Bambu Lab R1 Review: The Desktop Laser to Beat, If You Bring Your Own Designs

As a newbie to laser cutting and engraving, I had no idea where to start after the initial setup. Thankfully, Bambu Suite was one step ahead of me.

After binding the R1 to my Bambu account, I was immediately prompted to complete the tutorial project. It’s a small ruler with various designs, and you’re walked through the different color-coded laser settings. I clicked through the prompts, following each instruction and about three minutes later I had a ruler.

It’s a Lot of Back and Forth

Since then, I’ve gone through similar steps countless times to prepare and complete a project. Even with that familiarity, it’s a convoluted process.

Here’s the standard workflow. You start by importing a project into Suite, where you can then view the design, edit it, and indicate what type of laser process should be used on various parts of the image. The options are line, fill and cut.

Once that’s done, click on the prepare button in the bottom-right corner of the app. Go to the R1, place your material and leave the lid of the R1 open. Return to your computer, where Suite will then prompt you to take a picture of the material, noting its placement and type, and measure how far away it is from the tool. If Suite can’t identify the material, you’ll need to choose from one of the available options.

At this point you can go back to the project section of Suite to make further edits. If you want to see a preview of the artwork on your material you can right-click in the work area and select Show Captured Image. However, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve done that only to see that the captured image is skewed and distorted.

Instead, I’ve done the majority of my final tweaks and settings changes on the Prepare tab, which features most of the same settings and options, save for adding more images or text, and has yet to show a distorted image.

Once you’re happy, you have to click Make to send the project to the R1, then walk over to it, close the lid and press the start button.

Reading that back it doesn’t sound bad, but when the R1 isn’t next to your computer – be it across a room or in a totally different room – it feels like a lot. Especially if you forget a step, or have to adjust the material, after which you have to start the preparation process all over again.

I’ve gotten in the habit of leaving the lid open until it’s time to start. It saves me a trip or two… most of the time.

I would have much preferred for Bambu to figure out a different way to place the Birds Eye Camera (or maybe stitch together multiple cameras) in a way that allows you to place the material on the slats, close the lid and not have to go back and forth.

Reliable Cutting and Engraving

I’ve learned a lot over the last six weeks (some of which I’ll detail in a minute), and while there have been times where I’ve questioned the overall quality of cuts and imaging etching or engraving, I’m impressed with the overall performance of the R1.

Cuts have been clean and free of any soot or debris on both wood and acrylic. Once I got the hang of etching metal and glass, those looked clean as well.

With the basics down, you spend most of your time fine-tuning and perfecting the results.

One of my favorite features in Bambu Suite is the calibration tool that allows you to choose a range of speed and power level for the laser. It then produces a grid of laser lines, laser fill, or image engraving, providing you with a preview of what settings are best for that type of material.

For example, on 3mm basswood I think 150mm/s at 10% power provides a crisp-looking image, while a setting of 70% power at 150mm/s for a laser fill nearly burns through the entire thickness of the material.

The first thing I’ve done with new material is run all three calibration tests, then keep these references near my desk so I can tweak settings for each new project. With that on hand, I’ve been able to get consistent results from the R1, on different projects, across multiple material types.

I still have a lot to learn, but I’m much further ahead in my journey than I expected to be at this point.

So Much Faster than 3D Printing

One welcome aspect of laser cutting and engraving I didn’t anticipate was just how fast a project finishes. The tutorial ruler was done so fast I double-checked it looked like the artwork. Cutting a box out of acrylic or wood also takes mere minutes, both of which would take at least a couple of hours if I were printing it.

As part of my learning journey, I spent a couple of hours going through the Laser Box Maker tool in Bambu Suite, making boxes with various settings, cutting them, then adjusting and cutting another. I did the same with wood and acrylic, adding text with the size to the front of each box.

The majority of that time was spent making trips back and forth to the R1, adjusting material, taking pictures and doing the preparation dance.

Useful Accessories

In addition to the R1, Bambu Lab sent me the Riser, Automatic Conveyor Feeder, Vision Encoder, Rotary Tool and the Automatic Fire Extinguisher. I’ve installed and used everything but the conveyor and fire extinguisher (the gas cylinder it requires is out of stock).

The riser is useful because it adds vertical height, meaning you can engrave on the surfaces of objects too thick to fit in the standard work volume. It also enables you to use my favorite accessory – the Rotary Attachment. At $275.99 for the rotary attachment, plus $389 for the riser base, it’s a pricey upgrade, unfortunately. That being said, having it lets you place your favorite stainless mugs or glasses in the R1’s work volume. With a few settings changed in Bambu Suite to accommodate the expanded hardware, you can etch into the entire cup or round object.

The conveyor feeder, which lets materials up to 3,000 mm pass through the work area, will be helpful if I ever want to cut or engrave any larger pieces of wood.

Lessons Learned

I’m not sold on using slats to place the material on. On several occasions, I had a gift card holder project ruined by a piece of wood only partially falling to the tray below, causing it to protrude above the work surface and collide with the toolhead. Sometimes the R1 would stop altogether after the material shifted, while other times it’d continue cutting on a section of the board it shouldn’t have.

I’ve tried placing the material on just two slats so that anything cut out in the middle would fall out of the way, and I’ve also placed every slat under the material and have experienced the same issue.

I haven’t used one, but I can’t help but think that a honeycomb panel would eliminate this issue by providing uniform support below the material.

In the end, I had to cut one piece of the gift card holder at a time to prevent issues, prolonging the amount of time (and the number of trips back and forth to the R1) it took to complete the project.

I also wish that Bambu included more than just two of its material pins. I’ve had better luck with a successful project when holding down the material in more than two spots, but the 3D printed clips I’ve been using aren’t nearly as reliable as Bambu’s pins.

Ah yes, the $2,500 question – is the Bambu Lab R1 worth it? But as is usually the case, the answer is more complicated than that. It really depends on your use case, but I don’t think your experience with a laser cutter and engraver should factor into the decision-making tree.

The P2S from xTool has an MSRP of $2,999. On paper it’s the closest comparison for the R1, offering an almost identical work area in a larger footprint. For the $500 saving, plus the footprint-efficient design, it’s hard not to make the argument that the R1 is the desktop laser to beat.

I knew nothing about laser cutting before using the R1, and I’ve learned a lot in a very short amount of time. I think Bambu Lab succeeded in making this section of the creator hobby more approachable and easier to use.

The lack of depth in R1 files and projects on MakerWorld will take time to fix. For the casual user browsing for inspiration, there’s a gulf between what’s available for the R1 and the diversity of 3D prints on the platform. That might be jarring for someone coming to the R1 from Bambu Lab’s printers and used to leaning on that ecosystem.

But if you’re someone who’s itching to get into laser cutting and engraving, can create your own original designs – or live with extra steps in the workflow from sourcing outside MakerWorld – and want a stand-alone device that can do it all, the R1 is a solid choice.

Bambu Lab R1

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