For manufacturer, Amateur user is a very small part of their market，I have tried to contact various microscope manufacturers,The first thing they ask is always which company or institute that you're from. There is little patience to offer help to amateurs or even to offer the price of microscopes or accessories.Perhaps Zeiss is better than other manufacturers,because they offer an online store, though the prices are also ridiculously high.
Thank you Oliver, a very interesting video, the same thing happens with Telescopes, very high magnification is just a marketing ploy. Thank you for your channels they have helped me with this wonderful hobby, and my TH-cam channel, best wishes to you, ..Terry.
Hi William, you make some very good points here, i enjoy Astronomy, and i have a telescope, but where I live here in the UK, I find it such a frustrating hobby, my scope spends most of the time, sitting and collecting dust as the clear skies are very few and far between. I have a TH-cam channel, if you fancy checking it out mostly wildlife related stuff and i have a video on there where i show the Telescope i use and why I chose that type of scope, I have just started posting up some microscope video`s, still just experimenting at the moment.
yes, that's the truth. the webpages of resellers and manufacturers are mostly useless if you are a beginner. your channel helped me out to find a microscope which fulfills my requirements and wishes. thanx for your work Oliver!
If you are in the UK, give Alan Potter or Helen a call at “Brunel Microscopes”. Awesome company, top rate customer care and professionally knowledgeable. I am not connected with them in any way but I have purchased both my stereo and compound microscopes from them and can totally recommend them. Regards. Ps. They also carry a good selection of used and budget scopes as well.
If you live in Germany you can visit Bresser GmbH on the first Thursday of every month to try out the microscopes and buy direct then and there. I am very happy with the microscope that I bought on the day and took home with me. As far as I am aware it's the only place where you can do that.
Thanks for helping bring clarity to this - I recently used your videos to purchase a Swift SW380T and am very happy with its quality and performance! I appreciate your passion for the hobby / field of study and for sharing all of your knowledge!
Steve Cortez , I bought the same model from Amazon when it was on sale, along with the 10mp camera. I am very satisfied and o feel as though it was a worth while purchase. I was concerned, though, because the Swift web site doesn’t list this model in their inventory and I found very little data on it outside of Amazon. Thank you, Oliver, for providing your qualified opinions and experience.
I got the same model! Even though they used the same marketing ploy (100x oil immmersion time 25x eyepiece = 2500x dark smudge), there are enough combinations of optics to get exactly what I need for any specimen and it comes will all the important features. Made some dark field patch stops from using his videos, and I couldn't be happier!
This is exactly the problem I encountered when I bought my first microscope a few months ago. In the end it took me 5 weeks of research to settle on the scope I wanted.
Nice video. It's totally true. As a beginner myself, the websites are convoluted with hundreds of similar choices. It induces analysis paralysis. Hopefully this brings more attention to this issue.
The big ones - Olympus, Nikon, Leica etc always have "Ask for quote" on their pages. It's like they are embarrassed by their prices, which can be easily found through online resellers. The other thing is that many of the models look exactly the same, because they are made in the same factory in China, but have different labels.
@@johnboyd7615 The quote path is mainly for large fish (pharmaceutical, mining, etc). If you buy for few hundred thousand $. For small fry, they should put the basic stuff price online.
I was a professional salesman in real estate and think as a generalisation the microscope companies really need education in "selling". When you present a fact include it's related benefit and relate that to the customers requirements for a start... Be careful using "trade terms" ie facts that merely identify differences to vendors between products that are somewhat confusing to new buyers. Many marketers fail to put themselves in the buyers shoes and must miss countless sales. If you decide to get into selling microscopes please contact me for some useful "selling" guidelines. Selling is not about selling something someone does not need it is about helping the customer get what they need and want and to help them through the process and establish a relationship that sees them return for further purchases and recomend your company to friends and family. With such an approach you stand out as most sellers really have no idea.
Russian, Lomo brand microscopes used to be sold online with prices listed. They were easy to compare. The quality was very good for the price. Since then I have put microscopes together from parts I collected off of eBay. The only way I found to afford the parts off of eBay was to have a decent job, with disposable income due to living very (very!) modestly. It's taken me about 30 years to collect most of the equipment I have, so patience was another ingredient! Unfortunately there is no simple formula for obtaining the perfect microscope for the average person. I find that each setup I have excels at some tasks while being inadequate at other tasks. This unfortunately means that if your interests are varied, you will probably end up with a lot of varied equipment over time. Good quality microscopes and parts can be expensive. The parts show up on eBay sporadically. Also keep in mind that in order to successfully build a microscope from parts, you have to do a lot of research to understand exactly what you are doing. I wish I could give a simple answer. I'm not sharing my experience to make people depressed, but rather to help people have realistic expectations.
Agreed. Buying is the begin of trouble. I just sent my sv bony 201 back. Not even a package list. No manual. And after calling CS, nothing. I never succeeded to focus anything.
Thank you for this rant -- it was great to have someone knowledgeable articulate this because, of course, we beginners cannot express as we don't have the knowledge even to make our frustration understood. Thank you!
I have observed this phenomena in other industries also. Heterotrophic bacteria to break down waste in septic tanks are an example - is the environment oxygenated? Is chlorine present in the water for the system? pH of system? All of this and dozens of other factors are critical. What do sellers of bacterial spores do? Emphasize the number of colony forming units (CFU's) in their product. 1 billion CFU's! Completely irrelevant since the reproduction of heterotrophs is exponential and if the environment is unfriendly they won't emerge from the spores anyway. Rather than educate the consumer, the industry picks a benchmark that is irrelevant and marketing revolves around that benchmark. It is very frustrating wherever this occurs.
A subject well worthy of a rant! I agree with people who are saying that it's marketing tactics that create the problem. These tactics are present wherever you go to buy just about anything, and we fall victim to them more easily if we have no previous experience of buying or using the particular product.
I have been microscope shopping for about a month now. Still getting a feel for what I want. I agree that most everyone tries to hype the large numbers. Thanks to you and a few others I am starting to understand what I need. I have one in mind but I am going to keep on reading up for at least another week. Thanks for all the very informative videos as I have learned a lot.
I flipped through some manufacturers‘ websites and I found that it is hard to see if a microscope offers darkfield microscopy. I think it is a very important feature, especially for beginners who might just want to shove anything they find under the microscope just to see how it looks up close. Very frustrating. You get the feeling that no one is actually interested in darkfield microscopy - but people need it all the time, and for commercial purposes, too (like checking things for small damage etc.)
Most microscope with proper condenser have a small rack to hold a diy darkfield filter. I don't know why they don't talk about it more? I've bought a SWIFT380B last month for 203$ canadian (new/open box, shipping included). I shopped a lot, but Best buy ever! Please, ask me question if you need help to make a choice.
Exactly the problem I, as a total beginner, faced and face until today. Been searching for a good beginners microscope for years. Everything I find is either plastic microscope with the so called double magnification with the special eyepiece, or the extremely expensive machines for scientists. A year ago out of frustration I ended up, regretfully, with a toy from Toys R Us. Out of complete lack of knowledge and fake information on product pages online. I still remember being pissed after opening and box and realizing the coarse AND fine knobs is actually the coarse knob that looks like a coarse and fine knobs.
And, as an individual, even if you a load of money to spend on the "request quote" product, they just don't want to sell it to you or don't bother replying. a few years ago I had a 6000$ budget to buy a specialized camera, which was more than enough (considering I had much cheaper option available) and it was really difficult to buy it until I found a cool reseller. Basically I had to phone them and tell them "look, I'm sending you the money, once you received the full money, you ship it. I won't call for support, won't bother you with crap, just take my money and ship it dude"
I guess one problem might be that some of the companies are not "used" to talk to private people, as they target universities, hospitals etc. I myself have expierneced, however, that the big band companies were all very friendly and approachable, and even called back, to ask whether I am still interested in the offer, or if they can remove me from their database, so that they won't call anymore.
Could`t agree more. There´s been a while now since I started looking for a microscope and man, i´m stressed. Too many similar options of microscopes in a small price range or either big price jumps that I don´t really get reasons for between the specifications
Good one, Oliver! I'm struggling with many of the points that you just mentioned. In my case, I worry that I should get planar objectives or simple achromatic objectives. Or, for more detailed work, perhaps Phase Contrast would be good to have. And, again, do I buy lower end, affordable components, or should I be looking ahead to more serious microscopy and go for a Nikon or Olympus. I agree with y our 20/80 rule. But, sometimes the missing 20 would be nice to have. Thank you, for all of your advice.
I would say go for regular achromatic objectives at the beginning and when you are more experienced then you can always buy more. There is so much to discover even with low-cost microscopes. Plan are good if you do photography, but even I don't have them. Nikon/Olympus is good if you want to have special features that are not offered by cheaper microscopes.
YES! YOU SAID IT EXACTLY! Look, if I were a professional scientist, I would not be buying a microscope because I would have access to a lab with a $60,000 microscope. But in order to have real scientists take an interest in what I am finding, I must have excellent resolution or they will dismiss first, ask questions -- never. I needed this before, but couldn't choose. So currently I have no microscope. Thank you!
Couldn't agree more. the retailers need to get on TH-cam and demonstrate honestly what their microscopes can do, and what a consumer can expect to get for their money.
Thanks for the guidance! In 2023 would you say anything has changed? I see lots of decent Amscope and Omax microscopes on ebay clearly priced at $160-$300 USD (no need to request quotes). Plus lots of guidance on youtube thanks to people like you! A total beginner probably has no choice but to "cut their teeth" on a kids' kit for $40-$70. Only after working with pond water and getting a sense of how the magnification works, and corroborating this with online advice from the pros, will one get a sense of what is really important and be ready to upgrade to a $160-$300 scope.
PLEASE, follow his advice and use his affiliate link in description. Unfortunately, I only saw the affiliated link after I've purchase my microscope last month. Sorry about that. SWIFT 380B is by far the best ROI money can buy!!! 299$ Canadian (I've got it at 203$ Canadian for a new/open box. Sold by Swift on Amazon, next day shipping included). Awesome image quality. Binocular High precision z axis Great quality mechanical stage 1.25 NA condenser Filter holder (to put a DIY dark field) Great quality objectives I then buy a 60x objective to avoid the trouble of 100x with oil (it cost only 21$ canadian, shipping included. Great quality!!!). I just don't understand HOW they can sell us that scope for so cheap??? All that high tech machining, adjustment, craftsmanship, expertise???? What is the salary of the people working to make my scope? I'm so sorry about that... But can you blame me to buy the cheap stuff?
Oliver, don't feel bad. Because of your videos I am in my first year with a used microscope from a thrift store, it's very nice basic and I bought a 100x oil immersion lens, little sample bottles, droppers, slides, tweezers, even dyes and acid too. I can't wait to see all the small things in a world I can now see. The school compound microscope is very clear and I am glad I saw your videos this year, as I knew from what you were using what I wanted was the basic unit and little bottles too. I really like the cork lined box to put slides in. Also I am looking for a small centrifuge to look at samples that appear to have nothing in them, we shall see what the bottom drop has in it for more interesting samples and efficiently finding them. I only spent 20 dollars on my microscope and 15 dollars on an 100x oil lens, the centrifuge will be from a junk pile I fix a broken one for about 20, but it will spin 14k on a timer too. I am happy with this hobby as it makes me smarter about the world around me and it's fun and at 59 fun is a good thing to find. Thank you for your videos, it is an awakening for me. Very cool Oliver, my friend.
I have to say Oliver, you are the voice for this industry because I did not even consider magazine advertisement because you actually use and reveal the truth every week and that is the real truth to use. Now hospitals have different standards and high budgets too meet their expected expenditures to spend for their year and they have to talk about something to get attention, department heads know all this is bs to get the picture on the page and in the end the consumer really does get a nice piece of equipment, so who can get mad at a nice microscope, it is money well spent right.
*Im gonna RANT about pocket/portable microscopes on online stores AND TH-cam reviews:* Im a total amateur with microscopes. I've seen microscope videos on TH-cam with they magnification on screen. A few years ago I wanted a portable pocket microscope and the one I chose was a Carson 60x-120x from Amazon. Last year I wanted to updated it and started to look for a new one on Amazon. I there were many AMAZING 1000x, wifi and usb, and most of them have 4 stars, and most people are happy with those 1000x. But I saw the pictures buyers posted, and for 1000x I KNEW they were not even taking advantage of the 1000x AT ALL. So then I went to TH-cam to watch reviews on these 1000x microscopes and OH MY COSMOS... All of them are amazed, happy and excited with these 1000x watching insects, coins, leaves and their hairs!!! MY CARSON 60X-120X CAN SHOW THE SAME AS THESE 1000X MICROSCOPES!!! I WAS EXPECTING SOMEONE TESTING THEM SHOWING CELLS, BUT NO ONE DID!!!!
Now I want to update my Carson 60x-120x with a Carson 100x-250x, I think they are trustable with their information. The rest are liars and the reviews are full of people who have never EVEN seen in TH-cam videos of different magnifications to know.
Totally agree with what you say. Microscope retailers make a great deal of money with very big markups. The other big problem is not being able to actually see and try the model you are interested in before you spend quite a lot of money. Re-branding of identical products and acceories results in huge price variations. My suspicion is that retailers aren't really interested in beginners and those who only buy one unit. They much prefer schools, colleges and research establishments where the budgets are big and large orders are placed. When all microscopes come from China, we have no way of finding out what they really cost to make. It is a problem that cannot really be solved.
Love the rant, you are right on. You explained well the need for a microscope and I did purchase a nice one reasonable, new that my style. Thanks for this, cheers!
Can confirm this, I helped my brother get a stereo microscope thinking 180x was realistic told him to buy it but turns out the microscope maxes out at around 45x magnification, over that its empty magnification everything looks blurry and anything shiny you can see lots and lots of airy disks, at least the optics are good judging by the shape of the airy disks now we have two spare eyepieces and a Barlow.
I've seen $900 objectives on eBay. Are the optics really that much better than one that sells at, perhaps $200-$300? From what I have read, as a light microscope approaches 1000X, the resolving power diminishes because the small details are closer to the actual light wavelength.
There can be several reasons for this. It might be specialized optics (water immersion objectives, plan apochromatic objectives, those for polarization microscopy are strain/tension free etc). And this very quickly drives up the price. Expensive objectives might also have correction collars to adjust for cover glass thickness etc. So they might be better, being corrected more, but they might also be more specialized, or they might be from a well-known company or they might not be manufactured anymore and those organizations that need them are willing to pay. It is not always better image quality, but can be.
I learned the hard way about that artificially inflated magnification, but at least now i know better what to look for, but i suspect it added some artificial value to the thing, it's got a 5 & 16 eye pieces which just make for some awkward magnifications because I can't just go 300 to 400 to 600 8 & 1000, which I would be able to manage with a lesser advertised magnification that all seem to come with 10 & 25 eye pieces. The 40 times objective is not all that good quality either, especially at 1200, it's dog poop, wish I'd saved that extra 20 quid but there you go. As for sellers & manufactureres making it difficult to compare scopes, I've also run into this problem, Leica & Olympus are just horrible sites, why isn't there a bloody list of all their scopes & ranges from basic to ultra specialised, I'm not assuming this would be an easy task for them, but there could at least be some basic list to help give a good idea of what they offer in what price bands. Even Swift seem a bit tight with what they display, the only thing I found clear in any of my searches is they are keen to drive up the magnification, & quite often are not willing to describe how well the magnifications resolve detail, that's another thing with the 40x on mine, the glare washes out a lot of detail as well, in that respect, I wish I'd looked a little harder at what to expect with certain designs, & I'd now have happily have spent an extra 40 quid to at least have a condenser & diaphram, which mine doesn't. The 4x & 10x objectives are fine though, absolutely no issues with them. I almost can't wait to upgrade after I've gotten more experience with this basic thing & know much better what I'm after & to look for, wish I could do some dark field, phase contrast wouldn't go amiss either for studying some mycelium, but bright field works just fine for now. Anyhoo, loving your thoughts on these things, it's invaluable to have someone well experienced in something giving you a detailed picture of a given field, loving learning from you.
When it comes to manufacturers who want you to "click" for a quote, I just pass. I don't know about anyone else, but they lose my business when they do that.
This is common practice for high end microscopes. You have to ask for a price by sending an email or calling them up. This might make sense to some extent, as they will put together a microscope based on your needs (highly modular research microscopes don't come out of the box, but are put together individually, too many options). You will then get an offer with every single part listed and how much it costs. But it can happen that they might start to call you back asking if you are still interested..... Happened to me. In another case, I am still waiting for an offer. Research institutions etc. don't mind doing that, but for the normal consumer, who wants to compare prices, it's annoying.
i just bought a microscope and it was a similar experience to buying my first telescope , they promote things like magnification as if thats all that matters and they never have any actual clear data on the specs you need
Today I went to every shop who sell microscopes but it was of no use I didn't find one for amateur microscopist either they had to cheap one's without mechanical stage or LED or too expensive one's totally disappointed
For an alternate point of view - I used to work for one of the big manufacturers - they are set up for the research, clinical or industrial market and this is a different universe than the amateur hobbyist market - so is hard to compare prices. The demands on a microscope in one of these markets is extreme as are the support, service and technical knowledge demands. Just to provide a microscope to one of these customers it usually requires a rep with years of knowledge and entails at a minimum a detailed review of the application and discussion with a team of people, an on site proof of concept and testing of various features, an on site installation validation and training and years of follow up support and technical service - not to mention the dedicated in house support, service, QA and applications teams the manufacturers staff. This is what they are geared up to do and it is not possible to provide this level of service cheaply. The environments these microscopes are being used in requires them to function with the highest accuracy, precision and reliability for years on end. The customers can not afford down time or poor results. They are being used for life and death applications like cancer diagnosis, inspection of medical devices or stem cells used in humans, the heat shield on the space shuttle, the electronics in the control systems of the plane you fly in, etc as well as industrial applications where a mistake could shut down an entire manufacturing facility or research applications requiring quantitative data being submitted to the FDA. You would never see the low cost options made in China in use for these applications and many of these customers find the price quite reasonable based on the performance and the service they get along with the microscope. So it’s just different worlds we are talking about here. I’d also add that the big manufacturers innovate and develop all of the technology that the low cost manufacturers then copy so the big companies bear the all of development costs for the features you see in generic models. That being said I think everyone realizes the big manufacturers can be well outside of the price point a hobbyist can spend so the no name brands offer a valuable service by providing low cost microscopes with reasonably good performance to our community which allows many more people in the world to enjoy our hobby.
I want to be able to monitor my dog for giardia parasite cysts in his stool as it is impractical for me to take him to the veterinarian frequently. What microscope would I need to observe giardia cysts in dog stool.
Brand name microscopes cost the same as a used car even on the base level 2-5000.00 USD . Is not a hobby its a career when you are dropping that kind of cash.
Bacteria can be seen from a total magnification of 400x upwards. The microscope needs a condenser, so low-cost introductory microscope don't work. Ideally you need a Phase Contrast microscope but they are much more expensive. Viruses like Corona (Covid 19) can not be seen with a light microscope.
I would like to use my smartphone camera on my microscope. I have a Zeiss stemi 2000-c. It has a c mount camera adapter on it for use with a 1/2 inch CCD camera. Any suggestions ?
I been thinking about buying a microscope from a company called Amscope but i have no idea about their quality, im very much a it doesn't need to be pretty as long as it gets the job done type person but before i waste money i want to know that it actually will get the job done.
AmScope sells cheap microscopes. I got one and sent it back. You might be better off buying a used Olympus (CH2 or a BH2). The optics are outstanding. If you see Oliver's microscope, it is an Olympus. The only thing I would recommend is buying an Olympus if you have the option to return it. You can specify that the objective lens (expecially the 40x and 100x) are not scratched or have residue on them. With Amscope you can always return them but the problem is that you will never know how much better the Olympus is if you couldn't compare them side by side. I have had the luxury of comparing them and the Olympus is better. But a used Olympus has to be checked to make sure the 40x and 100x objectives are scratch and residue free. The most important thing in any microscope is the objective optical quality and the most vulnerable objectives to get damaged are the 40x and 100x due to the short working distance.
I have their model T490B and have no regrets. I specifically wanted trinocular with mechanical stage. I planned to use it for pond/sea microorganisms mainly, but also for anything around the house that I always wanted to take a closer look at ;) I printed few dark field filters that improve observations greatly and even sometimes use it as a very basic (because of not sufficient depth of field) stereo microscope - with external light source from the top. I think that quality of vision I'm getting is similar to what Oliver shows in his videos (except of phase shift which I don't have). As for build quality - it seems sturdy and precise (I don't have much comparison with better brands though), one thing I don't like plastic head but that's really all.
I think it depends a lot on the specific model. Amscope (like other retailers) gets the microscopes from China and then rebrands them. Some people are very satisfied others less so. Amscope has a full range and I think that if you buy a better one, then there should be no quality problems, as these more expensive microscopes are targeted towards the professional or educational sector. It also depends on your own quality expectations.
Buying an excellent telescope is much, much easier. I've had a terrible time buying a Nikon microscope - it's as if Nikon does not really want to see them. Weird!
Приветствую автора канала! Совершенно верно! Микроскоп даёт увеличение 1000× и не более того! Когда я купил свой микроскоп, то эти окуляры 25× выбросил в коробку и ни разу не одел их на микроскоп. От них толку как от быка молоко!🤣 Достаточно нормальных окуляров 10× Но куда деваться? Хотите вы или нет, они всовывают эти ненужные окуляры к микроскопу. Обман и маркетинговый ход. Вводят людей в заблуждение!
It's all depend of how much money you have (or you don't have!) to spend on it. For me, it was harder to find a decent deal than using it. Sure, this is not a simple instrument. There is a lot of trick to know to get the best experience. If you wanna get the easy way, you can use a stereomicroscope and have a lot of eazy/great fun. If you are interested to know more about your local soil microbe, less than 1mm size stuff, a compound scope is the way. But you are right, you need to know a little more. Fortunately, we now have free access to knowledge...
@@alexandrevaliquette3883 for me as a microscopy scientist i do not own a REM neither confocal laser TIRF or STED about 100 000 Euros. But i own about 20 DIY repared scientific light microscops. I found friens who own a REM or make me for 50 Euros a good SEM-picture. The art of microscopy is to find in nature interesting specimen and to prepare them under the steromicroskop. And of course you need a good microtome and to know how to use it. Today you can by scientific microscops and microtoms, by the way i prefer Zeiss, from university labs wich in 1980 were state of art and standard, for litle money. Go outside in nature with a little cheap field microscope and find something new. Beside the microscops it is important to have a good equipped microscop labaroratory and to know how to use it
For manufacturer, Amateur user is a very small part of their market，I have tried to contact various microscope manufacturers,The first thing they ask is always which company or institute that you're from. There is little patience to offer help to amateurs or even to offer the price of microscopes or accessories.Perhaps Zeiss is better than other manufacturers,because they offer an online store, though the prices are also ridiculously high.
Thank you Oliver, a very interesting video, the same thing happens with Telescopes, very high magnification is just a marketing ploy. Thank you for your channels they have helped me with this wonderful hobby, and my TH-cam channel, best wishes to you, ..Terry.
Hi William, you make some very good points here, i enjoy Astronomy, and i have a telescope, but where I live here in the UK, I find it such a frustrating hobby, my scope spends most of the time, sitting and collecting dust as the clear skies are very few and far between. I have a TH-cam channel, if you fancy checking it out mostly wildlife related stuff and i have a video on there where i show the Telescope i use and why I chose that type of scope, I have just started posting up some microscope video`s, still just experimenting at the moment.
yes, that's the truth. the webpages of resellers and manufacturers are mostly useless if you are a beginner. your channel helped me out to find a microscope which fulfills my requirements and wishes. thanx for your work Oliver!
If you are in the UK, give Alan Potter or Helen a call at “Brunel Microscopes”. Awesome company, top rate customer care and professionally knowledgeable. I am not connected with them in any way but I have purchased both my stereo and compound microscopes from them and can totally recommend them. Regards. Ps. They also carry a good selection of used and budget scopes as well.
Yes, I know that company - I ordered a slide ringing table from them some time ago. I can also recommend them!
If you live in Germany you can visit Bresser GmbH on the first Thursday of every month to try out the microscopes and buy direct then and there. I am very happy with the microscope that I bought on the day and took home with me. As far as I am aware it's the only place where you can do that.
Thanks for helping bring clarity to this - I recently used your videos to purchase a Swift SW380T and am very happy with its quality and performance! I appreciate your passion for the hobby / field of study and for sharing all of your knowledge!
Steve Cortez , I bought the same model from Amazon when it was on sale, along with the 10mp camera. I am very satisfied and o feel as though it was a worth while purchase. I was concerned, though, because the Swift web site doesn’t list this model in their inventory and I found very little data on it outside of Amazon. Thank you, Oliver, for providing your qualified opinions and experience.
I got the same model! Even though they used the same marketing ploy (100x oil immmersion time 25x eyepiece = 2500x dark smudge), there are enough combinations of optics to get exactly what I need for any specimen and it comes will all the important features. Made some dark field patch stops from using his videos, and I couldn't be happier!
This is exactly the problem I encountered when I bought my first microscope a few months ago. In the end it took me 5 weeks of research to settle on the scope I wanted.
Nice video. It's totally true. As a beginner myself, the websites are convoluted with hundreds of similar choices. It induces analysis paralysis. Hopefully this brings more attention to this issue.
The big ones - Olympus, Nikon, Leica etc always have "Ask for quote" on their pages. It's like they are embarrassed by their prices, which can be easily found through online resellers.
The other thing is that many of the models look exactly the same, because they are made in the same factory in China, but have different labels.
I think they go the quote path so they can give better prices to buyers who might be in the market repeatedly
@@johnboyd7615 The quote path is mainly for large fish (pharmaceutical, mining, etc). If you buy for few hundred thousand $.
For small fry, they should put the basic stuff price online.
I was a professional salesman in real estate and think as a generalisation the microscope companies really need education in "selling". When you present a fact include it's related benefit and relate that to the customers requirements for a start... Be careful using "trade terms" ie facts that merely identify differences to vendors between products that are somewhat confusing to new buyers. Many marketers fail to put themselves in the buyers shoes and must miss countless sales. If you decide to get into selling microscopes please contact me for some useful "selling" guidelines. Selling is not about selling something someone does not need it is about helping the customer get what they need and want and to help them through the process and establish a relationship that sees them return for further purchases and recomend your company to friends and family. With such an approach you stand out as most sellers really have no idea.
Russian, Lomo brand microscopes used to be sold online with prices listed. They were easy to compare. The quality was very good for the price. Since then I have put microscopes together from parts I collected off of eBay. The only way I found to afford the parts off of eBay was to have a decent job, with disposable income due to living very (very!) modestly. It's taken me about 30 years to collect most of the equipment I have, so patience was another ingredient! Unfortunately there is no simple formula for obtaining the perfect microscope for the average person. I find that each setup I have excels at some tasks while being inadequate at other tasks. This unfortunately means that if your interests are varied, you will probably end up with a lot of varied equipment over time. Good quality microscopes and parts can be expensive. The parts show up on eBay sporadically. Also keep in mind that in order to successfully build a microscope from parts, you have to do a lot of research to understand exactly what you are doing. I wish I could give a simple answer. I'm not sharing my experience to make people depressed, but rather to help people have realistic expectations.
Agreed. Buying is the begin of trouble. I just sent my sv bony 201 back. Not even a package list. No manual. And after calling CS, nothing. I never succeeded to focus anything.
Thank you for this rant -- it was great to have someone knowledgeable articulate this because, of course, we beginners cannot express as we don't have the knowledge even to make our frustration understood. Thank you!
I have observed this phenomena in other industries also. Heterotrophic bacteria to break down waste in septic tanks are an example - is the environment oxygenated? Is chlorine present in the water for the system? pH of system? All of this and dozens of other factors are critical. What do sellers of bacterial spores do? Emphasize the number of colony forming units (CFU's) in their product. 1 billion CFU's! Completely irrelevant since the reproduction of heterotrophs is exponential and if the environment is unfriendly they won't emerge from the spores anyway. Rather than educate the consumer, the industry picks a benchmark that is irrelevant and marketing revolves around that benchmark. It is very frustrating wherever this occurs.
A subject well worthy of a rant! I agree with people who are saying that it's marketing tactics that create the problem. These tactics are present wherever you go to buy just about anything, and we fall victim to them more easily if we have no previous experience of buying or using the particular product.
I have been microscope shopping for about a month now. Still getting a feel for what I want. I agree that most everyone tries to hype the large numbers. Thanks to you and a few others I am starting to understand what I need. I have one in mind but I am going to keep on reading up for at least another week.
Thanks for all the very informative videos as I have learned a lot.
I flipped through some manufacturers‘ websites and I found that it is hard to see if a microscope offers darkfield microscopy. I think it is a very important feature, especially for beginners who might just want to shove anything they find under the microscope just to see how it looks up close.
Very frustrating. You get the feeling that no one is actually interested in darkfield microscopy - but people need it all the time, and for commercial purposes, too (like checking things for small damage etc.)
Most microscope with proper condenser have a small rack to hold a diy darkfield filter. I don't know why they don't talk about it more?
I've bought a SWIFT380B last month for 203$ canadian (new/open box, shipping included). I shopped a lot, but Best buy ever!
Please, ask me question if you need help to make a choice.
Exactly the problem I, as a total beginner, faced and face until today. Been searching for a good beginners microscope for years. Everything I find is either plastic microscope with the so called double magnification with the special eyepiece, or the extremely expensive machines for scientists. A year ago out of frustration I ended up, regretfully, with a toy from Toys R Us. Out of complete lack of knowledge and fake information on product pages online. I still remember being pissed after opening and box and realizing the coarse AND fine knobs is actually the coarse knob that looks like a coarse and fine knobs.
Pro tip: if you see Dora the Explorer on top of your scientific instrument; this is a red flag!
Pro tip 2: if you shop scientific instruments at Toys R Us, you shouldn't be surprise that your instrument is... a toy.
And, as an individual, even if you a load of money to spend on the "request quote" product, they just don't want to sell it to you or don't bother replying. a few years ago I had a 6000$ budget to buy a specialized camera, which was more than enough (considering I had much cheaper option available) and it was really difficult to buy it until I found a cool reseller. Basically I had to phone them and tell them "look, I'm sending you the money, once you received the full money, you ship it. I won't call for support, won't bother you with crap, just take my money and ship it dude"
I guess one problem might be that some of the companies are not "used" to talk to private people, as they target universities, hospitals etc. I myself have expierneced, however, that the big band companies were all very friendly and approachable, and even called back, to ask whether I am still interested in the offer, or if they can remove me from their database, so that they won't call anymore.
Could`t agree more. There´s been a while now since I started looking for a microscope and man, i´m stressed. Too many similar options of microscopes in a small price range or either big price jumps that I don´t really get reasons for between the specifications
Good one, Oliver! I'm struggling with many of the points that you just mentioned. In my case, I worry that I should get planar objectives or simple achromatic objectives. Or, for more detailed work, perhaps Phase Contrast would be good to have. And, again, do I buy lower end, affordable components, or should I be looking ahead to more serious microscopy and go for a Nikon or Olympus. I agree with y our 20/80 rule. But, sometimes the missing 20 would be nice to have. Thank you, for all of your advice.
I would say go for regular achromatic objectives at the beginning and when you are more experienced then you can always buy more. There is so much to discover even with low-cost microscopes. Plan are good if you do photography, but even I don't have them. Nikon/Olympus is good if you want to have special features that are not offered by cheaper microscopes.
YES! YOU SAID IT EXACTLY! Look, if I were a professional scientist, I would not be buying a microscope because I would have access to a lab with a $60,000 microscope. But in order to have real scientists take an interest in what I am finding, I must have excellent resolution or they will dismiss first, ask questions -- never.
I needed this before, but couldn't choose. So currently I have no microscope. Thank you!
Couldn't agree more. the retailers need to get on TH-cam and demonstrate honestly what their microscopes can do, and what a consumer can expect to get for their money.
Thanks for the guidance! In 2023 would you say anything has changed? I see lots of decent Amscope and Omax microscopes on ebay clearly priced at $160-$300 USD (no need to request quotes). Plus lots of guidance on youtube thanks to people like you! A total beginner probably has no choice but to "cut their teeth" on a kids' kit for $40-$70. Only after working with pond water and getting a sense of how the magnification works, and corroborating this with online advice from the pros, will one get a sense of what is really important and be ready to upgrade to a $160-$300 scope.
PLEASE, follow his advice and use his affiliate link in description. Unfortunately, I only saw the affiliated link after I've purchase my microscope last month. Sorry about that.
SWIFT 380B is by far the best ROI money can buy!!!
299$ Canadian (I've got it at 203$ Canadian for a new/open box. Sold by Swift on Amazon, next day shipping included).
Awesome image quality.
Binocular
High precision z axis
Great quality mechanical stage
1.25 NA condenser
Filter holder (to put a DIY dark field)
Great quality objectives
I then buy a 60x objective to avoid the trouble of 100x with oil (it cost only 21$ canadian, shipping included. Great quality!!!).
I just don't understand HOW they can sell us that scope for so cheap??? All that high tech machining, adjustment, craftsmanship, expertise????
What is the salary of the people working to make my scope? I'm so sorry about that... But can you blame me to buy the cheap stuff?
Oliver, don't feel bad. Because of your videos I am in my first year with a used microscope from a thrift store, it's very nice basic and I bought a 100x oil immersion lens, little sample bottles, droppers, slides, tweezers, even dyes and acid too. I can't wait to see all the small things in a world I can now see. The school compound microscope is very clear and I am glad I saw your videos this year, as I knew from what you were using what I wanted was the basic unit and little bottles too. I really like the cork lined box to put slides in. Also I am looking for a small centrifuge to look at samples that appear to have nothing in them, we shall see what the bottom drop has in it for more interesting samples and efficiently finding them. I only spent 20 dollars on my microscope and 15 dollars on an 100x oil lens, the centrifuge will be from a junk pile I fix a broken one for about 20, but it will spin 14k on a timer too. I am happy with this hobby as it makes me smarter about the world around me and it's fun and at 59 fun is a good thing to find. Thank you for your videos, it is an awakening for me. Very cool Oliver, my friend.
I have to say Oliver, you are the voice for this industry because I did not even consider magazine advertisement because you actually use and reveal the truth every week and that is the real truth to use. Now hospitals have different standards and high budgets too meet their expected expenditures to spend for their year and they have to talk about something to get attention, department heads know all this is bs to get the picture on the page and in the end the consumer really does get a nice piece of equipment, so who can get mad at a nice microscope, it is money well spent right.
*Im gonna RANT about pocket/portable microscopes on online stores AND TH-cam reviews:*
Im a total amateur with microscopes. I've seen microscope videos on TH-cam with they magnification on screen. A few years ago I wanted a portable pocket microscope and the one I chose was a Carson 60x-120x from Amazon.
Last year I wanted to updated it and started to look for a new one on Amazon. I there were many AMAZING 1000x, wifi and usb, and most of them have 4 stars, and most people are happy with those 1000x. But I saw the pictures buyers posted, and for 1000x I KNEW they were not even taking advantage of the 1000x AT ALL.
So then I went to TH-cam to watch reviews on these 1000x microscopes and OH MY COSMOS... All of them are amazed, happy and excited with these 1000x watching insects, coins, leaves and their hairs!!! MY CARSON 60X-120X CAN SHOW THE SAME AS THESE 1000X MICROSCOPES!!! I WAS EXPECTING SOMEONE TESTING THEM SHOWING CELLS, BUT NO ONE DID!!!!
Now I want to update my Carson 60x-120x with a Carson 100x-250x, I think they are trustable with their information. The rest are liars and the reviews are full of people who have never EVEN seen in TH-cam videos of different magnifications to know.
It is true...somewhat complicated to choose a beginner microscope
Totally agree with what you say. Microscope retailers make a great deal of money with very big markups. The other big problem is not being able to actually see and try the model you are interested in before you spend quite a lot of money. Re-branding of identical products and acceories results in huge price variations. My suspicion is that retailers aren't really interested in beginners and those who only buy one unit. They much prefer schools, colleges and research establishments where the budgets are big and large orders are placed. When all microscopes come from China, we have no way of finding out what they really cost to make. It is a problem that cannot really be solved.
Love the rant, you are right on. You explained well the need for a microscope and I did purchase a nice one reasonable, new that my style. Thanks for this, cheers!
Can confirm this, I helped my brother get a stereo microscope thinking 180x was realistic told him to buy it but turns out the microscope maxes out at around 45x magnification, over that its empty magnification everything looks blurry and anything shiny you can see lots and lots of airy disks, at least the optics are good judging by the shape of the airy disks now we have two spare eyepieces and a Barlow.
I've seen $900 objectives on eBay. Are the optics really that much better than one that sells at, perhaps $200-$300? From what I have read, as a light microscope approaches 1000X, the resolving power diminishes because the small details are closer to the actual light wavelength.
There can be several reasons for this. It might be specialized optics (water immersion objectives, plan apochromatic objectives, those for polarization microscopy are strain/tension free etc). And this very quickly drives up the price. Expensive objectives might also have correction collars to adjust for cover glass thickness etc. So they might be better, being corrected more, but they might also be more specialized, or they might be from a well-known company or they might not be manufactured anymore and those organizations that need them are willing to pay. It is not always better image quality, but can be.
I learned the hard way about that artificially inflated magnification, but at least now i know better what to look for, but i suspect it added some artificial value to the thing, it's got a 5 & 16 eye pieces which just make for some awkward magnifications because I can't just go 300 to 400 to 600 8 & 1000, which I would be able to manage with a lesser advertised magnification that all seem to come with 10 & 25 eye pieces.
The 40 times objective is not all that good quality either, especially at 1200, it's dog poop, wish I'd saved that extra 20 quid but there you go.
As for sellers & manufactureres making it difficult to compare scopes, I've also run into this problem, Leica & Olympus are just horrible sites, why isn't there a bloody list of all their scopes & ranges from basic to ultra specialised, I'm not assuming this would be an easy task for them, but there could at least be some basic list to help give a good idea of what they offer in what price bands.
Even Swift seem a bit tight with what they display, the only thing I found clear in any of my searches is they are keen to drive up the magnification, & quite often are not willing to describe how well the magnifications resolve detail, that's another thing with the 40x on mine, the glare washes out a lot of detail as well, in that respect, I wish I'd looked a little harder at what to expect with certain designs, & I'd now have happily have spent an extra 40 quid to at least have a condenser & diaphram, which mine doesn't.
The 4x & 10x objectives are fine though, absolutely no issues with them.
I almost can't wait to upgrade after I've gotten more experience with this basic thing & know much better what I'm after & to look for, wish I could do some dark field, phase contrast wouldn't go amiss either for studying some mycelium, but bright field works just fine for now.
Anyhoo, loving your thoughts on these things, it's invaluable to have someone well experienced in something giving you a detailed picture of a given field, loving learning from you.
When it comes to manufacturers who want you to "click" for a quote, I just pass. I don't know about anyone else, but they lose my business when they do that.
This is common practice for high end microscopes. You have to ask for a price by sending an email or calling them up. This might make sense to some extent, as they will put together a microscope based on your needs (highly modular research microscopes don't come out of the box, but are put together individually, too many options). You will then get an offer with every single part listed and how much it costs. But it can happen that they might start to call you back asking if you are still interested..... Happened to me. In another case, I am still waiting for an offer. Research institutions etc. don't mind doing that, but for the normal consumer, who wants to compare prices, it's annoying.
i just bought a microscope and it was a similar experience to buying my first telescope , they promote things like magnification as if thats all that matters and they never have any actual clear data on the specs you need
solve the problem and you start a site that markets to you fants, youth and beginners.. Easy Peasy!
Honestly, I have already been thinking about this.
Today I went to every shop who sell microscopes but it was of no use I didn't find one for amateur microscopist either they had to cheap one's without mechanical stage or LED or too expensive one's totally disappointed
For an alternate point of view - I used to work for one of the big manufacturers - they are set up for the research, clinical or industrial market and this is a different universe than the amateur hobbyist market - so is hard to compare prices. The demands on a microscope in one of these markets is extreme as are the support, service and technical knowledge demands. Just to provide a microscope to one of these customers it usually requires a rep with years of knowledge and entails at a minimum a detailed review of the application and discussion with a team of people, an on site proof of concept and testing of various features, an on site installation validation and training and years of follow up support and technical service - not to mention the dedicated in house support, service, QA and applications teams the manufacturers staff. This is what they are geared up to do and it is not possible to provide this level of service cheaply.
The environments these microscopes are being used in requires them to function with the highest accuracy, precision and reliability for years on end. The customers can not afford down time or poor results. They are being used for life and death applications like cancer diagnosis, inspection of medical devices or stem cells used in humans, the heat shield on the space shuttle, the electronics in the control systems of the plane you fly in, etc as well as industrial applications where a mistake could shut down an entire manufacturing facility or research applications requiring quantitative data being submitted to the FDA. You would never see the low cost options made in China in use for these applications and many of these customers find the price quite reasonable based on the performance and the service they get along with the microscope.
So it’s just different worlds we are talking about here. I’d also add that the big manufacturers innovate and develop all of the technology that the low cost manufacturers then copy so the big companies bear the all of development costs for the features you see in generic models.
That being said I think everyone realizes the big manufacturers can be well outside of the price point a hobbyist can spend so the no name brands offer a valuable service by providing low cost microscopes with reasonably good performance to our community which allows many more people in the world to enjoy our hobby.
I want to be able to monitor my dog for giardia parasite cysts in his stool as it is impractical for me to take him to the veterinarian frequently. What microscope would I need to observe giardia cysts in dog stool.
I find anything above 1500 a complete waste but thats screen resolution not visual magnification.
Brand name microscopes cost the same as a used car even on the base level 2-5000.00 USD . Is not a hobby its a career when you are dropping that kind of cash.
What magnification is meedeed to see bacteria and cover 19
Bacteria can be seen from a total magnification of 400x upwards. The microscope needs a condenser, so low-cost introductory microscope don't work. Ideally you need a Phase Contrast microscope but they are much more expensive. Viruses like Corona (Covid 19) can not be seen with a light microscope.
I would like to use my smartphone camera on my microscope. I have a Zeiss stemi 2000-c. It has a c mount camera adapter on it for use with a 1/2 inch CCD camera. Any suggestions ?
For smartphones you need to take the picture through an eyepiece. Try to connect an eyepiece somehow and then us a mobile phone adapter
I been thinking about buying a microscope from a company called Amscope but i have no idea about their quality, im very much a it doesn't need to be pretty as long as it gets the job done type person but before i waste money i want to know that it actually will get the job done.
AmScope sells cheap microscopes. I got one and sent it back. You might be better off buying a used Olympus (CH2 or a BH2). The optics are outstanding. If you see Oliver's microscope, it is an Olympus. The only thing I would recommend is buying an Olympus if you have the option to return it. You can specify that the objective lens (expecially the 40x and 100x) are not scratched or have residue on them.
With Amscope you can always return them but the problem is that you will never know how much better the Olympus is if you couldn't compare them side by side. I have had the luxury of comparing them and the Olympus is better. But a used Olympus has to be checked to make sure the 40x and 100x objectives are scratch and residue free. The most important thing in any microscope is the objective optical quality and the most vulnerable objectives to get damaged are the 40x and 100x due to the short working distance.
I have their model T490B and have no regrets. I specifically wanted trinocular with mechanical stage. I planned to use it for pond/sea microorganisms mainly, but also for anything around the house that I always wanted to take a closer look at ;) I printed few dark field filters that improve observations greatly and even sometimes use it as a very basic (because of not sufficient depth of field) stereo microscope - with external light source from the top. I think that quality of vision I'm getting is similar to what Oliver shows in his videos (except of phase shift which I don't have). As for build quality - it seems sturdy and precise (I don't have much comparison with better brands though), one thing I don't like plastic head but that's really all.
I think it depends a lot on the specific model. Amscope (like other retailers) gets the microscopes from China and then rebrands them. Some people are very satisfied others less so. Amscope has a full range and I think that if you buy a better one, then there should be no quality problems, as these more expensive microscopes are targeted towards the professional or educational sector. It also depends on your own quality expectations.
Very informative video.
I can't wait to see my first coronavirus and share it with everyone.
Don't forget your Dr Birdo Plague mask.
Very nice of you to share your coronavirus. Thanks!
Buying an excellent telescope is much, much easier. I've had a terrible time buying a Nikon microscope - it's as if Nikon does not really want to see them. Weird!
What was the problem specifically?
How about making yourself a microscope via your 3d printer?
Yes, this is already on my plan. I already made a Lego microscope. Here: th-cam.com/video/DPApJdaYR8w/w-d-xo.html
Приветствую автора канала!
Совершенно верно! Микроскоп даёт увеличение 1000× и не более того! Когда я купил свой микроскоп, то эти окуляры 25× выбросил в коробку и ни разу не одел их на микроскоп. От них толку как от быка молоко!🤣 Достаточно нормальных окуляров 10× Но куда деваться? Хотите вы или нет, они всовывают эти ненужные окуляры к микроскопу. Обман и маркетинговый ход. Вводят людей в заблуждение!
Boris is 2nd
it is not difficult to buy a microscope , but it is difficult to use it
It's all depend of how much money you have (or you don't have!) to spend on it.
For me, it was harder to find a decent deal than using it.
Sure, this is not a simple instrument. There is a lot of trick to know to get the best experience.
If you wanna get the easy way, you can use a stereomicroscope and have a lot of eazy/great fun.
If you are interested to know more about your local soil microbe, less than 1mm size stuff, a compound scope is the way. But you are right, you need to know a little more.
Fortunately, we now have free access to knowledge...
@@alexandrevaliquette3883 for me as a microscopy scientist i do not own a REM neither confocal laser TIRF or STED about 100 000 Euros. But i own about 20 DIY repared scientific light microscops. I found friens who own a REM or make me for 50 Euros a good SEM-picture. The art of microscopy is to find in nature interesting specimen and to prepare them under the steromicroskop. And of course you need a good microtome and to know how to use it. Today you can by scientific microscops and microtoms, by the way i prefer Zeiss, from university labs wich in 1980 were state of art and standard, for litle money. Go outside in nature with a little cheap field microscope and find something new. Beside the microscops it is important to have a good equipped microscop labaroratory and to know how to use it