ive been wanting to get into octoprint for over a year now and this video just made it happen for me! Tons of android phones laying around waiting for a second chance.
I have as well, and the dongles...but also have like 6 rpi's here so Ill use that as I dont love the idea of batteries in a heated chamber. I do think this is a great solution to use old phones though, as there isnt many use cases for them and if you are like me you have a bunch of them.
For benchmarking the UI load time over an other browser, I recommend to time it after the login screen. The login screen has been optimised to take the least resources possible. Speaking as a dev who works with OctoPrint on the daily. Great vid and eye opener. Really enjoy it whenever people can repirpose their old hardware
What a gem this guy is, I discovered Tom a while back, but only now realise how amazing his content is, useful, innovative, novel, fast, comprehensive and to the point. Really enjoy listening, very good and humble teacher and also very fair on and subtle with sponsers and never in your face to support him. Amazing 3D printing channel, subscribed and hopefully will try support you somehow. Keep up the amazing work, we really appreciate it!
ohh man, I have wondered if a phone could be used for several years. I thought I would have to root it and install something complex. This is ground breaking for me. Amazing video
Honestly, thanks for doing this. I was looking into ways of running RasPi apps virtualized in Android and this video popped up in my suggested a few days later, this is literally perfect. As a few folks have said below, for Creality printers that have backpower issues, cover the fourth pin (5V) on the USB-A connector (host side plug, one that will go into the hub or adapter) with a small bit of electrical tape as well to take some of the strain off these older batteries. Have it working now, and I thank you and the Dev behind this app, for putting in great work!
Now this was a very useful video. What to do with your old phone once you upgraded to the new contract phone. And no need for HDMI cables to a monitor you are using on your PC. Very nice. Thank you Tom for always coming up with a relavent topic for your videos. FYI, your 18650 battery video. I pay 1.5 Euro's for a brand new battery. So you paying 1 Euro each is a massive saving when you need hundreds of them.
I just recently got a 3d printer and wanted to have octoprint but i dont have a raspberry pie, i have so much faith of people believing there might be already a solution that you can use android phone as an alternate, so i searched the keywords, android phone octoprint and here i am. A big thank you to you sir for creating this video and the developers behind this!.
UI Customizer plugin also gives a better responsive mobile experience for loading the interface on the phone directly and is still actively developed where TouchUI has several plugin conflicts and doesn't seem to be maintained anymore.
As a returning 3D printer user I wanted to set up octoprint but I did not want to buy new hardware so I installed it on an old Raspberry 1B(!) I had lying around. Everything worked fine, even a webcam, but it was incredibly slow. Inspired by your video I converted my old Xiaomi Mi A1 (Android 9, LineageOS) to an octoprint server and everything works flawlessly and the UI is really snappy. Filip did an amazing job on the Android port, thank you very much for bringing it to my attention. To be honest I kept my old phone exactly because I was thinking about an application like this and I couldn't think of a better way to repurpose my old phone.
I actually just reorganized my game room and actually found my Galaxy S3. I thought about just formatting it and tossing it out but I'm super glad I kept it now. I even have the USB dongle it came with as well so all I need is a splitter. Great video, thank you!
THANK YOU... I've been wanting to look more into OctoPrint, but since I've only had my 3D printer for a couple months I thought it could wait until I figure a few more things out. Now this might open up a whole new realm of possibilities. I have few old phones lying around (like everyone else) and even a couple tablets that I might be able to re-life as a print server :)
4:20 I used one of these on my trip to Japan. I used my phone to take tons of pictures. When it was full I used this to move the pictures to a flash drive, then went right back to taking pictures.
For you and for everyone: I waited a few weeks to write my opinion. After then I can confirm Octo4a works very well for me. I tested it on more smartphones. It worked also on a quite old Huawei P8 Lite. It runs now on a Huawei P20 Lite without any performace problem. I was able to set the energy management easyly. I made an "Y" cable, but it didn't work for either. It is currently running only on battery power. It lasts even up to a 24 hour of printing, or more. With a very used battery!! Especially when I turn off the camera server. I ordered a USB multiport hub. It's on the way. I hope it will work. I don't want to modify the phone with an additional battery charging module. The only one issue to me is about the camera focus. When I turn off autofocus, everything will be awful blurry. With autofocus too, but not as much as when it's turned off. I saw on github this is a current issue. So I'm waiting it will be fixed sometime. Overall I'm happy. I installed a BLtouch sensor. I was really scared to modify my printer. I scared about changing the firmware and losing the SD support too. But everything works fine. By the way my printer is Anet A8 Plus.
Have you managed to get charging to work with the hub you mentioned? I have a p20 lying around with information regarding simultaneous charge with otg scarce for whatever reason. I'm curious if you got it going and if you did, could you share the model of the hub?
@@rigormoritz Same issue, bought a otg cable from the link thomas provided but my one plus one doesn't charge while connected to the printer. thus the printer gets usb "power" from the connector of the charger....
I had several usb connection lost issues with my odroid xu4 running octoprint and I was just about to order a raspberry. After I had seen this video, I hooked up my Nexus 7 (from 2012!) and gave it a shot. It is not only running more reliable now, but having octoprint acessible right next to the printer on a big touchscreen is such a treat.
I'm glad that you are advertising a PCB company because I might need to get a PCB made with parts soldered soon. I just added to favorites. I have a few companies that do PCB in favorites and I will compare to see who is cheaper.
I'm still amazed it's so hard to find a phone sized for actual daily carry and real human hands out there. The only flagship I can think of is the Asus Zenfone 8 (non-flip) - which imo is the best Android phone on the market right now imo. That said - I'd still rather use a Raspberry Pi for Octoprint, but that's just my preference.
I miss my original LG Nexus 5. 4" screen is perfect in the hand, we don't need all this glass and aluminum. New phones are ridiculously large and heavy.
On the phone clamp: Edelkrone has a phone clamp in their partially 3d printable line of products. Granted, the non-printable parts still cost more than the clamps you linked to. But printer cred! :D
Thanks Thomas for the info! Yesterday I was finally able to convert my old android phone without a battery to a printer support! I've removed the battery, soldered wires to the test pads (fortunately there were 3 of them for each traces!), added a LM2596s module and a 10k resistor as a thermistor. Without a resistor the phone won't turn on. Previously I've tried several Y microusb OTG cables but the phone stopped charging after a few seconds. This way I can use it until the charger is plugged in.
Okay, tried printing a few models now and have some trouble maintaining stable connection. I'm getting timeouts randomly and that causes the printer to pause for a few seconds. Sometimes the motherboard disconnects completely and the printer fully stops. I'm not sure if it's some kind of noise, but I'll check with a raspberry pie soon.
I'm trying something different myself. I grabbed a trash tier Galaxy J3 and made it charge between 40 and 60 percent through software (AdvancedChargingController). Less risk than a constant 100% charge. Making it work through a usb cable without battery is possible, but it's too much of a hack job.
@@MiGujack3 Totally agree with you! I wanted to go this way, tried like 3 or 4 different OTG + charging cables (for micro usb port), but I gave up. I wasn't be able to charge it while using as a host.
@@adamhun994 I will do a custom cable myself and report back. One of the pins should be disabled to prevent power going to the printer board. As in, full lines go to the phone but only 3 go to the printer board.
Great idea! I have my three old android phones stacked in a box and haven't got around to adding a webcam to my Cr10SProV2+Octoprint+RPi2+Klipper yet :) Now I won't need to hunt around for a probably at most 720p webcam for the pi at a probably not cheap price :D
Simplish webcams are affordable again. I could buy a 1080p30 webcam with a very wide angle lens and fixed focus and terrible IR rejection and slightly wonky colour at Conrad for only 15€ (regular price for this sort of thing hovers around 30€) just a couple weeks ago. But it is actually super sharp and actually 30fps in MJPEG mode.
been looking for a raspi 3 for th last 2 weeks now and havent found any in stock that werent just too expensive for my use. Have phones just lying around, this was super easy to set up and looks to be working great :D Thanks for the video!
I always wanted to use octoprint but never got around to it but now that it's so easy to get it going I will definitely give this a try with my spare samsung galaxy S9+ hope it will work well. Thanks Tom for this video and many other videos this is why I sub to your channel over 4 years ago. Your videos are always packed with useful information.
Thank you for this! I am glad to have a use for my old devices and having a camera built in is great. Also noticed that when uploading print files on octoprint it is much faster than my rasp pi setup
That triagonal mosaic is so beautiful! BTW, it's probabably best to remove the battery because of potential fire hazard. There are some workarounds for the missing battery.
Are you a scorpio Tom? This is awesome i do not have many heros but you are definitely one of those heros bro. You made a huge impact in the 3d printing community and i can honestly say you always have been legit . Thank you
I've tried this, ended up getting a used 3b anyways. It's near impossible to find a dongle that will charge and transmit data simultaneously, and even if I got that working, running my old androids for more than 15 mins could probably let me print abs on the glass
Wish I'd seen this a few months ago, before I bought a Raspberry Pi 3B. I managed to find a decent deal, but I will definitely be using Octo4a for my next OctoPrint installation!
I'd just like you (and your sponsor) to know that I was just looking at getting a PCB printed and the sponsor message couldn't have come at a better time. Plus, I suddenly find myself with a spare Android phone and OTG connector I was almost retiring. Spooky good timing
My RPi4 just died, and orders for a replacement are at least a year out (14 months for me). Found this while looking for alternatives, and this appears to be a really good one and has me hopeful to get my printer back up and going.
Even two years later this makes more sense over a Raspberry Pi. With a phone you get all you need, the processing platform, a camera, power source, power backup (at least for the OctoPrint instance) and internet backup (WiFi and 4G or 5G). Additionally, in some setups you need an additional display since some displays can't be connected reliably to a Raspberry Pi.
Something to consider while using a phone/tablet : If it's plugged continuously (like 24/7) for a long period of time (like months) the risks are way higher that the battery inflates, so big risk of fire. I learned that by experience and bunch of other folks had the same issue trying to recycle their old phone
@@nobodyontheinternet784 consider to check voltages. It is fine to apply 3.7-4V constantly. But very cheap charger boards are not that precise often. If they apply like 4.3V to a battery then yes battery can easily inflate or just die.
I thought I was wasting money last year when I bought several Pi 4's to use for emulation. Now all of my enclosures have been gutted and I'm definitely glad I grabbed them when I did.
Wish this had come out sooner. I've been using an old 2008 iMac I bought from a local school for about a year now. Works perfectly fine, but it takes up a lot more room.
Dear Thomas. Your explanation is impeccable, very detailed and easy to understand. I had been wondering if there was a way to replace the Raspberry Pi with an Arduino nano or uno (looking for a cheaper option since PI is very expensive where I live)...and suddenly, you came up with this great video and explanation. I just started 3D printing and the truth is that there are interesting things to learn. I have already subscribed to your channel. I send you a big greeting from the South of Argentina!
Thanks Thomas! been trying to get OctoPrint for my printers and i didnt want to spend like $100 on a Pi, and my old phones been sitting here gathering dust for a yr and a half lol
Saving this. I have a couple old android phones and was wondering if there was a way to connect them straight to the raspberry pi. This is even simpler. Thanks! You have a new subscriber.
Borrowed a friends old galaxy s8 and it works well. Big problem, now I want one for each printer and I have to learn octoprint now….. Great solution and great video!!!
Beware of Y-Cables or -Adapters with USB-C, they can be dangerous to the attached printer. If it’s just a dumb Y-Cable and the phone negotiates a higher charging voltage using USB Power Delivery, Quickcharge or similar, the higher voltage might end on the VCC pins of the attached devices, which can lead to the magic smoke beeing emitted from the connected USB devices, including a connected printer mainboard, especially if it has a USB backpowering problem (looking at you, Creality *sigh*). USB-C-Dongles with a dedicated USB-PD-Charging-Port are probably safer.
The USB 5v line to the printer board should always be blocked by tape, a blocking dongle, or the wire cut. I have black tape on mine from the Pi since it almost never gets unplugged.
@@derekhawley9660 cut a thin sliver of insulation tape and put it over the right hand pin in the usb plug, the one that plugs into the pi (or computer) It is the right hand pin when the pins are at the bottom and you are looking down at them...
This is great - I just recycled an old Nexus 6 that has been sitting in a drawer. The only thing I'll say is, you should probably get one of those things that strips power transmission out of the USB connection - on my Ender 3 (and this seems to be a common Ender problem), the USB connection powers the screen on the printer. I didn't have one of those split connectors on hand that allowed me to charge at the same time, either, so I turned off my printer and didn't think about it. It drained my phone completely in less than an hour.
you could just put electrical tape on the Vin of the USB male port, that way you disable delivering power to your printer. Thats also what I did when running octoprint on my pi 3b+
@@Oddman1980 Thans for the reply. I have an amazon branded X4 and it keeps crashing when installing the dependencies, any ideas? Also, can you tell me which Y cable you purchased? or how you are powering the phone?
@@bjohnrini I have an old USB-C laptop dock plugged into the phone to both power it and give me a connection to the printer. My phone is a Google Fi phone I bought in 2017.
So i recently got back into Printing and this kinda was a tedious task that made it much more fun. I dont print often but now i have a way to do it without switching sd cards and spending money on a new piece of Hardware that might become obsolete in 5 to 10 years. I just wish there was more support for it. I would like to post my results whever i get some time (maybe also in 5 years) but I did mine using an old Oneplus 6 and an Ender 3 Pro 1.5v (4.2.2) Marlin 2.1.x. I learned a lot about more about the printer and code and i feel a little more satisfied with myself now that its almost finished.
This is great. I have an old Samsung Galaxy S7 that's been sitting in a box under my TV for a year. I was going to try and sell it, but it looks like it's going to get a new lease of life with me. Cheers.
As someone who's aware of all the nice tech that comes with an Android phone, this is the reason I hate iPhones, they have limitations and that shows in a project like this.
I like the trend to re-use an old phone. Just imaging how many devices with top notch hardware/camera/screen (perhaps a little weak battery) are laying around in the drawers of the world. Same would be good to just use like a standalone IP Camera, (like motionEyeOS)
yup or android cam which i'm going to setup another one of my phones this way to run it as a second camera in octoprint once i get octoeverywhere installed as i have a internet enabled webcam but inly through the companies app octo4a was a game changer for me for sure
Today i upgradet my pi zero w with an pi zero 2 w for my octoprint setup and it works so much better. i dont even need a more powerful pi so for 15 € its the best you can do.
The Zero W was perfect for my application. Everyone else seemed to have problems with it but, for sending files over the network and controlling the printer it worked great. Good to know that the Zero W 2 works even better.
everything has worked out great so far, only thing is, I cant connect my prusa since it is not able to find a fitting baudrate. That was a couple of seconds ago, found the cause: disable the rpi setting within your prusa printer settings.
Hi Thank you for the videos, it gave me the idea of putting Pi OS on Window Surface RT tablet I had collecting dust. Then I put OctoPrint and OctoDash on it. Now I can use the RT tablet for controling my 3d printer. The touch screen works great and it has a big screen.
While I really like this project, it would have been easier to replace the battery with a usb power source directly as the battery will probably heavily degrade over time if you leave it like this.
Exactly. I can say by experience that the battery will definitely inflates after a few months (maybe more). Some rare phones can works purely by usb. Mostly old ones, but never tried with a PD charger with more recent phones. Would be worth a try
@@nobodyontheinternet784 You can also hack the original battery by just taking the small board at the top of the battery, cutting of the battery terminals and replacing those with a usb power supply. It works like a charm, done it with 3 of my old phones.
That's my main concern. We all know it'll run hot while doing a constant process and charging at the same time. I wouldn't leave my house with a lithium bomb in my basement.
Not the case on most phones, not modern ones anyway. Most phones will shut down hard extremely fast if they go more than a couple of seconds without within-spec telemetry readings off the battery. It's not just "black and red wire go brr". There's a reason why most modern smartphone batteries have 4,5,6 pin connectors or more, even from just a single-cell "battery". Most of the little boards generating this telemetry also have e-fuses now (regulation thing I believe, lots of new stuff came in after the Note 7 sagas), so they permabrick if they experience severe undervoltage or full loss of power. Meaning quite often you can't just snip that board off an old battery and hook up a 3.9-4vdc supply to the battery cell tabs and use it like an infinite capscity battery that way. You could _try_ it, just be VERY! careful cutting the tabs, and with the old cell afterwards, as it has no protection at all anymore. Keep that in mind when disposing of it too, tape up and protect those tabs really well. If you wanna try to run it like you suggest, look into higher end model-specific bench PSU power cables for microsoldering repair work. Some of these have built-in electronics to simulate the battery telemetry the phone is requiring, and they have wire gauge morr suitable for sustained load. The low end cables do not have these telemetry emulation circuits, and most androids samsung S3 and newer ish, won't even fully boot up before cutting off without it.
I use Octoprint on a RP with Polymer on the phone, works for years now. Can work also over internet with a VPN connection. This looks like a lot of work to get it right... And be careful with the batteries of the phones, especially with the lithium polymer, a fire in your house is really possible. This type is also very popular with drone owners and has already caused quite a bit of trouble.
There are a couple RCA tablets at Walmart that are under $80 and you can charge them with a little 5 volt plug and they have a full size USB and mini USB output so you don't need the little dongle
I run octoprint on a 20 year old laptop, running linux. Works great, it's nice to have a big screen for control and monitoring, but mainly it's just what I used prior to octoprint. A linux install of octoprint is a bit more involved than just running the octopi image, but I had no prior Linux experience when I started and there are guides. You can also run octoprint on windows, but it's not quite ideal compared to Linux apparently.
@@TheMidnightSmith I have 2 S7s I was legit about to bring in to recycle with a pile of other electronics so I'm happy to use them. I did score a pi4 on Chicago electronics supplier for my voron build though.
Nice, informative video - one thing to note is that currently I can only find one reputable company (or a company at all) that provides simultaneous charge with otg, that being Lava, but they happen to be very expensive, at about $30-40 apiece.
By flashing your phone the requirement for a battery is dropped on most roms - means your phone can run without a battery, purely on usb power without any hardware modifications.
It is also possible to re-use old android tv box and either install fully featured Armbian or in worst case just run android octoprint. There are so many other arm devices around that can be reused instead of buying rpi's. The only downside is lack of gpio. But that can be cured with usb hub + arduino.
But you also need a display device than if you want a permernent display on your printer. An old TV would be a little bit overcized on a prusa mini. Also a tv box mostly has no webcam (but you always can use an ESP32 cam)
@@oleurgast730 neither an rpi has a built-in display. If you don't care about timelapses (and most users don't) it makes zero sense to buy webcam for rpi as well. Much more logical is to get IP cam. They have 100 times more features for same price.
That is awesome! Sometimes I question my decision to use my sole Raspberry Pi as a Pi Hole server instead of as a Octoprint server... but not anymore! I conveniently upgraded from a Pixel 2 to a Pixel 6 this past week, and now it looks like I have found my old phone's new purpose in life! Thank you sir!
If you install Raspbian, then pihole, then use the script install for octoprint. You can run both at the same time. Pihole uses basically no power, and octoprint only uses lots of resources when rendering time lapse
@@eslmatt811 Thanks, I thought about it, but my modem and router are upstairs, my 3D printer downstairs and it's not worth the effort to me to run a network cable to my basement. Currently I just use a Blink Mini camera for monitoring large printers and can live with loading prints via an SD card.
Just got my first 3D printer up'n'running (Prusa i3 MK3S+, haven't even installed the MMU2S I got with it yet) and was going to get a PiZero 2W and plug it onto to printer's board. This seems to be a better solution for me, with no cost for connection and camera since I already have a couple of Mobiles and OTG-cables. Subbed to get more goodies 😁😁
Do you have a description on how you fixed the poco f2 charging? I have the same device and charger problem and want to do the same thing as you did. Thank you!
I've tried this in the earlier stages about 6 months ago, but not much since then. much has probably changed since I used this. It's a great piece of software if you're in a pinch and want to try it out, but don't forget an old PC with an installation of linux can run octoprint just the same (plus there's a longer development trail, so it would be generally more reliable.). Great option though for quick setup (except for maybe designing the phone holder). Great Concept though and I bet it will only get better!
Thank you very much, this works great, been looking at the Pi's and didn't want to spend that for one. I only had to go to git issues to fix the failed install on the phone, but this is a very good solution.
I just tried this with stuff I had laying around and it worked flawlessly! Unfortunately my wireless charger can't keep the battery from dying so I will have to buy an otg cable but very cool.
This video just made my day ! I always wanted to make those cool time lapses on my Ender 3 V2 but never had the option because I already had the Creality wifi box... That works well but doesn't allow the variety of options which Octoprint does. Will surely be trying this out! Thanks a lot Tom 💯👍🙌
@@AkiraFurball not exactly... I got my first printer for 215 dollars with the wifi box and could pretty much print remotely so buying a ras pi didn't make sense. It was good enough for starters, but this is gonna be a lot of fun!
@@AkiraFurball That's why I'm making the switch. could you just explain to me one thing, something that I saw in another comment thread about the y cable messing up the printer instead of charging the phone... thanks!
+1 for the TempleOS computer! 😂👍
The os that shall not be mentioned.
@@rjanderson4207 The OS that should be ran on all computers
Temple OS is a great OS for Octoprint! Been running it since 300 BC
Terry indeed was the smartest programmer that ever lived
I chuckled about sideloading on MacOS and then I was like "wait wha-?"
ive been wanting to get into octoprint for over a year now and this video just made it happen for me! Tons of android phones laying around waiting for a second chance.
I have as well, and the dongles...but also have like 6 rpi's here so Ill use that as I dont love the idea of batteries in a heated chamber. I do think this is a great solution to use old phones though, as there isnt many use cases for them and if you are like me you have a bunch of them.
You can use an old Laptop aswell. But to use a Phone is 1337
I am glad that i dont have to solve this "Cheap" Problems this old phones produce
@@francistaylor1822 remove the battery and in it's place solder a capacitor.
@@jurgislll can you elaborate on that one?
For benchmarking the UI load time over an other browser, I recommend to time it after the login screen.
The login screen has been optimised to take the least resources possible.
Speaking as a dev who works with OctoPrint on the daily.
Great vid and eye opener. Really enjoy it whenever people can repirpose their old hardware
What a gem this guy is, I discovered Tom a while back, but only now realise how amazing his content is, useful, innovative, novel, fast, comprehensive and to the point.
Really enjoy listening, very good and humble teacher and also very fair on and subtle with sponsers and never in your face to support him.
Amazing 3D printing channel, subscribed and hopefully will try support you somehow. Keep up the amazing work, we really appreciate it!
Welcome aboard!
@@MadeWithLayers thanks Thomas!
ohh man, I have wondered if a phone could be used for several years. I thought I would have to root it and install something complex. This is ground breaking for me. Amazing video
Honestly, thanks for doing this. I was looking into ways of running RasPi apps virtualized in Android and this video popped up in my suggested a few days later, this is literally perfect.
As a few folks have said below, for Creality printers that have backpower issues, cover the fourth pin (5V) on the USB-A connector (host side plug, one that will go into the hub or adapter) with a small bit of electrical tape as well to take some of the strain off these older batteries.
Have it working now, and I thank you and the Dev behind this app, for putting in great work!
Now this was a very useful video. What to do with your old phone once you upgraded to the new contract phone.
And no need for HDMI cables to a monitor you are using on your PC. Very nice. Thank you Tom for always coming up with a relavent topic for your videos.
FYI, your 18650 battery video. I pay 1.5 Euro's for a brand new battery. So you paying 1 Euro each is a massive saving when you need hundreds of them.
Awesome! Anything to keep the phones out of landfills, but huge bonus that the re-use is such a great application.
Amazing work man and thanks to octoprint 4a crew too👍
You were and still are a great tutor for whole 3d printing community.
I just recently got a 3d printer and wanted to have octoprint but i dont have a raspberry pie, i have so much faith of people believing there might be already a solution that you can use android phone as an alternate, so i searched the keywords, android phone octoprint and here i am. A big thank you to you sir for creating this video and the developers behind this!.
Been looking at the Octo4a the past few days. Thanks for clarifying everything runs smooth. Thank you.
UI Customizer plugin also gives a better responsive mobile experience for loading the interface on the phone directly and is still actively developed where TouchUI has several plugin conflicts and doesn't seem to be maintained anymore.
As a returning 3D printer user I wanted to set up octoprint but I did not want to buy new hardware so I installed it on an old Raspberry 1B(!) I had lying around. Everything worked fine, even a webcam, but it was incredibly slow. Inspired by your video I converted my old Xiaomi Mi A1 (Android 9, LineageOS) to an octoprint server and everything works flawlessly and the UI is really snappy. Filip did an amazing job on the Android port, thank you very much for bringing it to my attention. To be honest I kept my old phone exactly because I was thinking about an application like this and I couldn't think of a better way to repurpose my old phone.
I actually just reorganized my game room and actually found my Galaxy S3. I thought about just formatting it and tossing it out but I'm super glad I kept it now. I even have the USB dongle it came with as well so all I need is a splitter. Great video, thank you!
you dont even need that! the s3 has pins for wireless charging under the shell where you could connect a charger
@@bullzebub I actually realized its not an S3, its an S7 haha. I already ordered the cords anyway so it's no biggie.
THANK YOU... I've been wanting to look more into OctoPrint, but since I've only had my 3D printer for a couple months I thought it could wait until I figure a few more things out. Now this might open up a whole new realm of possibilities. I have few old phones lying around (like everyone else) and even a couple tablets that I might be able to re-life as a print server :)
How perfect ist this video rn. I have an old phone with good camera quality and the same Adapters all at home.
haha i remember bugging the dev (politely ofc) on discord to release an update and open source for a few weeks! Glad to see it's actually usable now
4:20 I used one of these on my trip to Japan. I used my phone to take tons of pictures. When it was full I used this to move the pictures to a flash drive, then went right back to taking pictures.
For you and for everyone:
I waited a few weeks to write my opinion. After then I can confirm Octo4a works very well for me. I tested it on more smartphones. It worked also on a quite old Huawei P8 Lite. It runs now on a Huawei P20 Lite without any performace problem. I was able to set the energy management easyly. I made an "Y" cable, but it didn't work for either. It is currently running only on battery power. It lasts even up to a 24 hour of printing, or more. With a very used battery!! Especially when I turn off the camera server.
I ordered a USB multiport hub. It's on the way. I hope it will work. I don't want to modify the phone with an additional battery charging module. The only one issue to me is about the camera focus. When I turn off autofocus, everything will be awful blurry. With autofocus too, but not as much as when it's turned off. I saw on github this is a current issue. So I'm waiting it will be fixed sometime.
Overall I'm happy. I installed a BLtouch sensor. I was really scared to modify my printer. I scared about changing the firmware and losing the SD support too. But everything works fine. By the way my printer is Anet A8 Plus.
Have you managed to get charging to work with the hub you mentioned? I have a p20 lying around with information regarding simultaneous charge with otg scarce for whatever reason. I'm curious if you got it going and if you did, could you share the model of the hub?
@@rigormoritz Same issue, bought a otg cable from the link thomas provided but my one plus one doesn't charge while connected to the printer. thus the printer gets usb "power" from the connector of the charger....
May i recommend using UI customizer plug-in instead of Touch UI. It's made to be responsive and supports phones, tablets and more
Thank you, was looking for a pi, but this will be great on a Galaxy Note 8 that sits around collecting dust. Exactly what I needed.
I had several usb connection lost issues with my odroid xu4 running octoprint and I was just about to order a raspberry. After I had seen this video, I hooked up my Nexus 7 (from 2012!) and gave it a shot. It is not only running more reliable now, but having octoprint acessible right next to the printer on a big touchscreen is such a treat.
I have an old galaxy s5 lying around. You just gave it a new life.
That segway into the Sponsor Spot was awesome!
I'm glad that you are advertising a PCB company because I might need to get a PCB made with parts soldered soon. I just added to favorites. I have a few companies that do PCB in favorites and I will compare to see who is cheaper.
I'm still amazed it's so hard to find a phone sized for actual daily carry and real human hands out there. The only flagship I can think of is the Asus Zenfone 8 (non-flip) - which imo is the best Android phone on the market right now imo. That said - I'd still rather use a Raspberry Pi for Octoprint, but that's just my preference.
I miss my original LG Nexus 5. 4" screen is perfect in the hand, we don't need all this glass and aluminum. New phones are ridiculously large and heavy.
I got the Sony Xperia 5 km3 it's slimmer due to the 21:9 aspect ratio. I can easily reach across with my thumb 👍🏻
S10e? It's on the bigger end but still fits in my hand. They're very well priced on the used market though.
I believe you're looking for more of a _bannerboat._ What you request is rarely compatible with a _flagship._
@@fabianweihe8702 I second the xperia 5 (mine's a mkii) - the narrower screen makes it much easier to single-hand
On the phone clamp: Edelkrone has a phone clamp in their partially 3d printable line of products. Granted, the non-printable parts still cost more than the clamps you linked to. But printer cred! :D
7:22 That one caught me off guard! I wish I could upvote twice!
Thanks Thomas for the info! Yesterday I was finally able to convert my old android phone without a battery to a printer support! I've removed the battery, soldered wires to the test pads (fortunately there were 3 of them for each traces!), added a LM2596s module and a 10k resistor as a thermistor. Without a resistor the phone won't turn on.
Previously I've tried several Y microusb OTG cables but the phone stopped charging after a few seconds. This way I can use it until the charger is plugged in.
Okay, tried printing a few models now and have some trouble maintaining stable connection. I'm getting timeouts randomly and that causes the printer to pause for a few seconds. Sometimes the motherboard disconnects completely and the printer fully stops. I'm not sure if it's some kind of noise, but I'll check with a raspberry pie soon.
I'm trying something different myself. I grabbed a trash tier Galaxy J3 and made it charge between 40 and 60 percent through software (AdvancedChargingController).
Less risk than a constant 100% charge. Making it work through a usb cable without battery is possible, but it's too much of a hack job.
@@MiGujack3 Totally agree with you! I wanted to go this way, tried like 3 or 4 different OTG + charging cables (for micro usb port), but I gave up. I wasn't be able to charge it while using as a host.
@@adamhun994 I will do a custom cable myself and report back. One of the pins should be disabled to prevent power going to the printer board. As in, full lines go to the phone but only 3 go to the printer board.
@@MiGujack3 The cable work?
Great idea! I have my three old android phones stacked in a box and haven't got around to adding a webcam to my Cr10SProV2+Octoprint+RPi2+Klipper yet :) Now I won't need to hunt around for a probably at most 720p webcam for the pi at a probably not cheap price :D
Simplish webcams are affordable again. I could buy a 1080p30 webcam with a very wide angle lens and fixed focus and terrible IR rejection and slightly wonky colour at Conrad for only 15€ (regular price for this sort of thing hovers around 30€) just a couple weeks ago. But it is actually super sharp and actually 30fps in MJPEG mode.
been looking for a raspi 3 for th last 2 weeks now and havent found any in stock that werent just too expensive for my use. Have phones just lying around, this was super easy to set up and looks to be working great :D Thanks for the video!
I always wanted to use octoprint but never got around to it but now that it's so easy to get it going I will definitely give this a try with my spare samsung galaxy S9+ hope it will work well. Thanks Tom for this video and many other videos this is why I sub to your channel over 4 years ago. Your videos are always packed with useful information.
any updates on the s9+?
Thank you for this! I am glad to have a use for my old devices and having a camera built in is great. Also noticed that when uploading print files on octoprint it is much faster than my rasp pi setup
That triagonal mosaic is so beautiful!
BTW, it's probabably best to remove the battery because of potential fire hazard. There are some workarounds for the missing battery.
Got lucky and grabbed a Pi0 2W for $15 the day they came out. It’s running octoprint and a camera just fine!
Are you a scorpio Tom? This is awesome i do not have many heros but you are definitely one of those heros bro.
You made a huge impact in the 3d printing community and i can honestly say you always have been legit .
Thank you
I've tried this, ended up getting a used 3b anyways. It's near impossible to find a dongle that will charge and transmit data simultaneously, and even if I got that working, running my old androids for more than 15 mins could probably let me print abs on the glass
Wish I'd seen this a few months ago, before I bought a Raspberry Pi 3B. I managed to find a decent deal, but I will definitely be using Octo4a for my next OctoPrint installation!
I'd just like you (and your sponsor) to know that I was just looking at getting a PCB printed and the sponsor message couldn't have come at a better time. Plus, I suddenly find myself with a spare Android phone and OTG connector I was almost retiring. Spooky good timing
And in fact I was about to retire EXACTLY that Samsung Galaxy Nexus!
Finally someone using an "old" smartphone for a video like this
My RPi4 just died, and orders for a replacement are at least a year out (14 months for me).
Found this while looking for alternatives, and this appears to be a really good one and has me hopeful to get my printer back up and going.
Even two years later this makes more sense over a Raspberry Pi. With a phone you get all you need, the processing platform, a camera, power source, power backup (at least for the OctoPrint instance) and internet backup (WiFi and 4G or 5G). Additionally, in some setups you need an additional display since some displays can't be connected reliably to a Raspberry Pi.
Thank you for this. I am new to 3d printing and after looking at prices, my Note 5 will be revived.
This is exatly what i had been hoping to do with my old phones :D thank a super bunch bud
I just posted on Reddit a few days ago looking for alternatives. Thanks Tom!
I'm using an old netbook which is another cheap alternative.
Terry blesses you for including templeOS in your list.
Something to consider while using a phone/tablet :
If it's plugged continuously (like 24/7) for a long period of time (like months) the risks are way higher that the battery inflates, so big risk of fire.
I learned that by experience and bunch of other folks had the same issue trying to recycle their old phone
Battery can be thrown away. Just use step-down board with good 5V power supply.
@@D9ID9I definitely, but it is something important to consider
@@nobodyontheinternet784 consider to check voltages. It is fine to apply 3.7-4V constantly. But very cheap charger boards are not that precise often. If they apply like 4.3V to a battery then yes battery can easily inflate or just die.
I never sell my old smartphones, usually cuz Im worried I'll break mine new device. Now I finally have a use for my old tech....THanks!
I thought I was wasting money last year when I bought several Pi 4's to use for emulation. Now all of my enclosures have been gutted and I'm definitely glad I grabbed them when I did.
Thank you, this literally took me under 5 minutes to get this fully working on my old Galxaxy Note 10+, really amazing.
I plugged my tv box Formuler Z10 PRO into my printer. I installed octo4a on it... less complicated than installing it on an old cell phone... it works
I think I'll try my old netbook first but I'm very happy to have an alternative now!
Thanks!
Wish this had come out sooner. I've been using an old 2008 iMac I bought from a local school for about a year now. Works perfectly fine, but it takes up a lot more room.
This dude just described my situation perfectly
Got an old tablet I've had for a while. Going to give this a bash and see how it goes!
Thanks for the great video...
Dear Thomas. Your explanation is impeccable, very detailed and easy to understand. I had been wondering if there was a way to replace the Raspberry Pi with an Arduino nano or uno (looking for a cheaper option since PI is very expensive where I live)...and suddenly, you came up with this great video and explanation. I just started 3D printing and the truth is that there are interesting things to learn. I have already subscribed to your channel. I send you a big greeting from the South of Argentina!
Thanks Thomas! been trying to get OctoPrint for my printers and i didnt want to spend like $100 on a Pi, and my old phones been sitting here gathering dust for a yr and a half lol
I hope fluidd/mainsail does this too
Saving this. I have a couple old android phones and was wondering if there was a way to connect them straight to the raspberry pi. This is even simpler. Thanks! You have a new subscriber.
Borrowed a friends old galaxy s8 and it works well.
Big problem, now I want one for each printer and I have to learn octoprint now…..
Great solution and great video!!!
Beware of Y-Cables or -Adapters with USB-C, they can be dangerous to the attached printer. If it’s just a dumb Y-Cable and the phone negotiates a higher charging voltage using USB Power Delivery, Quickcharge or similar, the higher voltage might end on the VCC pins of the attached devices, which can lead to the magic smoke beeing emitted from the connected USB devices, including a connected printer mainboard, especially if it has a USB backpowering problem (looking at you, Creality *sigh*). USB-C-Dongles with a dedicated USB-PD-Charging-Port are probably safer.
ah yes
I love how my cr-10 control board stays powered until I unplug my raspberry pi
The USB 5v line to the printer board should always be blocked by tape, a blocking dongle, or the wire cut. I have black tape on mine from the Pi since it almost never gets unplugged.
@@OldCurmudgeon3DP Hi, can you please explain the tape thing? Thanks
@@derekhawley9660 cut a thin sliver of insulation tape and put it over the right hand pin in the usb plug, the one that plugs into the pi (or computer)
It is the right hand pin when the pins are at the bottom and you are looking down at them...
@@AkiraFurball Thanks Louise
This is great - I just recycled an old Nexus 6 that has been sitting in a drawer. The only thing I'll say is, you should probably get one of those things that strips power transmission out of the USB connection - on my Ender 3 (and this seems to be a common Ender problem), the USB connection powers the screen on the printer. I didn't have one of those split connectors on hand that allowed me to charge at the same time, either, so I turned off my printer and didn't think about it. It drained my phone completely in less than an hour.
you could just put electrical tape on the Vin of the USB male port, that way you disable delivering power to your printer. Thats also what I did when running octoprint on my pi 3b+
I do love it when I find something to add to my printer that I already have the materials for. Currently setting my old Moto X4 up for this.
Did it work for you with a X4? I'm trying and it just keeps crashing installing dependencies
@@bjohnrini I've been using my x4 for a few months now, no issues.
@@Oddman1980 Thans for the reply. I have an amazon branded X4 and it keeps crashing when installing the dependencies, any ideas? Also, can you tell me which Y cable you purchased? or how you are powering the phone?
@@bjohnrini I have an old USB-C laptop dock plugged into the phone to both power it and give me a connection to the printer. My phone is a Google Fi phone I bought in 2017.
@@Oddman1980 You have a link or info on the dock you are using?
Been waiting for this for literally years!
So i recently got back into Printing and this kinda was a tedious task that made it much more fun. I dont print often but now i have a way to do it without switching sd cards and spending money on a new piece of Hardware that might become obsolete in 5 to 10 years. I just wish there was more support for it. I would like to post my results whever i get some time (maybe also in 5 years) but I did mine using an old Oneplus 6 and an Ender 3 Pro 1.5v (4.2.2) Marlin 2.1.x. I learned a lot about more about the printer and code and i feel a little more satisfied with myself now that its almost finished.
Innovative, informative, knowledgeable person, keen to share, and very detailed content. It is sufficient for anyone like me to get started.
Finally i have a use for my old phones, thanks!
Fricking amazing! I'm definitely going to use this. This sounds so much easier than using a pie. And it even saves e-waste! Good job OctoPrint!
I tried couldn’t get it to work
This is great. I have an old Samsung Galaxy S7 that's been sitting in a box under my TV for a year. I was going to try and sell it, but it looks like it's going to get a new lease of life with me. Cheers.
Awesome! Thanks for sharing this! I don't have any spare pi's, but I've got a phone that should work perfectly for my ender 3!
It amazes me the amount of tech we obliviously carry in our pockets every day :O
As someone who's aware of all the nice tech that comes with an Android phone, this is the reason I hate iPhones, they have limitations and that shows in a project like this.
"Sorry, I've got to take this call. My Ender 3 is calling."
I like the trend to re-use an old phone. Just imaging how many devices with top notch hardware/camera/screen (perhaps a little weak battery) are laying around in the drawers of the world.
Same would be good to just use like a standalone IP Camera, (like motionEyeOS)
yup or android cam which i'm going to setup another one of my phones this way to run it as a second camera in octoprint once i get octoeverywhere installed as i have a internet enabled webcam but inly through the companies app octo4a was a game changer for me for sure
Today i upgradet my pi zero w with an pi zero 2 w for my octoprint setup and it works so much better. i dont even need a more powerful pi so for 15 € its the best you can do.
The Zero W was perfect for my application. Everyone else seemed to have problems with it but, for sending files over the network and controlling the printer it worked great.
Good to know that the Zero W 2 works even better.
everything has worked out great so far, only thing is, I cant connect my prusa since it is not able to find a fitting baudrate.
That was a couple of seconds ago, found the cause: disable the rpi setting within your prusa printer settings.
this is awsome. i have a raspberry pi but ive not had the time (also i was being lazy) to set this up. but i have like 4 old phones.
I had planned on trying this at some point and now I think I have to do it. Great upload!
Hi Thank you for the videos, it gave me the idea of putting Pi OS on Window Surface RT tablet I had collecting dust. Then I put OctoPrint and OctoDash on it. Now I can use the RT tablet for controling my 3d printer. The touch screen works great and it has a big screen.
While I really like this project, it would have been easier to replace the battery with a usb power source directly as the battery will probably heavily degrade over time if you leave it like this.
Exactly. I can say by experience that the battery will definitely inflates after a few months (maybe more).
Some rare phones can works purely by usb. Mostly old ones, but never tried with a PD charger with more recent phones. Would be worth a try
@@nobodyontheinternet784 You can also hack the original battery by just taking the small board at the top of the battery, cutting of the battery terminals and replacing those with a usb power supply. It works like a charm, done it with 3 of my old phones.
@@vincent.schmandt yep. Was talking about that in another thread
That's my main concern. We all know it'll run hot while doing a constant process and charging at the same time. I wouldn't leave my house with a lithium bomb in my basement.
Not the case on most phones, not modern ones anyway. Most phones will shut down hard extremely fast if they go more than a couple of seconds without within-spec telemetry readings off the battery. It's not just "black and red wire go brr". There's a reason why most modern smartphone batteries have 4,5,6 pin connectors or more, even from just a single-cell "battery". Most of the little boards generating this telemetry also have e-fuses now (regulation thing I believe, lots of new stuff came in after the Note 7 sagas), so they permabrick if they experience severe undervoltage or full loss of power. Meaning quite often you can't just snip that board off an old battery and hook up a 3.9-4vdc supply to the battery cell tabs and use it like an infinite capscity battery that way. You could _try_ it, just be VERY! careful cutting the tabs, and with the old cell afterwards, as it has no protection at all anymore. Keep that in mind when disposing of it too, tape up and protect those tabs really well.
If you wanna try to run it like you suggest, look into higher end model-specific bench PSU power cables for microsoldering repair work. Some of these have built-in electronics to simulate the battery telemetry the phone is requiring, and they have wire gauge morr suitable for sustained load. The low end cables do not have these telemetry emulation circuits, and most androids samsung S3 and newer ish, won't even fully boot up before cutting off without it.
I use Octoprint on a RP with Polymer on the phone, works for years now. Can work also over internet with a VPN connection. This looks like a lot of work to get it right... And be careful with the batteries of the phones, especially with the lithium polymer, a fire in your house is really possible. This type is also very popular with drone owners and has already caused quite a bit of trouble.
Appreciate you and your channel! Just discovered you recently and keep watching non stop 👌💯
There are a couple RCA tablets at Walmart that are under $80 and you can charge them with a little 5 volt plug and they have a full size USB and mini USB output so you don't need the little dongle
If you could get a Fire Tablet working with octoprint 4a, that would be a game changer. Fire tablets are everywhere and cheap...
I run octoprint on a 20 year old laptop, running linux. Works great, it's nice to have a big screen for control and monitoring, but mainly it's just what I used prior to octoprint. A linux install of octoprint is a bit more involved than just running the octopi image, but I had no prior Linux experience when I started and there are guides.
You can also run octoprint on windows, but it's not quite ideal compared to Linux apparently.
perfect timing!!! I was just thinking this should be a thing yesterday as I cant find a pi for less than $125 anywhere.. no thanks
PLUS a camera which is equally impossible to find!
@@TheMidnightSmith good point!
@@TheMidnightSmith I have 2 S7s I was legit about to bring in to recycle with a pile of other electronics so I'm happy to use them. I did score a pi4 on Chicago electronics supplier for my voron build though.
Nice, informative video - one thing to note is that currently I can only find one reputable company (or a company at all) that provides simultaneous charge with otg, that being Lava, but they happen to be very expensive, at about $30-40 apiece.
By flashing your phone the requirement for a battery is dropped on most roms - means your phone can run without a battery, purely on usb power without any hardware modifications.
"And unplug it like a little LEGO"
I see what you did there my good sir
"...and It is essentialy the same as running some software you downloaded onto your [...] Temple OS computer" cracked me 😂
good one!
Thats a cool jacket.
Also next printer Ill skip the pi, I have lots of phones collecting dust.
It is also possible to re-use old android tv box and either install fully featured Armbian or in worst case just run android octoprint. There are so many other arm devices around that can be reused instead of buying rpi's. The only downside is lack of gpio. But that can be cured with usb hub + arduino.
But you also need a display device than if you want a permernent display on your printer. An old TV would be a little bit overcized on a prusa mini. Also a tv box mostly has no webcam (but you always can use an ESP32 cam)
@@oleurgast730 neither an rpi has a built-in display.
If you don't care about timelapses (and most users don't) it makes zero sense to buy webcam for rpi as well. Much more logical is to get IP cam. They have 100 times more features for same price.
@@oleurgast730 I just use my computer. like with my pi 4. like I did with my pi zero. No biggie. I hardly use a camera.
That is awesome!
Sometimes I question my decision to use my sole Raspberry Pi as a Pi Hole server instead of as a Octoprint server... but not anymore!
I conveniently upgraded from a Pixel 2 to a Pixel 6 this past week, and now it looks like I have found my old phone's new purpose in life!
Thank you sir!
If you install Raspbian, then pihole, then use the script install for octoprint. You can run both at the same time. Pihole uses basically no power, and octoprint only uses lots of resources when rendering time lapse
@@eslmatt811 Thanks, I thought about it, but my modem and router are upstairs, my 3D printer downstairs and it's not worth the effort to me to run a network cable to my basement.
Currently I just use a Blink Mini camera for monitoring large printers and can live with loading prints via an SD card.
DUDE! Finally a use for my older pixel 2xl and Galaxy tab E. Yes! Thank you!
Just got my first 3D printer up'n'running (Prusa i3 MK3S+, haven't even installed the MMU2S I got with it yet) and was going to get a PiZero 2W and plug it onto to printer's board. This seems to be a better solution for me, with no cost for connection and camera since I already have a couple of Mobiles and OTG-cables. Subbed to get more goodies 😁😁
Do you have a description on how you fixed the poco f2 charging? I have the same device and charger problem and want to do the same thing as you did. Thank you!
I've tried this in the earlier stages about 6 months ago, but not much since then. much has probably changed since I used this. It's a great piece of software if you're in a pinch and want to try it out, but don't forget an old PC with an installation of linux can run octoprint just the same (plus there's a longer development trail, so it would be generally more reliable.). Great option though for quick setup (except for maybe designing the phone holder). Great Concept though and I bet it will only get better!
Thank you very much, this works great, been looking at the Pi's and didn't want to spend that for one. I only had to go to git issues to fix the failed install on the phone, but this is a very good solution.
I just tried this with stuff I had laying around and it worked flawlessly! Unfortunately my wireless charger can't keep the battery from dying so I will have to buy an otg cable but very cool.
Fantastic timing, I was thinking of retiering my Android tablet (Sideloaded the Google Play Store onto my Surface Pro).
This video just made my day ! I always wanted to make those cool time lapses on my Ender 3 V2 but never had the option because I already had the Creality wifi box... That works well but doesn't allow the variety of options which Octoprint does. Will surely be trying this out! Thanks a lot Tom 💯👍🙌
creality wifi box.. octoprint with none of the advantages LOL
@@AkiraFurball not exactly... I got my first printer for 215 dollars with the wifi box and could pretty much print remotely so buying a ras pi didn't make sense. It was good enough for starters, but this is gonna be a lot of fun!
@@nisargdoshi2640 Creality wifi box... Octoprint with none of the advantages other than wifi printing
;)
@@AkiraFurball yep that's true
@@AkiraFurball That's why I'm making the switch. could you just explain to me one thing, something that I saw in another comment thread about the y cable messing up the printer instead of charging the phone... thanks!