While additive manufacturing (AM), commonly known as 3D printing, has been in existence commercially for ∼30 years, desktop 3D printers are a relatively new and rapidly growing market segment. Both well-established AM companies and an increasing number of new enterprises are designing and retailing desktop systems of various sizes, capabilities, and prices. With the abundance of desktop systems now on the market, a consumer may benefit from determining which system best serves their needs. This research highlights differences amongst 45 desktop 3D printers and suggests a method by which to evaluate such differences. For this, a standard part consisting of various geometric features was designed and printed using each system. An updated version of a previously developed quantitative ranking model was utilized to rate the build precision of each system as well as other features, including build volume, size, cost, weight, and layer resolution. In addition, the research team observed part aesthetics and quantified mechanical properties. The criteria evaluated in this ranking model may be modified by each user, to extend this methodology to other desktop AM systems, including professional-grade machines. The results from the model presented in this research were compared with other commonly used ranking methods to help evaluate each technique. These included a simple ascending order rank based model adjusted for ties (1-best and 45-worst), a percentile value based model evaluating the factor contribution values presented in this paper; and the Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to an Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) which evaluated separation measures from ideal and worst solutions. As expected, the comparisons demonstrated that each model had slightly different rankings as compared to the model presented in this paper, with some outliers. Consequently, it was observed that percentile value based models (such as one presented in this paper) provide rankings different from separation value based models (from ideal and worst solutions) such as TOPSIS.

虽然增材制造（AM），通常称为3D打印，已经在商业上存在了大约30年，但台式机3D打印机是一个相对较新且增长迅速的细分市场。知名的AM公司和越来越多的新企业都在设计和零售各种尺寸，功能和价格的台式机系统。随着现在市场上大量的台式机系统，消费者可以从确定哪种系统最能满足其需求中受益。这项研究突出了45种台式3D打印机之间的差异，并提出了一种评估这种差异的方法。为此，使用每个系统设计并打印了由各种几何特征组成的标准零件。利用以前开发的定量排名模型的更新版本来评估每个系统的构建精度以及其他功能，包括构建体积，大小，成本，重量和层分辨率。此外，研究小组还观察了零件的美观性并量化了机械性能。每个用户可以修改此排名模型中评估的标准，以将该方法扩展到其他台式机AM系统，包括专业级机器。将本研究中提出的模型的结果与其他常用的排名方法进行比较，以帮助评估每种技术。其中包括针对领带（1最佳和45最差）调整的简单的基于升序等级的模型，评估本文提出的因素贡献值的基于百分位值的模型；以及类似于理想解决方案的订单偏好技术（TOPSIS），该技术评估了从理想和最差解决方案中分离的措施。不出所料，比较结果表明每个模型的排名与本文提出的模型相比略有不同，但存在一些离群值。因此，可以观察到基于百分比值的模型（例如本文中介绍的模型）提供的排名与基于分离值的模型（理想和最差解决方案）（例如TOPSIS）不同。