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A5S mainboard and LCD. Why so expensive?
giantrobot2001
Posts: 106🌟 Super Member 🌟
The board for the A5S is $70, the LCD is $50 plus shipping from China. Is there an alternative? Do the A5 parts swap over? The MKS Gen L system seems a lot more reasonable.
Post edited by giantrobot2001 on
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The original A5 and A3s use readily available generic MKS electronics, so the prices are competitive amongst the various sellers on Amazon and Aliexpress - not so cheap if you buy from JGAurora, who seem to sell all spares at 2x to 3x the price I can buy from Aliexpress - just look how much JGAurora charge for generic nozzles, heater cartridges and thermistors
I've not yet bought the A1 I have my eye on - it supposedly prints better with a 32 bit board than the A5 does with an 8 bit board - but then again Makerbase have MKS 32 bit versions of the Gen_L - they are called SGen_L - and the 32 bit version is the same price as the 8 bit version (less than £12 including postage from Aliexpress) - so I suppose you could fit a SGen_L to an A5 if the firmware will still run - MKS also have Robin and various other 32 bit boards that could possibly be used if you don't mind experimenting and modding
I still say the A1 is a good machine for the money if you are prepared to swap out any custom parts that fail with generic parts (no way would I buy JGAurora electronics)
https://www.aliexpress.com/store/1047297
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/33057853469.html
The above kit has improved stepper drivers than came with the A5, but apart from having to also flash the TFT board, should be quite easy to retro-fit
There are youtube videos about flashing the TFT - JGAurora A5 screen uses standard MKS firmware - you can select how the screen looks using MKS supplied versions, or use this: https://jgaurorawiki.com/a5/lcd-firmware
Main difference with A5 and A5s is that the A5 has 2 controllers - the mainboard and the TFT board - you flash them seperately, and lose some functions such as filament out/print resume depending on whether you are printing from memory stick or USB cable
Lots of info on messing with MKS boards and displays - main thing will be the main board to display board cable pinouts - not sure if they are all the same
I'd like to hear if upgrading from MKS Gen L to MKS SGen L is trouble free - not totally convinced 32 bit is that much better, but would be interested to find out from anybody who has tried it
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=upgrade+mks+gen_L+mks2.8+tft
Yes, you put a SD card in there and power on the printer - display board automatically goes into firmware update mode
You must first unplug the data cable to the display board, or the flash can go horribly wrong and corrupt the bootloader of the control board processor, making things more complicated, otherwise its a simple process
The original A5/A3s V1 Gen_L 8 bit board is essentially an arduino mega with extras for motor control and heaters - so it is usually programmed as an arduino mega using arduino IDE programming tool which is a free download
You must flash with A5 firmware, not A5s firmware
The wiring is going to be different, but things work the same - the original board had lots of loose wiring that had ID labels so you knew where the wires plugged into the board - your wiring will likely be a lot neater, but going to custom plug in connectors - so going to need wires identifying and soldering to correct types of plugs
There are photos of the Gen_L board and wiring on here somewhere
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