Announcement Watch · Multicolor FDM
Sovol’s M1D wants to kill the purge tower for $1,199 — on paper
An IDEX machine and a toolchanger welded into one printer, seven materials with “virtually zero” purge waste, and a Kickstarter you can’t back yet. Here’s every claim, where each number actually comes from, and the pricing shuffle nobody’s mentioning.
If you run multicolor FDM, you already pay the tax. Single-nozzle systems flush the old color out before every switch, and on a busy print that flushed plastic — the purge tower, the “poop” chute — can quietly outweigh the model you actually wanted. We’ve done that math before, and it’s ugly enough that the whole industry is now racing to make it stop.
Sovol — the Shenzhen brand behind the budget-hero SV06 and SV08 — just entered that race with the M1D, and its pitch is genuinely novel: don’t choose between an IDEX printer and a toolchanger. Build both into one machine.
READ THIS FIRST — WHERE THESE CLAIMS COME FROM
Today’s All3DP article on the M1D is sponsored content written by Sovol itself. We’ve cross-checked it against Sovol’s official product page and independent coverage of the June announcement from Notebookcheck and AMPulse. As of July 13, 2026, no independent hands-on testing has been published anywhere. Every spec and performance figure below is a manufacturer claim until review units exist.
▣ The claimed spec sheet, in one place
| Item | Sovol’s claim |
|---|---|
| Architecture | “DualX” — one fixed extruder plus one tool-changing extruder on independent carriages, with a dock of six additional toolheads |
| Materials per print | Up to 7 colors or materials, support filaments included |
| Build volume | 300 × 300 × 350 mm |
| Max speed | 600 mm/s (manufacturer figure) |
| Tool swap | ~5 seconds via a patented metal auto-grip; each head preheats before it’s called |
| Calibration | Camera-based XY offset alignment (claimed up to 2.5× faster than probing), real-time auto Z-lift on the second head, eddy-current non-contact bed leveling |
| Filament handling | 6-channel auto filament system: auto-load, run-out, clog, and tangle detection with indicator lights |
| Monitoring | Camera watch for spaghetti failures and foreign objects on the plate |
| Interface | 5-inch touchscreen with a redesigned tap-and-go UI |
| Openness | Much of the hardware and software open source, files on GitHub — continuing the SV06/SV08 approach |
| Availability | Kickstarter, “soon” — a $20 deposit scheme is live; no campaign date announced |
Sources: Sovol’s product page and sponsored announcement, corroborated by independent June coverage. None independently verified.
▣ Why IDEX × toolchanger is actually a new idea
Desktop multicolor has split into two camps. Toolchangers — the Prusa XL school — park a rack of complete toolheads and swap them in, which sidesteps most purging but only ever runs one head at a time. Classic IDEX machines run two fully independent carriages, which unlocks printing two things simultaneously — but caps you at two materials. Bambu’s H2C splits the difference a third way, swapping induction hotends on a single printhead; our H2C breakdown covers how far that gets you.
The M1D’s claim — and Sovol says it’s a first for consumer machines — is welding the two camps together: two independent carriages, and behind the second one, a six-head dock. If it works as described, you get everything at once. That architecture is what unlocks the M1D’s four modes:
MULTI
Up to seven colors or materials in one run, support filaments included — the headline act, and the purge-waste story.
COPY
Both carriages print two identical parts at once — effectively doubled throughput for spares and small batches without a second machine.
MIRROR
Left-right symmetric parts print simultaneously — matched handles, brackets, and wing pairs come off the bed together.
SINGLE
One head, standard printing, no multi-tool overhead when you don’t need it.
Copy and Mirror are the tell that this is real IDEX rather than toolchanger-only: they require two heads moving independently at the same time. And seven channels matters beyond rainbow Benchies — a dedicated head for soluble or dissimilar support material is the difference between good bottom surfaces and glassy ones, a trick we’ve shown you can push even further with CAD-modeled interfaces. When switching materials stops costing purge plastic, those techniques get dramatically cheaper to use.
▣ “Virtually zero waste” — the physics fine print
Sovol’s core argument is sound: each toolhead carries its own filament, so nothing gets flushed through a shared nozzle to change colors. The purge tower — the big, dumb block of melted money — should largely disappear. That much the architecture genuinely supports.
But “virtually” is doing quiet work in that sentence. Toolchange machines still typically prime and wipe a head after a swap so extrusion pressure stabilizes, and idle hotends ooze — Notebookcheck’s coverage flagged the same point, noting head changes will likely still produce a little waste while the extruder finds equilibrium. For calibration, consider that Bambu — a company with every marketing incentive to say “100%” — publishes an “up to 58% less purge” figure for its own hotend-swapping H2C. Near-zero purge towers: plausible. Literally zero waste: no toolchanger on Earth delivers that yet. The honest open questions are swap-time overhead across hundreds of changes, ooze control with two live heads, and alignment repeatability after thousands of grip cycles — exactly the things only independent testing can answer.
▣ The price: $1,199 today, $1,499 last month
Here’s the part nobody else seems to be flagging. The numbers have moved between announcements:
| Snapshot | Published figures |
|---|---|
|
Early June 2026 (independent coverage of the announcement) |
Super early bird $1,499 · list price $1,799 · Notebookcheck cited a $20 deposit locking $1,399 |
|
July 13, 2026 (Sovol’s sponsored All3DP piece) |
Without enclosure: early bird $1,299, VIP $1,199 with a $20 deposit · With enclosure: early bird $1,599, VIP $1,499 |
Our read: pricing has been revised and split into enclosure/no-enclosure SKUs since June. We can’t say which numbers survive to launch — the live campaign page will be the only ones that count.
Two practical notes. First, the $300 enclosure question isn’t cosmetic: if ABS or ASA is anywhere in your seven-material plans, an enclosure moves from nice-to-have toward necessary — our enclosure guide explains why. Second, deposit schemes are a marketing lock-in, not a contract for a delivery date. Treat every number here as provisional.
▣ The Kickstarter reality check
- Crowdfunding is preordering with risk. Campaign timelines slip industry-wide, and a v1 toolchanger lives or dies on the repeatability of its grip-and-register mechanism over thousands of swaps — the single hardest thing to get right in this category.
- Software is the quiet decider. A 7-tool workflow demands mature slicer support, and Sovol hasn’t yet detailed the M1D’s software stack publicly. AMPulse’s coverage raised the same ecosystem-maturity question against Bambu’s and Prusa’s entrenched toolchains. Whichever slicer it lands on, our 2026 slicer guide shows what “mature” looks like for multi-material.
- The open-source lineage is a real point in its favor. Sovol says much of the M1D’s hardware and software will be open, files on GitHub, like the SV06 and SV08 before it. Open machines get community fixes fast and stay repairable long after warranties die — we’ve written about why that’s worth paying for.
- This is execution risk, not existence risk. Sovol isn’t a no-name render factory; it has shipped genuinely good budget machines at volume. The question is whether a first-generation toolchanger arrives polished — not whether the company is real.
▣ Who should care — and who should wait
Watch this closely if: purge waste genuinely offends you; you run small batches where Copy mode’s doubled throughput pays rent; you print symmetric prop and cosplay parts that Mirror mode would pair automatically; or you do multi-material engineering work where a dedicated support-filament head changes your surface quality.
Skip or wait if: this would be your first printer (a proven sub-$500 AMS-style multicolor machine is a far saner on-ramp); you need multicolor capacity this month, since shipping machines like Bambu’s H2D and H2C exist now; or a campaign with no launch date and moving prices is more uncertainty than your wallet enjoys. Waiting for the first independent reviews costs you the early-bird discount — and buys you certainty. That trade is yours to price.
▣ The San Diego angle
Around here, purge waste isn’t abstract: it’s filament dollars plus SDG&E kilowatt-hours plus the evening you spent reprinting. A machine that meaningfully cuts multicolor waste would be a real line item for local prop makers and Etsy sellers — which is exactly why it deserves the skeptical read above, not a preorder reflex. One more coastal note: six always-loaded filament channels sitting open in marine-layer humidity is six spools slowly drinking water, so budget dry-storage discipline into any multi-channel setup. And for the record: we have no affiliation with Sovol and earn nothing if you back or skip the M1D. We already service Sovol machines all over San Diego County, so whenever M1Ds land in local garages — gripper gremlins and all — we’ll be the ones fixing them.
Need 7-color output before the Kickstarter ships?
We run multicolor FDM jobs every week — $7/hr machine time plus material (resin from $9/hr) — so you can have the parts now and decide about the printer later. Already own a Sovol, Bambu, Creality, Elegoo, or Anycubic that’s misbehaving? Mobile repair across San Diego County, honest quotes before any paid work, and free basic email troubleshooting. We’ll also give you a straight buy/skip/wait answer on the M1D once real reviews exist.
Get a print or repair quote →☎ 858-342-6984 · ✉ dreaming3dprinting@gmail.com
📷 @dreaming3dprinting · 🌐 dreaming3d.net · 📍 Carmel Valley, San Diego
▣ FAQ
What is the Sovol M1D?
The M1D is an announced desktop FDM printer that combines an IDEX system (two independently moving carriages) with a toolchanger (a dock of six additional swappable heads), for up to seven colors or materials in one print with, per Sovol, virtually no purge waste. Claimed specs include a 300 × 300 × 350 mm build volume, 600 mm/s top speed, and ~5-second tool swaps. It launches on Kickstarter at a date not yet announced, and no independent hands-on reviews exist yet.
Does the M1D really produce zero purge waste?
Sovol says “virtually zero,” and the architecture supports eliminating the big purge tower, since each head keeps its own filament. But toolchange printers still typically prime and wipe after swaps, idle nozzles ooze, and independent coverage has noted small waste is likely while each extruder stabilizes. Expect dramatically less waste than single-nozzle multicolor — not literally none — pending real testing.
How is the M1D different from the Bambu Lab H2C?
Both target seven materials with minimal purging, but differently: the H2C swaps compact induction hotends on its printhead, while the M1D claims two fully independent carriages plus a dock of complete toolheads. That IDEX layer is what gives the M1D Copy and Mirror modes — printing two parts simultaneously — which the H2C doesn’t do. The H2C’s counterpunch is that it ships today inside a mature ecosystem. Our H2C purge-math breakdown has the details.
Is the price $1,199 or $1,499?
Both numbers are real, from different moments. June’s announcement coverage cited a $1,499 super early bird against a $1,799 list price; Sovol’s July 13 materials list $1,199 VIP / $1,299 early bird without an enclosure and $1,499 VIP / $1,599 early bird with one. Pricing has clearly been revised and split into two SKUs — treat every figure as provisional until the Kickstarter page is live.
Should I back the Sovol M1D on Kickstarter?
That depends on your risk tolerance, and only you can price it. Backing early saves money if everything ships as promised; waiting for independent reviews costs the discount but buys certainty about the toolchanger’s reliability and software. Crowdfunding is not a store — delivery dates slip. If you need multicolor now, shipping machines exist, and we can print your multicolor jobs in the meantime. Whatever you choose, we service Sovol printers across San Diego County — repair requests here.
SOURCES · All3DP sponsored announcement authored by Sovol (Jul 13, 2026) · Sovol M1D official product page · Notebookcheck (Jun 2026) · 3Druck.com (Jun 2026) · AMPulse (Jun 2026) · Bambu Lab published H2C purge figures via our prior coverage. All M1D specifications and performance figures are manufacturer claims; no independent hands-on testing has been published as of this writing. Dreaming3D has no affiliation with Sovol and used no affiliate links.