3D printing is much the same way - it gets mesmerizing to watch the filament get laid down little by little, at least for me.
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Drives my wife nuts - Iâll disappear for hours and sheâs wondering whatâs going on. Iâm playing with designs, watching the machine, tweaking things. Giant time suck 
(Thatâs why I keep track of how long things take - I always underestimate them and they always take longer than I think they should so it would just set bad expectations for when Iâll be done.)
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Those of us old enough to have used darkrooms experienced the same thing. A minute and a half here, a minute and a half there, and suddenly itâs six hours later.
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Just think, once your Glowforge is âin the houseâ, she might be the disappearing act.
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So far sheâs got no interest in the laser in the garage. I wouldnât put her through the trials of that process either 
But the GF might be something sheâll decide she wants to learn to use. She does like some of the things I can do with the laser but right now thinks itâs too hard for her. Sheâs Danâs use case.
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The ancient Greeks had two words for time, chronos and kairos. Chronos refers to chronological or sequential time, while kairos signifies a time lapse, a moment of indeterminate time in which everything happens.
Anytime you get âlost in the momentâ youâve slipped from chronos to kairos. My wife is in kairos whenever she is painting or quilting, as am I when making or flying.
Described nicely in Star Trek: InsurrectionâŚ
Anij: Have you ever experienced, a perfect moment in time?
Captain Picard: A perfect moment?
Anij: When time seemed to stop, and you could almost live, in that moment.
Captain Picard: Seeing my home planet from space, for the first time.
Anij: Yes. Exactly. Nothing more complicated than perception.
Anij: âŚWeâve discovered that a single moment in time can be a universe in itself, full of powerful forces. Most people arenât aware enough of the now to even notice.
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That gives me an idea to find someone who hasnât done anything like this before. Sit them down at the computer or give them the iPad (it does work well!) and have them make something without instructions.
I do believe the Glowforge, like Silhouettes and Cricuts, can be the gateway to higher computer literacy, where the computer assists to solve problems and is a tool rather than just another media device or fancy typewriter.
Learning design software is an important leg up on things, but just using hand drawings will be enough for a lot of people.
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That is how I would identify my wife as. Once Glowie 
has arrived, my wife will be getting exposed to its use and personalized attention from me on whatever she wants to do with it.
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What do you base this statement on? The Pro models description begins:
Our Pro model is designed for frequent, shared use, like a makerspace.
Something cannot be designed for shared frequent use if it is slow.
This really concerns me.
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Itâs based on any video from fairs or pre-release customers uploaded so far. The big killer is engraving - expect it take probably an hour to do anything bigger than a couple of inches (the Tested video suggested it took approx 40 minutes to do its scan and trace and engrave on the sketch). Vector cutting is probably reasonable unless youâre doing something pretty intricate.
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I wouldnât be worried about it for a Makerspace. The trouble with words like âfastâ or âslowâ is theyâre relative.
Any laser is screamingly, mindblowingly faster than asking the same cuts & engraves by hand (at the same levels of precision). Any 40W CO2 laser is agonizingly slow compared to a 130W or 1KW laser. Speed costs money - more piles of it than most of us likely have.
So what.
The GF is at least as fast as any other alternative similarly sized laser you can get. Decrease resolution and itâs faster. Increase resolution and itâs slower. Increase power and itâs faster. Decrease power and itâs slower. Faster/slower than what? Than itself or a similar laser with similar resolution and power. Itâs physics. Last time I checked that was the law 
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Sigh.
So pretty much all Brands&models with the same Tube type will perform similarly and the only practical way to increase is move up in Tube?
However say a Model has insufficient cooling, then it would overheat quicker thus creating downtime?
Voccell DLS 60W
engraving speed 400mm/s,
Max. cutting speed 800mm/s
Duty cycle Unlimited @ Full Power
Full Spectrum H
engraving speed 300mm/s,
Duty Cycle @ 72 F Ambient = Est. 15 Minutes @ 90%
g.weike
storm 5030 (35w lasertube )
engraving speed 0 to 60,000mm/min
Liaocheng Xianming
6040
Max engraving Speed 1000mm/s
Max cutting speed 600mm/s
Redsail 50W
Max. cutting speed 200mm/s
KEHUI
50W
Max moving speed: 500mm/s
Generally speaking thatâs correct. As you noted cooling is important and will affect throughput but I often do projects with hour long run times and it doesnât stop the machine. Iâve only had issues during the heat of summer (90sF+) after several hours of engraving/cutting.
Tube size is critical (& often not correctly identified by cheap Chinese lasers - they almost always report the max possible rating, not the rating for general running - like redlining it in the car vs normal operating RPMs).
You also get slight differences based on motor quality. The better motors can be run faster. Thatâs why you see some differences in the models you referenced.
GFâs tubes are almost certainly correctly rated. But theyâre also doing some neat things with speed & power management that improves throughput managed by their software.
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Thank you this will help simplify my comparisons and purchase decisions.
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I did my first foray into custom, manual settings. I did 50% power and 100 inches per minute using a 50% grey scale small image. I didnât catch anything on fire 
and it did what I expected. A very light engrave just about enough to show.
So I have a starting point for a test file.
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Great. Good luck with your tests. Look forward to seeing more.
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