It’s been a while since I was looking, but what are all the cool kids using for controllers these days?
My RAMPS 1.4 board has just bit the dust. It went peacefully, the input power lead for the heated bed seems to have melted. I can splice it, but I probably shouldn’t, since my bed is most certainly pulling more than the 11A @ 12V RAMPS is rated for. I’ve been keeping a fan pointed at the thermal fuse to use my heated bed: and alreadly spliced the bed output lead [edit: board trace] once when it melted. 
I think I need something that can handle at least 15A @ 12V. It looks like RAMBO can do this, but are there any other boards I should check out?
This not any answer you were looking for but if it were me i would unsolder the burnt connector and soldier the hotbed wire directly to the board.
@Wayne_Friedt I more or less did that the first time it failed. I soldered a nice fat cable between the connector and the trace, skipping the burned part of the trace. This time, however, the lead between the power supply and the thermal fuse went. I’m not sure I want to solder the line from the PSU in the same way.
Rambo is not the answer. Right @Tim_Rastall ?
Actually, all of my woes have been with RUMBA. Friends don’t let friends buy RUMBA.
You definitely won’t go wrong with the RAMBo (http://youtu.be/6PHExxK8lLg).
I’m personally still using a heavily modified RAMPS, with all the power electronics replaced and off-board and a whole lot of other mods, so I don’t think it still qualifies as a RAMPs.
After playing with multiple RAMPS boards and having to frankenstein them (like Thomas is saying, but knowing him probably not as crazy) I have switched over to Azteeg boards from Panacutt and I will never turn back. Comparable to the Rambo from what Ive read but they seem to like me more. I had headache after headache with my only Rambo board… though admittedly I think it was a random lemon.
I like Azteeg boards as well. Have used and loved the X1, X3, X5. You could also consider Smoothie.
Turn the bed on and off with a rated relay, solid state or mechanical.
I like the azteeg X1 and X3. I’m running one on each of my two printers. No complaints.
I like my RUMBA board. Just make sure you mount it securely before you go attaching wires to it. The screw terminals can need a little force and if you don’t mount the board properly first it can bend and cause the surface mount parts to pop off.
@Robert_Quattlebaum_d I have 3. All of which have developed faults.
@Tim_Rastall : That sucks. I hope my current one doesn’t die! I’m hoping I can eventually fix the one I broke from too much tinkering. The board is fine except for the AVR USB chip, which seems dead (but worked fine at first, but too much pressure seems to have caused some of the solder joints to break). My current board is working like a champ.
What was the failure mode you experienced on your boards?