A maker used a jailbroken Nintendo Switch to run Klipper, shifting 3D printer motion processing to a faster CPU and cutting Benchy time from 90 minutes to 8.
3D printing has a way of turning small projects into long waits, and one maker’s Prusa MK3S proved the point. Even straightforward prints felt “disappointingly tedious,” so [Cocoanix] looked for a practical way to move faster.
The solution was as unusual as it was effective: a Nintendo Switch.
There’s nothing inherently special about the console hardware that automatically makes prints quicker.. The Switch serves as a convenient platform to run Klipper, the software that changes how a printer handles motion control.. Klipper is built around a split workload.. Instead of forcing the printer’s onboard microcontroller to do all of the heavy lifting. Klipper off-loads the complex motion processing to a faster general-purpose computer.
That shift matters because many 3D printers rely on limited microcontrollers for motion calculations.. Klipper keeps those microcontrollers focused on lower-level duties. like driving the motors. while the faster CPU takes on the computation-heavy parts.. The result is that printers already equipped with Klipper can often print faster. and additional techniques such as input shaping can further improve both speed and print quality.
Of course, the Nintendo Switch is not required. [Cocoanix] notes that a Raspberry Pi or another computer would typically fill the same role. Still, the fact that the setup runs on a jailbroken console adds a certain novelty to the engineering effort.
The payoff showed up in the numbers. In the demonstration, the time to print a Benchy dropped from 90 minutes to just 8.
For viewers who want to see the workflow and results firsthand, there’s a video embedded with the Switch-based Klipper setup. It’s also a reminder that, in 3D printing, software architecture and where you place the compute can be as decisive as the printer itself.
3D printing Klipper Nintendo Switch Raspberry Pi input shaping maker projects motion control