USB Microscope

[Guest]

Im considering buying a USB microscope to use for taking zoomed pictures of Lincolns.
If money was no object I would get a nice trinocular stereoscope and mount a digital camera on it similar to the post by Billy Crawford showing his set up.
I am a apple fan boy so that limits my options. I was thinking about these and wanted to see if anybody here has an opinion on them.

1) Celestron 44302 Handheld Digital Microscope
2) Carson Z-Pix 26-130x Digital Zoom Microscope
3) Veho VMS004DELUXE

As I said earlier if I was going to spend around $200 I would go with a stereoscope so please dont recommend a dino-lite cause from what I have read that is the best.
Thanks in advance to any responses.

[jcuve]

I shoot with a scope in a similar way to Billy and have no experience with these digital scopes (sorry). My sense has been that the LED illumination source can be too much sometimes causing shots to be washed out. So hopefully someone has some commentary on what might be a good buy. Good luck!

[mudbox]

I bought the celestron. you can get close, but there are 6 always on leds which make it difficult at best to get a good image. I also use a Mac and the celestron works plug and play with photobooth. I was going to try some black nail-polish or something to try to block several of the leds but I'm too lazy/cheap to buy any.
Also, the camera quality is crap. =( Look at some of my previous posts and you can tell which images were taken with the DSLR and which were with the celestron.

Bottom line, you get what you pay for. It helps to get closer, but I should have just put the cash aside until I could afford something better.

[Roller]

If you already have a microscope you might consider looking on ebay under "usb digital microscope camera". I'm sure you've seen them while looking for the unit you are seeking now. There again, though, I would go with a minimum of 5MP and you run into the $2-300 area. I doubt that the cheap 1.3MP would do a good job although I have thought of trying one and sending it back if I was not satisfied.

[stewg]

Thanks for the responses!
@ mudbox-
Yeah I spent some time looking thru your posts and your right the quality is less than desirable on the Celestron.
Looks like I will be saving my pennies for awhile, wait thats what I would do anyway? LOL!

[DWK]

Check out the QX5 also. Its cheap. (about $79.00). And very easy to use.

Its only 1.3 MP though so the picture quality isn't as good as I would like.

Check out some of my posts for examples.

DWK

[stewg]

I ended up getting the Carson zPix 200 in the mail today.
My first impression is Overall not bad for only 40$
Hopefully I can figure out how to use it a little better in the future.
Im about to post a few cents I have been sitting on under the "how does this happen forum" if you are wondering about quality.
Thanks for the responses!