QIDI Q1 Pro - Can it compete with BambuLabs?

The Q1 Pro is a fully enclosed CoreXY FDM printer with active chamber heating, bi-metallic hardened tip nozzle, 245x245x245mm build volume, that can heat up to 120C on the bed and 350C on the nozzle. They claim printing performance up to 600mm/s speed and 20kmm/s² acceleration. That seems like quite a lot to promise for the $599 USD price tag,  So let’s find out if they managed it.

Sponsorship disclosure: As mentioned in the video, this video counts as sponsored because the printer was provided in exchange for the review. No additional services, products, fees or anything of value has been exchanged. All opinions expressed are my own and Qidi had no influence over the published content, they didn't even see the video or know my opinions until it was published publicly.

Printed Files:

Chat on Twitter: @Adam_V3D

0:00 Introduction to Qidi Q1 Pro 3D Printer
1:23 Unboxing and Setup
2:03 Around the Outside
2:58 In the Printing Chamber
3:22 Hotend and Extruder
4:08 In the Electronics Enclosure
4:44 Toolhead Board
5:18 Firmware
6:20 Network Connectivity
7:26 Weird Configuration
8:10 Print Performance
10:44 Conclusion

[Garage]

I think you were a bit harsh given price to performance. Bambu Lab doesn't use stock open source firmware and you can put vanilla Klipper on this machine if you want to. How many people want to use ethernet over WiFi for printing? The packaging for shipping seemed fine and no reviewers have received damaged units. There is a lot of good, especially for $469 or even $439 with a coupon right now. It can use advanced materials and seems pretty trouble free. In all reviews I have watched, the print quality looks phenomenal. You didn't show much printing, which I think is very important. Not totally knocking the review. It just seemed a bit against the printer from the start.

[Factory]

I ordered one. It's cheap and my expectations are appropriately low.

Should do what I want it to do.

[MemelordSupreme]

Crazy weird because other reviewers have had a totally different experience seemed much more promising. and their wifi worked out of the box

[DiggityDelights]

Hi and thanks for working out the flaws with the Q1 Pro so they could fix them for the rest of us. I know you seem concerned about the type of plastic packing material Qidi uses but I can assure everyone it protects the printer very well. Did anyone have a broken printer because of poor packing? I seriously doubt it. My friend got a Qidi Q1 Pro a few days ago and it has all the problems fixed, has latest firmware installed and has an ethernet port added if you want to hard wire it but it has not been necessary. The Q1 Pro prints ABS as good as a Bambu Lab P1S prints PLA. The Q1 has a heated chamber and the build plate heats up to 120C - I don't think a P1S can do that. Like comparing an SUV to a Pickup - both vehicles but intended for different uses. When opening the door it was immediately obvious to me how to do it. I have no problems opening the door. I love the aesthetics of the case. I don't mean to insult any Chinese People but to my American Eyes, the Q1 Pro case looks like a futuristic Sci-Fi inspired design you might expect from a Japanese company. It is a home consumer item and not piece of commercial equipment so I think its nice of Qidi to liven it up a little. Pretty impressed with the Q1 Pro and what it does for only $380 delivered to your door. I think the Bambu Lab P1S costs a couple hundred more and that's without the AMS. Thank you Qidi.

[etiennegarneaubeaudoin]

It would have been nice to see the actual capabilities of the hotend and heated chamber with more exotic materials like high temp nylon or polycarbonates. I think this is where this machine could shine when compared to other printers like the p1s or k1c. I get that the firmware is old, but does it really affect the quality of the parts when printing special filaments?

[Duckferd]

Although you can't update Klipper out of the box, can you remove and reinstall Vanilla Klipper with KIAUH? Assuming that you can put together a printer.cfg for it well enough.

[legendfpv]

It's for sale at $440 right now, shouldn't you have considered that in your review and comparison to p1s?

[EAFQ]

The heater is safe no way to touch it directly because of the heater grid. any toaster is more "dangerous".
In the US, all garages have GFCI plugs, plus you can convert any regular plug to GFCI and never get shocked in case of a ftupid mistake.
In Europe, almost all homes have "GFCI" brakers.
Anyway, it is completely safe, safe than any other electric space heater 🤷
Looks like a complete overreaction

[mikeyKnows_]

I wonder what's better for a beginner this or the Babu A1?

[GiovaSanta]

I'm a little undecided between Qidi Q1 Pro and Creality K1C, you tested either those models? What's your advice for a total beginners that want first 3d printer?

[NoMercyFtw]

I contacted support and the newer printers are coming out with an Ethernet port and they're going to send me out an updated board all I had to pay was $20.00 for shipping

[CCSEA]

Hello, I have a question for you; if you were to make a comparison, would you prefer the Bambu Lab A1 Combo or the Qidi Q1 Pro?

[rgbok]

Im gonna let it circulate in the market for a bit so the versions they will release in the future will be slightly improved based on feedback.

[gggg]

Good content although for delivery I prefer a more conversational style vs this repetitive intonation style used by so many YouTubers for reasons that are beyond me.

[richc]

I think there is a firmware update in process for this printer which will hopefully fix some of the quirky issues. Good to know a usb network port can be used in place of the wireless dongle. For the minute cost of including the RJ45 port on the board, not sure why they chose not to include it (as they have with the XMax 3).

[BradClarke]

Wow, that's really bad regarding the klipper install.
Did the mks mcu come with an ancient Linux version as well?
Sovol uses an mks board for their klipper screens and it ships with buster, causing issues with crowsnest.

[mmmmbeeeeer]

I've just been having a closer look at the QIDI specific klipper version that they have in their github account. It's actually a bit crazier that you've noted. You said that they're using a very old version of klipper (0.10.0 I think you showed), but doing a quick diff between the real klipper repo and the QIDI repo, it looks like they've manually merged SOME of 0.11.0 into their repo - it clearly has some of the 0.11.0 files, bit it looks like this was done before 0.11.0 was released, or at the very least, some of the updated files are newer than the 0.10.0 version but older than the 0.11.0 version.

I haven't had time to go through in detail, but I'd guess that their version (assuming your machine has the latest that is in their github) is *somewhat* closer to 0.11.0, but not actually based on 0.11.0.

I'm hoping to have time to go through and work out what they've actually changed in their version apart from just selectively pulling updated files from 0.11.0.

I'd like to say that I hope this sheds some light, but tbh it really just throws some pretty harsh shade on their software development practices.

[ScytheNoire]

This is a great example of cutting a lot of corners.
The more I see companies push towards closed off environments, even though they are using open source, the more I'm fairly certain my next printer will be a Voron.
Just waiting to see more news about the Voron Phoenix, release date, build sizes, LDO kits, etc.

[NoMercyFtw]

I was going to order a A1 but not anymore

[doomersnek]

I've been thinking about getting the Q1 since its release, but some things in this review does concern me. This especially is a concern for the open source-ness of the printer and the firmware issue. Is their X-Plus 3 better for open source?