Brand: Artillery
Model: Sidewinder X1
Type: FDM
Price range: currently approx. $400
Build volume: 300mm x 300mm x 400mm (11,8" x 11,8" x 15,7")
Enclosure: no
Print platform: fast AC heated bed (max. 130°C), tempered glass
Leveling: manually, 4 large knobs at the bottom (4 corners)
Print resolution: down to 0,1 mm
Print speed: up to 150 mm/s (never tried it) and max. 250mm/s travel speed (never tried it too)
Extruder: direct drive extruder (Titan extruder)
Nozzle: comes with a 0,4mm Volcano nozzle
Endstops: inductive
No of heads: one
Connection: USB stick, USB type B port, SD card
Power: 110V or 220V variants
Materials (1,75mm filament): ABS (never tried it), PLA, PETG, TPU, …
Software: Cura (or others with gcode output)
Ease of Setup:
The printer comes in two parts (the website calls it “95% pre-assembled”). Only a few screws have to be fixed with the included tool and some ribbon cables have to be plugged in. It probably took me less than 30 minutes from unpacking to the first print (a sample model for the first print is already available on the included USB stick).
Additional accessories like spare parts for vulnerable parts (ribbon cables, lever for filament feeding, rollers for the linear guides, …) are included. Unitl now (nearly 1,5 years) I’ve not needed one of them.
Ease of Use:
All settings can be easily reached due to the TFT touch screen. I have no comparison to other systems, but I have no open wishes regarding operation, everything is easy to find and control. There is also a menu item for manual alignment of the printing plate, with which the four corners and the center can be directly approached with the nozzle. The adjustment through the large knobs on the bottom is then quickly done (not much longer than a minute in total). However, the alignment is also only rarely necessary (every few weeks), so overall it is not a problem.
To change the filament, heat up the nozzle manually via the menu and pinch off the filament with a side cutter 1-2cm above the extruder and pull out the rest. Then you put on a new spool, feed the filament through the sensor and directly into the extruder. All in all, this takes less than 2 minutes.
Print Quality:
I don’t print art, but mostly practical pieces where the last bit of quality doesn’t matter in the end. That’s why I haven’t played around too much with different settings and made series of measurements to determine ideal or optimized parameters. Nevertheless, I am usually positively surprised by the quality. I’m sure you can increase the quality further, but I don’t see any reason to do so for my applications and save myself the time needed for this.
Overall, in my experience, the printing speed plays a big role. If you allow a little more time and print more slowly, the result is usually much nicer.
I can only share @endlessfix 's positive impressions regarding overhangs, it is sometimes impressive how well problematic printing situations are mastered by the printers.
Print Accuracy:
Many of my printed parts have a mechanical purpose as a goal. Therefore, it often depends on a corresponding accuracy. From my point of view, high reproducibility is important, and this is well given. Over time, you develop a feeling for what tolerances you should consider for certain purposes when modeling (e.g. 0.1 - 0.2mm allowance for a nut to fit well in an opening), so you can achieve very good accuracy over time.
Pros:
The printer is very silent (even better with a heavy stone added, idea from Stefan). The printer is right next to me on the desk, yet it doesn’t bother me while listening to music, watching videos, …
It has several types of error detection, although I haven’t really needed or tested them yet (power failure, filament runout sensor) and recovery.
The cable management through ribbon cables are described as negative by many reviews. I cannot confirm that. They have worked without problems since the beginning and do not give the impression that this would change. They look very tidy and clean compared to many otherwise common “air wiring”. For emergencies, even spare cables are included, so I could easily swap them as well.
Cons:
The spool holder at the top of the z-axis can probably become a problem at higher prints due to the mechanical load and the resulting vibrations. However, I have not yet observed a problem here at my mostly smaller prints. If that really became a problem, you could of course always attach the spool externally, the direct extruder doesn’t care where the filament is fed from.
At the beginning, the adhesion of the first layer to the glass plate was good. Over time, however, this has weakened and even the usual tricks (hairspray, glue stick, blue tape, cleaning with Isopropanol, …) have not really improved this. I then switched to a double-sided structured, powder-coated PEI spring steel sheet with magnetic sticker. Since then, not one print has come off, however, the underside of the prints is always slightly textured as a result, but this does not bother me.
General Impression:
The printer is not a tinkering object for me, where I want to spend time and money on optimization. I use it as a desktop printer that has to work without much effort when I need it, similar to a usual paper printer. That is definitely possible with this model.
3D printing in general is impressive, I can spend a lot of time just watching the printer work and watching the creation of a real object from a small plastic sausage, a very calming and satisfying process.
Anything Else:
The printer has a very large print volume, which was also a reason for my purchase decision. However, I can also say in retrospect that I have never used the volume, most of my models are not higher than a few centimeters. The time it would take to print at full size is alone a reason I have never used this, it would take many days. I don’t have that much time for one model, I have too many different parts to print 
I show many examples of my printing results here, for the evaluation of my remarks, it is probably helpful to also consider the objects created and types of application, as these also have a direct influence on the evaluation and expectation: Cotty's 3D printing adventures
Edit:
In the end, it doesn’t really matter which printer you have. Two things are important:
- you have a printer and
- you know how to create the models you need yourself and don’t have to rely on downloading third-party models.