1st Impressions: Somewhere between "Meh" & disappointed
I got my Palette 3 Pro this week. I paid $799 for the “Air Shipping” September delivery option.
- On Sep 10, I received an email saying the schedule was still on track to ship to customers paying for the “Air Shipping” option within September.
- On Sep 28, “Air Shipping” customers would no receive them by early Oct.
- On Oct 21, the update indicated End of Oct was the new date.
- And finally, On Oct 27, I was notified the shipment was being processed.
- The shipment was sent via UPS Ground lol
Repeated over-promising and under-delivering… But not the end of the world.
Now that I’ve unboxed my Palette 3 Pro, the first thing I noticed is the dead-end setup links in the emails they sent:
Not the end of the world. I found this article on the support site. And when clicking on links such as “Please review this article for more detailed instructions and videos on how to physically set up Palette with your printer.”:
Still not the end of the world.
The instructions are okay, but overly vague at times. There are several references to attaching the extruder clip to your printer, for example, but nothing that actually indicates how except for (in some cases) that the square Velcro should be used.
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Okay, I ordered the Palette 3 “Pro”. And when I think of the word “Pro”, there are several synonyms which come to mind. None of which include Velcro, or duct tape. I paid $800 for an accessory which, in many cases, costs more than the printers themselves, and was provided one clip with a few squares of Velcro which is to serve as the primary interface between the accessory and printer. At this point, I’m feeling a little embarrassed for Mosaic.
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If you were lucky, some links point you here: Collections - Thingiverse . Last night, however, most links were pointing here: Designs - Thingiverse which is a mess of a collection and I didn’t know where to begin.
Recommendations for Mosaic:
- Under-Promise & Over-Deliver
- Communicate changes to the delivery dates before the delivery date has passed, not after
- Do not thank people who have paid for Sep delivery for being patient in Oct when in fact they are not being patient. It is appropriate to request patience, but not to assume it.
- Do not re-write the delivery agreement as it suits you. When you sell customers a Sep delivery date, do not decide at some point that a Sep shipping date is the equivalent despite knowing the logistics network will constrain the delivery date to Oct (let alone the actual delivery date of Nov)
- When you provide an option for air shipping which costs $100 above the other option, ship it air, not ground… to the customer.
- Know your customer base
- Include extruder clips for at least the top 5 printers used
- Or allow customers to select which printer they use when ordering and have the extruder clip designed for their printer included in the box
- For all other printers, have specific links to clips which have been validated by your team to work with that specific printer
- Do not provide links to dead-ends in your “getting started” articles.
- Respect the difference of a crowd-funded campaign and a pre-order campaign.
- Crowd-Funded: Unvalidated but worthy concepts, many times executed by start-ups who have no customer base and reputation. The concept is still in development.
- Pre-Order: Validated concepts but not yet mass produced, existing product (unreleased), company and reputation.
I haven’t used the product yet but it definitely feels like a crowd funded campaign launched under the guise of a pre-order. And I was thoroughly disappointed to learn that OctoPrint would not be supported because I searched before ordering and was under the impression it would be.
Mosaic: I’m not trying to troll and hope you’ll consider this feedback in future releases. The price point of $800 places you in a segment beyond what I’ve seen delivered. Hopefully, I’ll retract that statement once I’ve actually used the product.
With regards and an open mind.
Is this a worthwhile discussion?
I’m officially downgrading my impression from “in between Meh & Disappointed” to “Totally Frustrated and Highly Disappointed”.
More details here if anyone has any ideas or experience to share.
by Dexter Gillette
Dexter,
Unfortunately, I echo your sentiments completely. “Totally Frustrated and Highly Disappointed” are spot on.
Canvas is such a quantum leap backward. Painting and stamping are good ideas but overall, the entire user experience is painful and the resulting prints are terrible. It's not the printer. My RailCore II ZLT has been dialed in for well over a year and prints that are sliced with Simplify3D come out perfect. The same model sliced in Canvas takes 10 times longer to slice and the resulting print quality is not good.
by Larry Schack
Great news....they are consistent. Waited and waited for this thing and not a darn thing has improved and furthermore the USB they shipped is empty, but I am told to use a file on there...what file? Oh, you know what? They have no faith in their own equipment. In the warranty they disallow returns. Who does that? Won't load the alt firmware to work with Prusa so I am told it "should" work with a CR-6 SE running the community edition software.... So taking another printer out of service. I now refer to this "thing" as The Brick in all correspondence.
by Cort
I have a p3pro and use it as a papeer weight. I 've had the machine for months, printed the key chain and failed on every attempt since. Could do with a prpper manual. I find it is like a detective story its all there if you can find it.. With Luck I may eventually win.
by Derek Matthews
Sorry to hear that you're having issues, I'd be happy to help. Please send me an e-mail at jonny@mosaicmfg.com with a summary of the issues that you're seeing and I can definitely guide you in the right direction.
by Jonny Yeu