Hey guys! I'm looking for an affordable laser engraver and glowforge has been on my radar for a while. It's a little over my price range, but is it worth the money?
These fora are for engineering-related questions for practicing engineers... your laser questions don't really fit that criteria. I recommend you look at some of the Facebook groups available for this type of information, or fora designed with hobbyist-style questions in mind (like Sawmill Creek).
But before this thread disappears... no, the GlowForge is an over-priced, over-hyped piece of engineering fluff. A Chinese system purchased for way less than half of the price will do the exact same thing with only a slight increase in learning curve, particularly considering the GF uses all of the same major components as any other Chiense system on the market.
They do no such thing. They take standard COTS material that everyone else sells and slap a label on it. There are absolutely zero unique properties about the materials they sell (other than a higher price tag).