainstream we'll all be the experts.

At 3 grand I don't think it's worth an extra six inches in width. I know it is for a more 'professional' target group, but I think most engineers and the likes view 3d printing in our community as a temporary oddity. The ones I have spoken with to try and start some local business and even after showing off some of the better prints were hardly impressed. They know they can afford the higher res prints from companies with the industrial grade printers, and would rather pay-to-play rather than drop the money for one of those machines.

The S2 is still, bar none, the best deal out there. And that's handy because if they do release all of the parts, etc, no one could take them out of business because they're making the things so damn cheap.

I don't have a case and door yet.

If you have the ABS coupler, it wouldn't hurt to ask for the new Z rod, especially yours is noticeably wobbly.

I suspect they may have a dilemma with the cases and doors.  Their stock may be such that if they send out all the cases that are owed to printers already shipped, they will run out before they reach the end of the backlog and have to either delay shipping printers that are already long delayed, or ship without cases like the initial orders.

I'm not too concerned. I'm toying with the idea of making acrylic side and top panels held on with magnets so I can easily see into the printer when it's closed.  I would still need the door, however.

I've put acrylic sides on and it helps keep the heat it, mine are all held on with magnets. 

I also didn't put any extension on my top cover, so the filament does in fact rub, but it also doesn't seem to be a problem at all.