NM, Figured out how to make a 5i work.

Has anyone tried this before? My Z18 has a 3.5 inch LCD with a scroll button type input. Is there any way to drive this with a Duet or am I just going to have to kludge something?

So I have a pair of Makerbot z18's I bought a long time ago because I needed the 12x12x18 build volume, and I really wanted the heated build chamber too. But incredibly, MB didn't put a heated print bed in these things, which was a real show stopper for me. So a few years ago, I retrofitted both with my own HBP and built an Arduino controller that I mounted to the front, it worked well but was a bit of a kluge.

Fast forward a few years and the Z18 has become an orphan, I decided I want to replace the controller and go with open source firmware. I am trying to plan out the new build which will require a new QC toolhead and I'm revisiting the HBP as well. The Z18 has two 12V chamber heaters and I was planning on using the built in bed driver for that, then using an AC bed heater with an SSR.

Since I've never done anything but low voltage DC heaters I'm just checking to see if there is any reason (other than aversion to mains) that I would not want to do that? It saves me the second power supply so I can tuck everything inside the chassis easily, so desirable just from that standpoint.

I'm done. So just keep the process of upgrading a NOS board at least 10X more complicated than it has to be with the current docs and repo organization. It's not my problem anymore...

Just to be clear, I finished the machine work on my printer 3 years ago but it sat next to my workbench for all that time unused because I've been kind of busy.

Does anyone think I'm the only guy who has a Duet printer project on the shelf waiting to be finished?

Like I said, in the end my solution was simple and covered updating my 1.18 all the way to current in one step. I'm pissed because I had to spend so much time figuring out the steps and locating the files. Is it really unreasonable to expect that someone on the other side of the equal sign for this monetary transaction do a little due diligence and clean up the awful documentation because I've read the comments by others and I'm not the only one who's had to just suffer through a firmware upgrade when dealing with older code releases.

MY beginning if you'll read the title of this post was 1.15, I have no idea what you're talking about.

BS, I made a single image that covered everything back all the way to the beginning, but I had to scavenge the files from different places and fix the directions. If I'd known what I was doing I could have had it done in no time and all that would be involved in maintaining that image is updating files and re-linking names.

This is just your bullshit excuses to cover for bullshit process.

It was only 3 years man. I've been in the industry for 40 years and I've seen decade old firmware as many times as current firmware in customer equipment.

Oh that's really rich. There are over 30 releases between where I started and the latest, and you think everything I needed to know could have been found by reading each and every set of release notes on every one of them huh? You pretty sure about that??

And I'm sure you also read all the terms and conditions on every web site you visit before checking OK?

Of course your suggestion make MUCH more sense that doing it my way and making one sd image and one set of complete instructions, why do that?

Just adding that note isn't a fix for this. The documentation is a cross between a train wreck and a boiler explosion, I've honestly never seen anything like it. You don't give an end user and endless list of if..then..else conditions to get through a firmware upgrade, then leave out a third of the steps.

In the end I went form 1.18.1 to 2.04 in one step, but first I had to scavenge all the files from different places, and then make copies of some with different names to satisfy the initial firmware, etc, not knowing except by trial and error what release of what would work with the other files I collected. Why can't there be one damn image with the latest stuff, and any additional renaming, duplication, whatever in one SD image? That is exactly what I did but it took hours of misdirection to get there...

And then maybe have someone actually run through all the steps and make sure they ARE ALL WRITTEN DOWN...

This board cost me under $200 to buy, and nearly 10X that in my time just to get the stupid firmware update done.