The real story isn't the dual-extruder hype—it's that Elegoo finally figured out filament drying matters. Multi-color machines like Sovol's M1D get press because they're flashy, but they solve a problem most people don't actually have; what *does* ruin prints at scale is moisture in filament, and Elegoo's H1 HT addresses that ruthlessly at a sensible price point. The browser slicer tool outperforming Bambu Lab's proprietary software is the actual warning shot—open ecosystems are starting to eat closed ones, and firmware updates alone won't save you if your entire workflow can be replaced by free code. Watch Prusa's incremental firmware releases as the death rattle of "firmware as moat"—they're shuffling deck chairs while the industry moves to modular, platform-agnostic tooling.