I think the tech that I'm most interested in for the purpose of colonizing other worlds will be 3D printing. In its current form it's no where close to good enough, but if we stretch our time horizon to hundred plus years I do think we can build 3D printers powerful enough to make everything we need to mine and sustain life on other worlds.
Let me know when your 3D printer can make it's own electronics. Also, mining equipment... I mean, wow. I suppose sintered metals might be possible but there's still the refining of raw materials. I guess my point is that the supply chain needed to build a 3D printer is probably enough to sustain things without the 3D printer.
That's not to say they wouldn't be useful. I really like being able to sketch out whatever bracket, holder, candy dish, etc that I want and print it. That would be very useful on a world without a huge economy providing every little thing you might want or need.
