Are you saying the port exists inside then? I don’t mind cutting out a port hole myself if there is a usable Ethernet port inside.
I believe the actual port is long since gone from the board layout. The boards you see in demos are ancient compared to the latest we have running in the lab. (Where “ancient” means “months old”).
1 Like
I see. Any chance we could get it added back onto the board? That seems like a fair compromise between your statement that you’d love to provide support but that you are unwilling to run the plastics through a second pass to cut a port hole and relocate the port or add a jumper connection to that hole.
It seems like if there was enough interest and your team was committed enough to provide this feature, a retrofit solution could be put together before shipping, but if that’s not the case I’d like to push for at least the port being inside so I can retrofit a port onto the case myself.
At this point any additional changes to the hardware are going to delay the product for everyone. If we get a freebie with a board spin that’s going to happen anyway we can look at it, but I wouldn’t be optimistic.
1 Like
I have understood from the start of the campaign that the GF, at least this first version, would be wifi only. At home office I have several connected devices. I find that the devices that connect to each other via ethernet are easiest to assimilate/integrate into the network. Wifi devices usually work well too. What I don’t like doing is dealing with setting them up on my wifi router (has ethernet too), its a hassle. Although, it doesn’t take long, it does require a restart to add a device wirelessly. So, my question is, what is it going to take to add a wifi device to a secure network, if my wifi network requires some info about the new device, and the device can’t talk to the wifi network? I did read a comment about adding an affordable WIFI access point just for the GF, but then that is providing access into my network, which I’d prefer not to have. if the GF can be setup to use secured wifi (just WPA2) then that would be very good for me and others with the same network set-up. Thanks.
1 Like
I don’t have shipping details on wifi protocol compatibility, but as it’s a firmware-upgradeable functionality (for the most part), it’s something we may improve over time.
1 Like
Personally, with Wi-Fi being ubiquitous, I don’t see the necessity for a wired connection anymore. Like it was stated before, you can just add a Wi-Fi router or access point for a couple bucks.
Unless, your worried about security, then just make sure you’re using a WPA2 connection
2 Likes
Here’s hoping there’s absolutely, positively no way you can brick the radio by upgrading its firmware…
Wireless is convenient, but as I have a lot of wired equipment running already, pushing a lot of data preferably at the lowest latency possible, usually hitting 1gbps, I prefer wired if it is available. Its predictable, stable, fast, and very little maintenance.
Wireless has its plusses, but if I had the option to run glowforge on a physical network I would.
2 Likes
Here is a question!
How do we connect to new wifi networks? Will there need to be a USB connection at some point so passwords can be entered?
I am not an expert at this but I am assuming it will work a lot like my drone. It broadcast a wifi signal that I connect to via iPad or iPhone just like I am connecting to wifi for Internet access. Then I can receive picture and video feed from the camera I have mounted and also change the viewing angles of the camera.
2 Likes
This questions has been answered on another thread. As I recall from that post, it will work just like @elsman18 described.
When the GF broadcasts itself as an access point, does that mean my neighbors can take over my GF? This could get really interesting! 
It gets really, really interesting when your neighbors play with the kill-kill-kill button in the web interface. 
They can also print obscene pictures on your wi-fi printers, stream cat videos to your chromecast when all you wanted was a dog video, adjust your thermostat till you have to go buy winter clothes mid summer heat wave, watch your children on the nanny cam, start your car for you. We could be paranoid and you should be protecting all your devices against all those things.
Or we could remember your glowforge won’t do anything until you push the button, so their mischief is pretty limited.
Excellent point @ihermit2 - Stratasys learned that same lesson when deploying their FDM printers into high-school shop classes - a responsible “adult” must be present to push the start-print button, to screen against the students printing inappropriate items.
I’m hoping the web client for the GF can upload jobs to the GF and nothing else - both starting and stopping should be controlled by the big white button. That will prevent the GF from starting unattended, and being messed with during the job.
One of the stated benefits of a wired network is higher speed, but I suspect most (future) owners will be limited by the speed of their WAN connection. My local WiFi speed is around 50Mbps, but my WAN connection is only 30Mbps. Latency can be much worse through WiFi, but that’s generally only a concern for gaming.
The biggest unknown for me, is what throughput GF is going to pay for when sending job files to the machine. For example, Steam’s file servers deliver data at 4-5MB/s (that’s bytes, not bits). Elsewhere in these forums I read an estimate for a large job potentially running up to 100MB - that could take over 20 minutes from when you tell the web client to proceed, and the machine fully buffering the job. You may be able to start the job while it’s still downloading, but then you have to do a risk assessment to decide if you can tolerate an interruption in the download.
I think your math is a bit off here… 4-5MB/s for 100MB means 20 seconds, not minutes…
1 Like