Hello,
I’m trying to print a file with a LOTS of vector points. The file is only 1MB pdf made from the Original Illustrator file 5.6MB. When I print the file by itself it prints fine, takes 25 minutes. However, when I try to gang up 10 of the same file the GF gives me an error.
Does GF have some sort of max file size ( or number of points) that can it can handle?
I have a GF Plus. Already been upgraded to new software.
Somewhere on here I read the machine can hold about 3.5 hours worth of data total.
Can you simplify the file at all? If any of it is engraved, you could rasterize those parts (make them into embedded images) while keeping the vector paths for anything that needs to be cut. That could be a lot easier for the GF app/server to handle.
Try to print 8 or 5 at a time. You will quickly find the maximum practical size that works easily. I think the maximum is different if you have premium than if you don’t, as premium accesses more expensive servers.
Not sure the premium servers do anything other than process the designs faster. Did GF ever get around to doing data streams for overly large files or did that future feature die a quiet death?
I forget who but someone a few years back found a rough number for vector data point limits.
I believe that was @eflyguy. Not seeing him around anymore. Hope everything is ok.
I found a limit for my machine, laptop, and the app/cloud at that time, but that would likely not be a limit now. If you search for “nodes” posted by me, it appears it was ~35,000 before things started to “break”. My most complex design has 38,000 or so, and still loads just fine - I just tested, took 5 seconds from the time I opened the file in the app to get to “rendering”, about 1 second to show up in the app, and it can be moved around at-will like even the simplest shapes. Even rotating and scaling are immediate. I don’t have the “special servers” or whatever they call it (fast lane?)
It’s not a GF “feature”… cloud services are like having a fleet of cars with everything from a minivan to a race-car, and when processing needs to take place, a task will be assigned to one to handle it - except, unlike a car, the task can be re-allocated if the performance requirements mandate it.
Cloud computing has come a long way, and it’s got nothing to do with GF app features. They load the app into the cloud, and the provider handles everything else - based on licensing of performance and features GF is paying for, of course.
Node count is a good estimate but it’s not the entire story.
TL;DR: It is possible to make an SVG that is too large for the Glowforge to handle, but you’re not likely to do it in normal usage. Be wary of files that you purchase or download from the Internet because you don’t know how the person created it — They may not have designed to be optimal for your laser.
Detailed ramblings for the curious:
A quick note: much of this is theoretical, But it does line up with real world experience in terms of how the interface performance feels.
While 35,000 nodes may not be too much for the interface to handle, not all nodes are created equally. For example, if you have 35,000 nodes across 17,500 paths(as in some cad output) it’s far more difficult for the Glowforge software. Going a step further,I suspect that if you have 199 non-intersecting groups of paths of about 175 total nodes apiece (ergo still about 35000 nodes), that might be even more difficult because of the way that Glowforge handles automatic grouping— It kicks in at 200 such paths, called hull groups.
They’ve never shared with us exactly why but I’ve always expected that it’s because they’re trying to do grouping and determining if something is in a particular hull group.
Also the original question about file size… Glowforge has never stated an absolute file size maximum but I’m willing to bet there is one. Beyond that there is likely a maximum practical file size due to network speed and upload timeouts. It’s hard to hit that maximum, but if you have a file with large rasters in it you can certainly make a very large file with a low node count.
In fact it’s possible to make a zero node file that is effectively too large for the Glowforge interface to handle because it contains something like 100 MB worth of raster files and no paths.
You’re not likely to make a file like this but it is possible. And to be clear, I don’t know if 100 MB would be too large for any individual user I’m just saying that there is some upper limit where the upload will fail. And in fact you can load up an SVG with an arbitrary number of large raster files, as far as I know there’s no hard limit in the SVG standard. It would really be down to whether or not your PC could handle creating a file with a gigabyte or more worth of rasters in it.
Again, much of the specifics about how all of this works is theoretical because Glowforge doesn’t divulge details. But just knowing how the web works and some practicalities of what it takes to process and store files, some of these maximums and limits are almost certainly at play.
Also, sidenote: this is definitely one of those cases where you ask a simple question but the answer is more complicated than you might think. We get a lot of this in the Glowforge community, I call it the “minimum complexity problem”. When somebody asks a simple question like “what are the best settings to engrave a photo”, there’s just no simple answer to that. This is one of those.
The nature of each node plays a role. They generally aren’t just points with straight lines inbetween, but curves that project away from it. The processing has to convert all of that maths into coordinates that the machine can follow. If you consider that the machine can position the head to something like 1/1000", that’s a heck of a lot of processing to turn even simple curves into a set of instructions.
This topic was automatically closed after 30 days. New replies are no longer allowed.