Unboxed and first test done

OK, so I received the SD last night as the UPS guy stealthily set it on the stoop and ran away.  Didn't even hear him set the box down, but I heard the truck, so I knew he was there... It was 6pm, so who else would it have been?

As per danny's post, the box arrived in fair condition.  Top was staved in a bit and the main tape strapping the top had peeled away from the center of the top, but otherwise in good condition.  Opened the box and found the ubiquitous packing peanuts.  Removed the SD from the mass (power supply in hand so as not to tear that off the board), pulled the bubble wrap cover and all the bubble wrap supports holding my 2kg roll in place under the bed. 

Unlike danny, my bed was lowered to almost the top of the roll, which meant that I couldn't remove it until I had it plugged in and ran the bed back up.  Fired it up, plugged in the USB and (after loading the driver set as my machine decided it just couldn't find drivers for it) started up Pronterface.  Ran X, Y and Z checks for smoothness and sent the unit to Home... good thing I didn't home the Z first as when it homed I noticed that the z stop was all borked up.  It was near 1-2mm below the bed.  I moved the Y a little to verify, but I would have crashed the extruder head had I homed the Z first thing. 

Spent the next half hour figuring out the Z stop screw and what the proper height would be.  Figured as long as the head didn't crash the bed, I'd have a starting point.  Once I had it to what I figured was a proper height, I ran the X to 100mm and the moved the Y in about 30mm.  Set a piece of paper on the bed and homed the Z.  A little loose.  Dropped the bed and moved the z stop screw a little.  Re-Home the Z.  Paper had a little resistance.  This was a good sign. 

Figured that I had enough to run a quick test. Set bed and extruder temps, waited and then backed out the factory filament from the extruder.  Loaded the "sample" filament (green) into the extruder, and ran out the factory color until I got green.  Ran a quick skeinforge of a test piece that I had created (only thing I had on the machine and I didn't want to take time browsing thingiverse).  Hit print and watched as the machine quickly drew out the raft.  I noticed it seemed a little flat, but for a quick test it seemed OK.  About half way through the print, the raft disengaged from the bed and the print just started following the extruder around like a lost puppy.  Stopped the print and dropped the bed to let it cool.

Looking back I noticed my bed hadn't reached temp, so I figured it probably cooled a little too quickly to stick, so I went back to the stl, doubled the scale in replicatorG (because the object was a bit smallish) and reset the temps, this time waiting for the bed to reach close to temp.  Hit print at 78deg and watched the magic begin again.  This time, the print stuck and the design finished 15 or so minutes later.  Dropped the bed, killed the temps, and waited 5 minutes.  Pulled the print, removed the raft (stuck a bit much to the print, but it mostly popped off with just peeling with my fingers) and marveled at the first object that I had successfully completed with this device.

Post-print activity:  Homed the extruder and backed out the filament (as I have kids that have hands EVERYWHERE and I don't need broken filament from kidlets pulling on it), unplugged the USB from computer and SD placing it in the case. Powered down the SD and put everything in the corner with my netbook bag on top.  Warned the kids of the danger of Daddy if something were to happen to his new tool (not TOY, as toys are for kids, so the munchkins tell me).  This process took all of 3 hours.  I missed dinner but I didn't mind as this was MUCH more important.

Thoughts:  Out of the box printing is phenomenal and this was worth the wait and the money.  If I hadn't become involved in this forum I would have been a little meeped at the fact that the machine would have crashed the head on trying to print the first time.  I know that the bed is spring loaded, but it would have dragged the bed at the very least and tore up the kapton.  There should also be some documentation on the z stop screw and how to tweak it, but other than that a very satisfying first experience.

On that note... anyone else have a problem with the head being lower than the bed when they received the unit?