Greetings all. First post. Have not yet downloaded or run Octoprint. Still in recon mode.
Spent a while searching and browsing already, but have not found the data I'm sure the experts here can shoot out in an instant.
My scenario:
2 custom racks
2 custom isolated enclosures per rack
1 Creality CR-10S4's in each enclosure
(total of 4 printers)
Desired behavior:
cam on each printer, remotely viewable
ability to send output from Simplify3D to a central location for all printers.
ability to control these printers and cams from a central location remotely.
Will Octoprint do these things? I've been assuming the 'Octo' means multiple, but from the archived multiple instances thread, I am now confused. Do I need a separate Pi for each printer?
I can run multiple copies of S3d now connected live to each printer and I send my data out over a USB extender, and it normally is fine, but Windows being Windows, for long prints this sometimes does not end well. I am looking to minimize that outcome. I have not implemented the cams yet, but want to.
Am I overthinking this? Is this a walk in the park for Octoprint?
How would you setup what I would like to do?
OctoPrint can only print on a single printer at a time. You can have multiple profiles, etc, but only one can be connected.
While not officially supported, it is possible to run multiple instances of OctoPrint on a single RPi, but the main concern is resources, especially when you start talking about webcams and plugins.
I personally run 2 instances on my rpi4b (4gb ram), each with a webcam, without any issues at all. I'm not sure how I'd feel about 4, especially with each having a separate web cam; OctoPrint itself probably wouldn't be much of an issue, but if you tried to view all 4 webcam streams at once you'd probably start hitting the limits of the wifi adapter, etc.
I'm not familiar with Simplify3D, but just about every other slicer out there can send directly to OctoPrint. You'd just have to choose which instance you want to send to.
As far as managing multiple OctoPrint instances/printers, OctoFarm may interest you.
Thanks a lot folks. I thought the case was a single instance per printer, with everyone recommending a dedicated Pi per instance. The name though is kind of confusing - maybe UniPrint would be more succinct?
I was researching further after this post, and docker seemed like a potential method of virtualizing multiple instances on a single piece of hardware, but I'm not sure I'm all that interested in taking on those admin duties too.
Anyway, thanks, I will also go checkout OctoFarm too, thanks for that tip.
Well, i don't know in how far the name has been derived from that but Octoprint sure is giving a lot of tentacles to the printer, all little hands that work together for easy and well working with the printer.
Especially with all the plugins that are possible to use and doing things together.
So, even while the name is not coming from that, I think the name really fits the software. Much more then 'uniprint' would do.
About the hardware: especially if you are using multiple 3D printers in the setup you mention, the price of an extra pi per printer is very low. Just a bit more then a single spool of filament. And it really can safe a lot of spools and damage. I have used more then one printer on one pi for a while but have all my printers on their own Pi / computer now
Have printing-fun!
Yes, Octoprint is a cool thing, and appears to be very popular and well done. I believe I will be trying it out, as well as Octofarm which was pointed to here.
