I was very against Bambu in the beginning for their lack of proper network (not cloud!) support. Then they added LAN mode and I actually considered getting one. Luckily I was lazy and never got around to it. What the fuck Bambu?? Security, really? Not even HP dares to make that excuse...
Bambu Lab have been quite explicit about this. Their consumer-grade printers rely on a cloud service; for people who want or need printing over a private LAN, they offer the X1E.
That hasn't been true for years, the regular X1C has an officially supported lan mode and works fine without any of the cloud stuff. (I believe the smaller ones do too, but I haven't used them so I can't speak to them).
All HP printers still give you the option of paying full price for ink cartridges and owning the printer. The rental model is one they try very hard to steer you into, with lots of dark patterns, but you can still use HP printers with no account and no subscription ink model.
I mean, I technically see why authentication may be something they want to consider, especially for the less technically inclined users that Bambu is very obviously targeting.
However, this can be easily achieved without bricking every single third party integration. That should simple be a toggle in the settings that works entirely local
