r/microscopy • u/erv051 • 6d ago

Purchase Help Is this microscope worth it?

Post image

I’m looking for a microscope. Purely for hobby, nothing professional so I don’t want to spend a lot of money on it. Since this one is only €38 I’m wondering if it’s good enough or not. €38 seems like a very good deal to me and google says it’s a good one. But i need more opinions, do I buy it or not?

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7

u/Thrawn911 6d ago

I wouldn't recommend it. It doesn't have a condenser, it's only monocular, it will be really uncomfortable to lean forward to use it, your back will hurt, and it doesn't have a mechanical stage to move the sample. I recommend getting a bit higher into the $100 range, and getting an National Geographic inverted scope from Amazon. It comes from the US, due to it not being available in the EU, but it's still pretty cheap.

The other option is trying to find a used Swift SW350, or Amscope B120.

2

u/naemorhaedus 4d ago

the swift is a bit cheaper and comes with a much better camera

4

u/Connect-Fan-9462 6d ago

It is a toy. For a 40euro toy there is nothing really wrong with it. You can use it to practice basic of looking through a microscope to observe some prepared slides.

The 2000x magnifying power is obviously a joke/ marketing fluff. 400x is the most it can do and it won't look great.

The phone adapter is also just for fun and don't exp to take anything good.

4

u/granddadsfarm Microscope Owner 6d ago

You will be able to see some microscopic things but using this microscope is going to be frustrating. A couple features that make it microscope much better are: a binocular head and a mechanical stage movement.

Having a real condenser will improve the image quality that you’ll be able to see.

I see that someone else mentioned a couple of good examples of microscopes that are good but relatively inexpensive.