I’m going to wait until there is 5 - 10 (currently only 2, but it’s early) “go get your money back” captions in the comments of this thread, then link them all in so you can see what the school yard bullies looks like every time a victim steps up to say something.
I’ve never had a problem dealing with bullies, so have at me all!
Much appreciated jdodds!! I’m currently ignoring those comments, as I’m simply a frustrated customer who would like some answers and who isn’t going to get into a bickering war with anyone over it.
I hear you. . . 
I know what you mean. Its hard to get any real detailed info regarding whats going on. Ive had to piece together an idea of whats happening from all of the small responses weve been given.
From my understanding here is what is happening:
Glowforge has finally gotten to the point that they are pretty much finalized with their hardware. However as they havent produced a large quantity of machines yet, and are still seeing small issues here and there, they want to increase their sample size to see if those issues scale up with the sample size. If they do, then they have a problem, and if they dont, it was just a fluke and they can continue to scale up production.
I think the threshold that they met with random problems was just enough to make them wary of going full bore right out of the gate, as that could potentially lead to a recall down the road if there really is an issue in production somewhere.
It really does seem they are ready to get these shipped to everyone, they are just taking the the necessary precautions to make sure none of those small issues theyve seen in the initial test batch propagate into the the 15k+ units that they need to ship.
Im super frustrated by the extra time its going to take, but Id be even more frustrated to have to ship my unit back and them go bankrupt because they made 15k+ defective lasers. I think were really close to getting them…
I get your reasoning, @takitus, and I’m trying to convince myself of this as well, but it is a third delay, a last minute announcement, little more than copy/paste responses and answers, and lack of information that’s pushing me more and more into the ‘I better get my money back and find an equivalent or better product while I still can’ category.
The elephant in the room is regulatory approvals. In the video Dan stated CE was started, not completed and was a long lead time item. My guess is it only just started as we know pre-production machines have a different metallic coating to production. Production samples would need to be submitted as the coating would affect EMC and probably safety.
He was also asked a direct question as to whether UL and FCC have been granted here: Schedule update (December '16). He didn’t answer but he answered some other questions in the same post. From that I assume they don’t have UL and FCC either as if they did it would be easy to say so. That means they can’t sell any yet and until they can be sure of passing they can’t manufacture in bulk.
I’m not really sure that’s any more helpful than people repeatedly making those arguments. It would be a shame for the reverse to be done to people like the OP, who are also just voicing their feelings and opinions, no?
Everyone is allowed to say what they think, at least until staff steps in and says otherwise, and everyone is angry and frustrated and sad.
to be fair, -on this point and this point alone- there are only so many different ways to apologize for the same thing.
If I had to apologize to ten people for the same thing, I might start sounding like copy/paste. Dan is responding to… more than 10.
It’s unfortunate there is a contradiction between the people who want more information and those that are quietly swallowing the news while gritting their teeth. Those that want more information about the delays are clashing with those that feel they have heard enough information and feel that more information gathering will only delay things further.
If you are a member of the first group and you can find the time to read the forums, hopefully you’ll glean the answers that resolves any misgivings. Some people don’t have time for that and want immediate answers, but that would come at the expense of the second group. As a personal opinion, I think perhaps 90% of the Regulars are in the latter camp because keeping up with the forums has been more reassuring.
Yeah, Im really not too happy with the way they handle these issues either. Last delay I made post after post about the need for better communication, for them to show us these features theyve promised since the beginning (3d engraving/raster engraving), and to work with the community a little more.
None of that seems to have changed in terms of how they interact with the public. They seem to have their need for moderate secrecy about certain things. I dont think anyone online really knows why. Dan has been pretty excited to show us the new features when he’s been allowed to (im assuming thats the case… I dont know whos calling the shots).
But from what we have seen, the featureset has finally been filled out for the most part, and it looks like its down to software tweaks for the most part. Thats great news. The 3D engraving stuff is finally being shown and its amazing! I cant think of anything else that would really keep them from delivering at this point. The 3D engraving seemed to be the most monumental hurdle.
Having seen that the hardware has reached the place it needs to be gave me a pretty good sense of relief. Im almost 100% positive they will ship. We cant really do much but wait to see if all of the small components pass the stress tests which is what stage it seems theyre at.
It could be something as small as making sure the hinges they are using can withstand opening and closing 100,000 times and still have the lid camera be in the same place. Itll take a little while for those robots to churn through the units they give them for testing, and we’ll be the better for it.
If you decide to stay in, I think youll be happy in the end. If not, lasers are fun in general and im sure you will enjoy using whatever you get. I got a k40 in the meantime and its been a lot of fun. It also makes me realize how much better the glowforge will be when it gets here because its not some hacked together plugin for a pirated version of corel draw lol.
I feel like I’m in the same boat, I’m really curious what specifically happened to cause this delay after being so close. The one thought that keeps coming up in my head to calm me down is "Dan is super excited to release this thing to the world and make his backers happy. If he can’t say what it is, it’s probably because of some weird legal thing or waiting for patents to be approved or something."
I can come to this conclusion and feel relieved because I met him in person and have interacted with him over various media for a little over a year now. In all that time he has always remained, well himself. I’m sure he is dying to give us updates, but his very wise advisors and counsels know what the end result of certain disclosures will be. This is a highly advertised project, and competitors are like piranha in bloody water. If you want to see how easy it is to steal someone’s ideas and undercut them, you only have to look at Harbor Freight.
Well, based on things @dan has mentioned it sounds like there isn’t one specific thing, just a lot of random little problems that add up to make current machines too unreliable to ship. Things as unpredictable as static electricity building up on a sticker. (That was one of the specific examples he mentioned.)
I doubt he wants to post a list of all the things they’ve seen go wrong; that would be bad marketing. They just need some time to find and solve all the little things that can only be discovered through actually using the machines. Obviously they should have had more beta testers earlier in the process, and they really should get a few dozen pre-release units out for testing, so they can find and fix all these issues faster.
He also said the line of faulty machines he had are now in storage in the basement. That is odd as there should be engineers crawling all over them to find out the problems as that would be high priority if it is what is stalling production.
cc: @tim1724
I dont think its anything specific. I think this is quite possibly the reasoning behind the delay:
I also think they are attempting to prevent WebMD syndrome by telling us all the little things that have failed on one or two glowforges and having us worry about that when we get ours, when it really isnt statistically going to be an issue.
In my opinion, one feature that is not yet up to snuff is the ability to align the print job with the bed material that is captured with the lid camera. This is more than just a pass-through feature issue…
Imagine that everyone attempted the same approach that you did and emailed GF directly. Did you really expect anything more than a canned response given that they probably have several hundred, if not thousands of emails in their in-boxes, all demanding the same thing?
Every person who is unhappy and has commented on the desire for “more transparency” has a different criteria to be placated. You want issues and resolutions - never mind the fact that in a complicated hardware platform that is married to an incredibly complex software interface there could be hundreds of issues that need resolving. Someone else wants photos and videos, very specifically cell-phone. Someone else wants independent audits. Someone else wants Dan to step down. So that’s four people who have all put down a similar stake (i.e. pre-ordered at least one Glowforge) all with different criteria to be happy.
Dan (or his lawyers) have to draw a line in the sand somewhere. They cannot please everyone. They have chosen where that line is based on information that we don’t have and aren’t entitled to. They absolutely shift that line and allow more information out as it becomes safe to do so. (i.e. proof of 3D engrave, pre-release user free to discuss anything and everything about his pre-release Glowforge)
Dan has said that they are considering all input from these forums, particularly when it applies to communications. He has said that if they decide to change their approach, they will just change the approach and move forward with it. He has acquiesced to posting photos. First he posted a stitched together shot of each GF at HQ, and when that wasn’t enough to placate he posted a shot of four units all in the same photo. Additionally, it has been only five days since the announcement. If they were planning on changing their approach to communications, it would likely take more than five days to get approval for it. Yes, Dan has to get approvals. Sure, he’s CEO, but he has to answer to lawyers, and he has to answer to investors. So be patient.
It will only get better in the coming months. More pre-release units will go out, more reports will come in, more photos, more videos. More pieces of the puzzle will be beyond the point at which opposition obtaining it will be a problem.
I’ve backed 25-30 crowdfunding campaigns including other tech ones (never at this high of a cost though). In my experience, GF has been far more communicative about everything than any other tech campaign I’ve ever seen. Thus far they are still under-par for delays too. As for the rest of the categories that I’ve been involved with; software is far, far worse than GF in communication; board games run the gamut from more to less communication than GF. But if I had to rank all the crowdfunding campaigns, I’d easily put GF in the top 90%. Granted, my sample size is small, but it is still relative.
Oh yeah I definitely agree. Luckily that’s all software, so they can still send us our lasers while they’re getting those pieces to talk to each other.
If possible I’m planning on doing some hackery to their software to add some additional features they haven’t implemented. Ive got a little list I’m working on
I originally thought that way. And I’ve been pretty upfront with Dan about opening up more. But I’ve been thinking about it a bit and decided he may actually be right in his reticence. I asked myself what I’d do with the info if he said “we had 10 machines where there was static build up on a sticker inside that we needed to move the sticker to the outside and we had 2 machines where the screw holding the flamminpocket to the flupperjuper dislodged after running for 47 hours straight and we had 1 machine that refuses to turn on if the humidity goes above 65% and a machine that won’t turn off without making brrrmmm…brrrrrmmmm…brrrrrmmm noises.”
(all hypothetical by the way)
What would I do with that info? I can’t do anything about it. I can’t solve the problems. I can’t even evaluate whether the problem is big or small. Maybe the sticker static is a non-issue or maybe it points to some aura leakage from the high voltage side of the power supply. I just wouldn’t have enough information from a simple listing of the problems and their fix status.
That really sucks because I’m an engineer and I want to fix things 
I also was wicked pissed that he had unicorn and rainbow announcements all the way up to the “not this year after all” announcement. Again, I sat in his shoes and said, okay it’s beginning of Nov & we’re toast, too many bad units. He’s got to tell us there’s a problem, what he’s doing about it and maybe making some kind of financial concession. That ain’t all going to get formulated and agreed upon with the Board/VCs in a week or even two (especially with a holiday in there). So it’s not unreasonable for them to have taken 3 weeks or more to figure out what to do and how to communicate it.
I actually thought back in the first announcement about Pre-Release units (was that in Oct?) that December was out. With the process being selecting, sending, receiving, using, providing feedback, evaluating feedback, making changes, implementing changes on the line, producing - it just wasn’t happening in the calendar time available. But I had doe-eyed hope I was wrong 
I’m actually somewhat in that same mind with the July date - with only a single admitted to certification (don’t remember which one but it wasn’t anything I recall ever seeing before), 50 machines going to testing (which based on the right side/left side comment about good vs defective machines, suggests more than 100 will be needed to produce 50 to go to testing) which will eat up more than a month of production at their current production pace. Then there’s getting the results of those tests & pre-release and beta into the evaluate/change/test/commit cycle before sending the final production ready units to the various certification agencies for testing. That certification can take 8 weeks to 4 months without glitches. And then start manufacturing for production release. Not sure that’s doable in the next 6 months either. It’s daunting.
But I’m hanging in there because of what @takitus said about the K40 (and it’s brethren out there - commodity chinese produced lasers in general), the results of the 3D engrave and the promise of that removable head…
Truly, I was also starting to look at the knock-off Chinese lasers and it was @takitus posts about the headaches, incessant tuning and poor variable engraving that solidified continuing to wait for the GF.
I love mine (hate them too though) - a laser in the hand (or garage), even a Chinese one, is better than no laser at all if you’re any kind of tinkerer and not afraid to muck with things. But I still want my GF to do things I can’t do with mine and will be a love-love relationship