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  • Author Author: ntewinkel
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Digital Microscope

ntewinkel

I finally bought a little microscope to help out with the smd parts.

 

I got it mostly to identify small parts, but it appears to be quick enough that I might actually be able to solder with it. In my quick bit of testing I didn't feel any lag.

 

I went for something a few steps up from the least expensive, to get the bigger screen, higher resolution, better stand, better lighting, and remote control (to avoid shaky pictures!). At $140 CAD this feels like a pretty nice unit for the money actually. That was on Amazon Canada, so it arrived quickly too.

I had been thinking about a stereo microscope, but that's a few magnitudes more pricey and hard to justify at this moment.

 

image

 

I had a little SR-505 motion sensor nearby that I tried it out on.

The resistors in the picture are just over 2mm long. I think... my ruler is not that accurate at that scale image

 

image

 

image

 

These were my first pictures, so I'm still having to repeatedly adjust light intensity and angles to try to get the clearest pictures image

 

Best,

-Nico

Parents

  • Hi Nico, what is the make and model of your amazon supplied microscope?

     

    amazon UK lists quite a lot of different ones, up to £250 GBP.

     

    Neil

  • in reply to neilk

    Hi Neil,

    Right, same here on the Canadian site - there's no limit to how much you can spend! It's also tricky to navigate whether or not a more expensive item is actual a different unit or if it's any better.

     

    I haven't really used it much other than the first few bits of trying it out, so I can't give a better review on its performance yet, but this is the one I got:

    https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B08HLJQ539/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_ZMTMPX5X8XRHY3ARD7ZY

    "7 inch LCD Digital USB Microscope with Wired Remote 32G TF Card,Koolertron 12MP 1-1200X Magnification Camera Video Recorder,LED Fill Lights,Rechargeable Battery for Circuit Board Soldering PCB Coins"

    It came with a 32GB sd card... I should test that for authenticity too.

     

    I'm not sure about that 1-1200x magnification - it seems to have only one optical lens, so I bet the magnification is just by zooming into the jpg file. But they all seem to be like that (in that price range)

     

    Best,

    -Nico

Comment
  • in reply to neilk

    Hi Neil,

    Right, same here on the Canadian site - there's no limit to how much you can spend! It's also tricky to navigate whether or not a more expensive item is actual a different unit or if it's any better.

     

    I haven't really used it much other than the first few bits of trying it out, so I can't give a better review on its performance yet, but this is the one I got:

    https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B08HLJQ539/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_ZMTMPX5X8XRHY3ARD7ZY

    "7 inch LCD Digital USB Microscope with Wired Remote 32G TF Card,Koolertron 12MP 1-1200X Magnification Camera Video Recorder,LED Fill Lights,Rechargeable Battery for Circuit Board Soldering PCB Coins"

    It came with a 32GB sd card... I should test that for authenticity too.

     

    I'm not sure about that 1-1200x magnification - it seems to have only one optical lens, so I bet the magnification is just by zooming into the jpg file. But they all seem to be like that (in that price range)

     

    Best,

    -Nico

Children
  • in reply to ntewinkel

    Hi Niko, thanks for the link image

     

    "koolertron" desn't exist on the UK site, but one branded "elikliv" looks exactly the same and is described in very similar terms!

     

    It's priced at £83.99 GBP, which is marginally cheaper than the koolertron, but it doesn't seem to include the 32GB SD card!

     

      wrote:

     

    I'm not sure about that 1-1200x magnification - it seems to have only one optical lens, so I bet the magnification is just by zooming into the jpg file. But they all seem to be like that (in that price range)

     

    Very likely, as with the camera in most smart phones. Zooming in merely reduces the field of view, so you have fewer, but larger pixels.

     

    Thanks again for the information.

     

    Neil

  • in reply to neilk

    >I'm not sure about that 1-1200x magnification

     

    The default zoom setting seems to be just right for identifying small electronic parts image

     

    I just used it over the weekend to identify some tiny zener diodes.

     

    I forgot to mention that it's also battery powered (it has one 18650 in it) - that turns out to be extremely handy for quick looks at small parts.

     

    Best,

    -Nico

  • in reply to ntewinkel

    Nico,

     

    This is very interesting to me. Have you tried soldering in real-time with it yet as this would be the thing I would probably most want to do - I'm running out of magnification on my head mounted lenses.

     

    Dubbie

  • in reply to dubbie

      wrote:

     

    Have you tried soldering in real-time with it yet...

     

    Not yet, but I think I better get on that as everyone (including my wife) keeps asking image

    Maybe I can get her to take some video later. I'm pretty sure I still have a practice smd soldering kit somewhere.

  • in reply to dubbie

    Hi Dubbie,

    I soldered a tiny (so tiny!) smd LED onto some thin magnet wire (enamel coated from a transformer), and it actually went really well. I didn't feel any lag, it all seemed really normal, and there is enough space between the lens and the table that I didn't melt any of the microscope image

    I think I was probably messing around with it for about an hour just on battery power, so that too was handy.

     

    Of course, I'm no expert, and all my soldering was rather dodgy, but I found it a to be a very useable setup.

     

    I took some video. I'll try to post that this weekend.

    For now here's a couple of pictures.

    The first picture shows a closeup of a Canadian quarter. The second shows a US penny, with the soldered smd LED on it.

    imageimage

    Best,

    -Nico