The Atomstack A5 M50 Pro is a 445nm blue laser diode desktop laser engraver. It has a working area of 410mm x 400mm, which can be expanded to 410mm x 850mm with optional upgrade kits. The engraving machine uses 40W of power and the laser diode outputs 5.5W. The laser itself is fixedly focused, and you can manually adjust the height of the laser head above the material using a convenient knob. The laser head has built-in eye protection and a fan that blows air towards the material, which does a good job of driving fumes away from the lens. The frame is all extruded aluminium, and the motion comes from a belt-driven stepper motor controlled by a 32-bit GRBL control board.
Assembly is relatively easy. It took me about an hour to get it up and running. The manual provides assembly steps, and all hardware is packaged in individual bags with step numbers labeled. I did find some of the assembly steps a little hard to follow, mostly about how to run the cables without pulling too hard.
As for software, Atomstack recommends LaserGRBL or LightBurn to control the laser. LaserGRBL is a free and open source tool for Windows with a built-in material library including pre-built profiles for various materials for Atomstack A5. The pre-made material library is great, and the profiles are in place. Lightburn is a paid software, but offers a 30-day trial period. I ended up really enjoying LightBurn, so most of my testing was done with it. However, I did pull all material settings from LaserGRBL.
Using a laser is very simple. Place the material in the laser, adjust the focus by placing the provided acrylic spacer on the material, then lower the laser head until it rests on the spacer and tighten the knob. Connect the laser to your computer via USB and start working via LaserGRBL or Lightburn. It only takes a few tries to really get used to switching materials and changing focus. The frame rise from the surface is great because you can slide the larger stock over the side. You are not limited to 400mm² of stock.
Atomstack advertises that this laser can handle a wide variety of materials, so I wanted to try as many as possible. First is Wood. Wood is the livelihood of this laser. Common craft woods such as basswood and Baltic birch are beautifully carved and cut. I use 3 passes of 1/4" plywood. The fan in the laser head ensures no flames, the only time I caught fire was when I was running very slowly at full power in the initial material test mode.
It might take some testing to really dial in the settings for different materials. Some of my initial tests with these living hinges didn't quite pass. You'll still get some bending, but you can see that it's not quite through. Thankfully, LightBurn has a great material testing tool to generate meshes with different settings, so you can really dial in those settings.
Speaking of natural materials, the leather is well sculpted. Make sure not to use chrome brown leathers as they give off dangerous fumes, but vegan leathers work well. Using their suggested speeds and feeds, I got really nice, high-contrast sculpting.
Also on the list is stainless steel. I tested it on a stainless steel flask that I also bought on Amazon, and yes, the A5 M50 Pro was able to engrave on it. Their suggested setting is very slow, 100mm per minute at 100% power, 3 passes. Due to time constraints, I only engraved it once, but even this leaves a permanent mark. Even image engraving seems to work on stainless steel. However, the slow speed means the metal absorbs a lot of energy, and all that heat eventually deforms the material. So if you want to carve the flask, you will need to adjust the settings to prevent warping.
Next, acrylic. Diode lasers cannot cut or engrave clear acrylics. Visible lasers pass directly through them and do nothing to the material. However, opaque acrylics do work. I used some opaque black acrylic and those cut and engraved fine. I love making acrylic keychains, they are perfect for handing out at events. These black acrylic keychains look great and saving the file to an SD card makes it easy to cut more of them.
Also misleading is the mention of "glass" in their engraving listing. Again, the visible laser just goes through the glass and doesn't engrave it at all. Someone mentioned using various paints or tapes to absorb the energy and engraving on glass using a diode laser, but I haven't had any luck. If there are reliable techniques for glass engraving with these types of lasers, please let me know in the comments. But I think Glass probably shouldn't be listed on their website.