I know pretty much nothing about lasers but I find myself with an Aufero Laser 1 running on an HP Laptop with Windows 11. Currently, I have no interest in cutting anything or engraving images; I simply want to engrave some text in hardwood. At this point I’ve managed to engrave the word “test” but the letters are more of an outline than sold, and they’re very blurry. Does anyone know of a source for helping beginners get started? I’ve watched a lot of videos on YouTube but none were helpful.
Ensure it’s focused properly… Look up how to do a ‘ramp test’ to see where the focal point is.
I’m a woodworker, so the only use I intend is to sign and date my work. Nothing else.
I have looked at Lightburn’s videos, but not James Dean yet. He certainly has a lot of vids though. I’ll give him a try. Thanks for the reply!
I’ll try that as well. Thanks for taking the time to reply!
That’s what you say now…
Good luck
…I know. That’s kinda how I got started with making furniture
1 Like
good luck!! share some photos
Right? - “I’m just going to make this one little end-table…” and the next thing you know… Boom… Bedroom set.
OK, after a few more hours of watching videos (thanks to JMichael) and more hours just dinking around in the program I finally was able to get off the ground. I stumbled across the ‘Beginner Mode’ option in settings (that helped clear out most the stuff I wasn’t interested in) and then came across the ‘Cuts / Layers’ tab and (low and behold) the Line, Fill, and Fill+Line options. The reason my letters were “hollow” was because I guess it defaults to ‘Line’; I switched to fill and problem solved. I didn’t need to re-focus.
The pic shows one of the several attempts on some scrap wood. When it’s finished it will go on the urn I made for my brother-in-law. After much frustration, but with the help/encouragement of this community, I created my first engraving. WooHoo!!!
I’m on my way!
LOL, and thanks for the tip!
Jut did my first image (signature) today. So much for doing text only. Down the rabbit hole I go… 
1 Like
That’s pretty cool 
Hi Brian. I really struggled to get started. I read lots of stuff and in the end it came down to testing, testing, testing. Use a spare piece of wood the same as what you want to engrave on. If you only have lines you might not have selected line and fill. I found that using 80% power and 50% speed worked for me. Good luck.
Thanks for the input! I don’t do enough engraving to become very good at it, but I have discovered there’s a real difference in outcome when it comes to speed v. power. I’ve burned a lot of wood trying to get something acceptable 
Also, there’s a big difference between hardwood and softwood, so simply saving settings doesn’t always work for the next project. Thanks again for your help.