Mach Motion

[John HaineParticipant @johnhaine32865]

Does anyone know just what is going on with Mach3 and Mach4? The company has been absorbed by something called Mach Motion and the support forum seems to be blocked. Time to change to another system perhaps?

[Clive FosterParticipant @clivefoster55965]

Looks like the Mach 3 & Mach 4 forums have been moved over to the MachPro site.

I found them via the Forum button at the bottom of this page:-  https://www.mach-labs.com/software/mach-feature-comparison/  .

Looks like MachPro is going well upmarket, maybe £500 +, with a considerable list of extra features added to Mach 4. How much are real right now are vapourware I dunno. Considerable gruff about how open and programmable it is but plug ins are only going to be permitted by folk who have signed the non-disclosure agreement and, presumably paid for access. Which doesn’t look good for access to drivers and motion control cards. Rather ominous that Mach 4 plug ins will no longer work and that users of uncertified hardware are on their own.

The claims for vast sums of money spent on development seem far fetched.

Closed nature of the software / hardware loop suggests a high probability that it will crash and burn.

Out of date before it’s launched I think. Fundamentally appears to be a Centroid competitor with a pretty face but lacking installed base support.

Modern computing power makes true vector following systems practical and affordable. Think 3D printer run backwards with step over equivalent to filament size, albeit with much greater variability. With whats out there open source a modern equivalent to mach3 price with capabilities approaching professional software is very practical.

Clive

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