Digital Blue QX5 Digial Microscope

I bought this as an educational toy for my daughter. The design is cheap and very low quality. It also lacks its own power supply and relies on power from USB. The software is primitive and keeps putting my display in the lowest possible resolution.UPDATE:The PCs where I had trouble were all AMD based. I recently was given an Intel PC running xp. The scope installed without problem and runs fine. The difficulties may have had to do with AMD incompatibilities. Interesting that the win98 box was also Intel.While this does not excuse the problem it indicates if you got an Intel PC you are probably fine. If AMD you may have issues.Installation was a nightmare as I have described below.Installation: I first tried installing it on a new XP machine. No luck as the microscope never came online. Then I tired it on a Win2K which did not fair any better. Next I tried their "trouble shooting" guide. It basically tells you to keep re-installing and rebooting until it works. No luck there either. I noticed that it seems designed for older machines. I therefore tried an old Win98 machine. This went better and I was actually able to control the scope's lights from the computer. But still no picture. I then rebooted the machine once more followed by disconnecting and reconnecting the scope. This did the trick. I was actually able to see pictures. Any movie making however crashes the software. I realize that others have been able to install it on Win2K and XP but that may be due to configuration differences. A good product will install regardless of configuration issues.Operation: The pictures are good to mediocre but for the price they are fine. It is also nice that it has two lights. Lets you look at things like coins that are not transparent. The microscope is removable so it is possible to point it at things and play with it.On the whole, the software and problems with XP and Win2K make it unacceptable to me. If I did not just happen to have a Win98 machine around I would have returned it. As is, I have it hooked up to the Win98 box and is good enough for a toy. My advise is to keep your expectations low and buy it from a local place. Then if it gives you trouble just return it.

I love this microscope! My kids and I are having lots of fun with it. The best part is being able to take photos and videos of the stuff you look at. My son has used the photos for science homework assignments. My only complaint (and the only reason I gave this product 4 stars rather, than 5) is that the software is buggy. The software interface is fine and child-friendly, however it crashed one of my computers (blue screen). The microscope would work just fine, then out of nowhere, a blue screen of death and I'd have to reboot the whole system. So, I connected it to another computer and the software crashed when trying to save a movie to the hard drive. However, on the second machine I can just restart the program and it does save the movie and works fine otherwise, just a nuisance to have to restart the program every time I save a movie. Both of my machines are high-end computers, well-maintained running Windows XP. I emailed tech support via[...] regarding these software issues about a month ago and never got a reply. I did not try phone support. But not impressed with email support. I don't understand why a tech company would not embrace email support over phone support as I do, but anyway... aside from the software issues, I love this product and there is a good chance the software would work fine on a differently configured PC. Still, I'm hoping that Digital Blue updates the software soon.

Overall, this is a fun toy.Software frequently crashes on Vista, but otherwise is really easy to use with some cool tools!Focusing is a pain because--remember, this is a toy--cheap plastic knob doesn't function smoothly.We've had zero luck using 200x in combination with the stage and illumination. I just don't think there's enough light. In hand-held mode, with auxiliary light sources, it's okay.Optics, in combination with focusing issues, won't make this a great tool for plant cells and such, but we've found some pretty cool bugs that we wouldn't have seen with the naked eye. (Diagnosing mites in mason bee cocoons, etc.) I was hoping to use this to do some basic parasite tests (fecal floats) for my animals. Hold out for a traditional student 'scope, at the least, for anything like this.We're keeping it since for the price, it's a fun toy even if we only really use it at 10x and 60x. If I'd bought it locally, though, I might be more predisposed to returning it and saving up for a better 'scope (even sans camera)...but it all depends upon what qualities you most need.You'll need to pick up your own glass slides and cover slips elsewhere--dealers found on Amazon have been good to us!

I bought this microscope to help introduce 'natural science' to my almost 3 year old. He had been playing a bit with toddler software but would lose interest. Since buying this (and we have to leave setup at all times!) my son is not only fascinated with looking at things (the stuff he wants to look at! dead earthworms, onion skin, leg from a dead spider, every feather) but his computer skills are really developing. He loves the software that comes with it (graphics type for 'art' and making your own movies) and handles it like a pro. The only fault with this is it did not include slides (for $90 you'd think they would include a few) - I am currently purchasing some - cool water experiments here we come (I think I have as much fun with this as my son!!)