Craft Edge

Hello ladies and gents... I am asking for reviews of the cutters for 2 specific reasons.
1. I am researching for an evaluation paper I am writing for my college english class. So If you reply please reply in complete sentences and I will also need your name... any name I can use to quote you!!
2. I am getting rid of my Cricuts... I have an original Cricut and a teal expressions Cricut. I have creatively out grown them... I never use the cartridges. I want to be able to upgrade my software.

So here is the question. Which die cutting machine should I buy and WHY!!!???

Thanks in advance for all your help!!
Meg in MO...well now in NE

you say you have "outgrown" the cricut, in what way?
size limitations or, as I gather from the rest of the post, because you want to design your own files rather than what someone else says you should use (carts)

for easy of use, the cameo is the next step up from a cricut. it cuts 12 inches wide and uses either it's own software (silhouette studio or the designer version) or you can use scal3. both allow you to draw your own shapes and cut them. also you can cut fonts from your computer.

if for size limitation and you wish to go bigger than 12 inches wide then you are looking at a more professional cutter, the phoenix silver bullet US cutter etc are just two - some are billed as vinyl cutters
the bullets are in sizes 13", 15", 18" & 24" - these cut the actual size they say so the 13" will cut 13" and are not limited in length (unless software has limits) and use scal3 (& inkscape) for cutting & designing.

Gaz

There is a topic on this forum for "cutter reveiws" you might try it and see what is there and maybe some other jumping off links too.

viewtopic.php?f=85&t=27377

When my eclipse works, I love it, however....the first one I received wouldn't stay on, sent it back, the second one worked a short time and stopped midcut and froze my mac, sent it back, the third one worked for a while then stopped midcut and froze my mac, sent it back, the fourth one was a "refurbished" machine which I had high hopes that the glitches were refurbished out of it, I received it in July and it was wonderful till Dec when it froze midcut and froze my mac, I am now awaiting to receive the fifth one...in the meantime it takes a couple of weeks each time and delays the projects that my friends and I are working on......is anyone else having this problem??? Is there a solution???? the girls from customer service are very patient and sympathic, but that doesn't solve the problem.
Hope the 5th one is a charm because I really do like this machine when it works.
Karen Diehl

Do you know anybody who has SCAL 3 on a PC and not a Mac? I love my MAC, but I only use PC's to run SCAL. I'm wondering if it might be the MAC causing the problems for your cutter.

I use eCAL on my Mac and it works without issue. The only time I have an issue is when I have too much going on at one time and it can't handle all that eCAL wants to do (and that is rare). Makes me also think it might be something else possibly running with your Mac that it's using a lot of memory?

Did you send a report to CraftEdge?

I did talk to customer service and they had me send the eclipse back once again.....if and when I get a replacement, I will try not to cut too many things at one time, maybe it will work??
Karen

My Mac shuts off shortly after cutting one of two files if I don't turn the cutter off between cuts, and turn off the printer. I think it is more an electrical problem as I have a printer, monitor, cutter, lamp, and computer all on the same circuit. Also, ecal/scal takes a lot of memory so a shut down from overload is possible too.

Try and see if you can save your eclips by trying to turn things off before you go through the process of returning it.

I hope this has been useful information.