Hi, we got ourselves a xTool P2 and are currently trying out Lightburn but, while some things are nice to have for sure, many things that make xTool Creative Software convenient are simply missing or not working.
Here’s our main issues we cannot get to work (missing?):
Camera and all related features like eg close up
Auto measuring
Curved lasering
Those two are about the most important things we bought the P2 for because it saves a lot of time however, they simply aren’t there or not working.
Having to switch to XCS, measure the distance, convert the measurement and put it into Lightburn for each peace that has a different height is, simply put, a pita!
Also placing something correctly without seeing the piece in the overlay is almost impossible to get right. Mostly you are just a tiiiiny bit off, ruining the piece and wasting your time and money.
Anyway, with those main features missing, i see no reason why i would choose Lightburn. Sure, the ability to make the process of lasering itself faster is very nice and saves time, throwing away 80% because you’re just off a tiny bit ruins that gain.
So question is:
When are those features added?
Are they added and we’re just too stupid to get it to work?
Can you export an optimised path to XCS and laser it from there?
They do have a camera function, but I don’t know how it interfaces.
Auto Measure, appears to be what we could call auto focus… This is handled by the controller in the end. I watched a Youtube on this and it also appears to be some kind of proprietary software/hardware.
This (and curve) requires the Z axes to be controlled… I noticed that the Z axes is turned off in their setup. I can only conclude they don’t use any kind of standard controls for this or the controller handles it some way.
There is a curve setup in Lightburn is for cylinder correction… it only works with a galvo at the moment, but there has been comments on how to move it to the dsp and grbl machines.
It appears to be no standard information on how this works. Making development difficult, if not impossible.
Usually the problem is the manufacturer doesn’t want to give any details to developers. Since it’s probably proprietary in the software and details are hidden… probably not likely until they are willing to cooperate.
There is also software architecture to contend with…might not be so easily implemented as we may think.
You can export out of Lightburn, but I’m lacking what you mean exactly.
A better answer can come from Lightburn, if this doesn’t cover it.
As for the camera, the P2 has two cameras integrated, one for close ups and a normal one. While they’re working nicely in XCS, in LBS they’re not even recognised because i cannot get them activated, let alone working.
Curved isn’t so important right now for me as of right now, i just realised it’s not as feature complete as in XCS.
A rotary support seems to be present, haven’t tested that yet.
Since xTool states it supports Lightburn Software, i suppose they are somehow working together to get everything working - after all, xTool is the hot sh** right now and LBS is the biggest laser related software on the market, so it would make sense to get everything working together. For the sake of both of them (and the users)!
Considering exporting, i meant the path the laser takes when i select offset fill, which seems to really save a lot of time. However, i haven’t found a way to export the actual way the laser should go into XCS.
You can use LightBurn to create your design and operate xTool P2 to cut materials. Currently, the camera and auto-focus functions are not supported by LightBurn. You need to perform framing to preview the processing area and manually input the material thickness.
I think if these were standard grbl controls, it would work…
You would think…
IMHO, these Chinese companies don’t tell any free countries anything they don’t need to know…
I have read that Lightburn has reached out to some of these companies and was denied any information… so they appear to be blocking this information, hence the available support…
Either put up with the deficiencies of Lightburn/xTool or use their software…
Well, if they write Lightburn compatible on their flag, they should support it.
Guess it’s time i’ll go to their forums and ask around there because imho “compatible” shouldn’t just be “works somehow” but “works flawlessly”!
Even though it says you can use Lightburn, they do state some functions are not currently working with Lightburn.
Currently, generally means it’s vaporware and may never exist.
Maybe @JohnJohn can give us some kind of clue as to whether they have any communications with xTool to correct these issues…
If it gets added or not, is probably related to xTool giving some kind of support to the Lightburn developers details of what they need to do to make the p2’s hardware/firmware functional…
After a quick review of the communication through our support email, we seem to lack technical input from them. We look forward to hearing from them on technical matters and specifications. XCS appears to be a closed-format proprietary file. They also own the rights to and contents of all the files on their cloud service.
They don’t write code for LightBurn. They are welcome to send us an lbdev file and enough information so the LightBurn dev team won’t have to reverse-engineer the commands specific to the xTool P2 but I’m not optimistic.
I wish you great success in this. Again, we’re looking forward to hearing from them. Please feel free to share screenshots and links to their responses. I would be interested to hear about your experiences with their forum.
The reason that they turn off Z-axis is that positive value is downward.
In addition, there two different measurement system for Z axis (slate, and open).
For slate mode, the formula is 25-n where n is material thickness.
I seem to be hearing that the lightburn developers are waiting on XTool you provide information on how to support the hardware. Well, ktmcmo managed to do so with his P2Controller interface. The Lightburn developers cannot do the same? I understand that there may have been a bit of trial and error and reverse engineering at play. My hats off to the ktmcmo your doing a great job but it would be so nice to have native lightburn support. Keep up the good work. You are bridging a severe limitation with lightburn and the P2. I look forward to autofocus support.
The camera is set to my setting. Do the calibration as each camera varies a little different. Beside it is fun. In additon, double check the Z setting and make sure that they are disable as I’m try to remap the axis.
Our Dev team is very productive and very busy. The P2 has a small following so it’s a lower priority. We have two xTool P2 engravers for support and analysis.
While these efforts are interesting and appreciable, the GPL 3+ license terms prevent us from using this code for ‘native LightBurn support’ because LightBurn is a commercial venture. I’ve been told (in no uncertain terms) that our dev team won’t even look at it.
In additon, double check the Z setting and make sure that they are disable as I’m try to remap the axis.