On 5-11-03, Sandra wrote:

Im looking into buying a microscope for
parasite ID among other things. Do any
of you have opinions on a good brand
that will allow for 100-400
magnifications. I've seen some online
for under $100 that magnify to 10x-40x.
I haven't been able to figure out if that
means 100-400?

Hi Sandra,

I'm new here, but I know a bit about this subject, so I thought I'd
respond.

Look at the description of the microscope. In addition to the the 10X
and 40X magnification, which I suspect is the power of the objective
lenses, that is the lenses at the "bottom" of the scope, you will
probably see a mention of 10X for the eyepiece magnification.

That eyepiece power, multiplied times the objective lens power gives the
total magnification.

For instance, I have a microscope with a 10X eyepiece and 6X, 10X and
40X objectives, which means the microscope magnifies 60X, 100X or 400X,
depending on which objective is in use.

There are now inexpensive "student" microscopes, that will be quite
sufficient for casual use in the price range that you mention. Just make
sure that it is a standard size microscope and has glass, color
corrected lenses. Mine is of this variety, and works quite well. I paid
a bit over 100 for it, but not much, and I suspect that you're looking
at similar models. Avoid the scopes that you see in toy stores, as they
will almost certainly be really bad.

For fish parasites, that should be plenty of power.

Also, i've seen some results of the inexpensive computer microscopes,
and the images that they produce aren't too bad, but they aren't up to
the quality of a decent standard scope. You'll see a lot more detail
with a traditional microscope.

John

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