EEVblog #390 - Mantis Elite Microscope Review

[free_electron]

Not only Voyager had Mantis scopes. Dr Pulaski in TNg used one as well.
I have an original one . even on felabay those go for a truckload of money.
found it in the local junkshop. was in 2 pieces ( the arm and the head and the handle was missing + the lamps were gone.
i gave the guy 50 $ for it. He had no clue what it was. ordered about 150$ in spare parts from Vision and its as new.
This thing is the dream for anyoen soldering surface mounted stuff.

[hans]

I should be grateful then I can still solder (just barely) 0402's bare eye, only just. Not good for eye fatigue indeed.

For hobby I have a cheap 8x magnifying 'toy' from EuroCircuits which kinda works, but the viewing area is very small and only good for inspection afterwards. I am considering getting one of those bench lamps.. For a small hobbyist with limited lab space they seem the best deal.
These Mantis microscopes look wonderful, but then there is the price tag But I guess when you treat it careful, it will never wear out.

As I also posted on youtube, in my experience standard microscopes suck for people with glasses. I do have glasses for nearsighted, so they don't help at all at short distance. In fact I often take them off I really want to examine things.

When aligning eyes for a microscope, they usually don't allow my eyes to move close enough so I have to take them off every time. And when I search for something on the bench, I have to put them on again. I think I 'only' have -4 to -4.5 on both eyes, which is bad enough to see things vaguely enough to be unable to read normal text (like Times New Roman 12pt) at ~25cm. It gets very annoying after a little while during inspection jobs or looking for stuff on the bench (component bags), but whatever.
At least I can sort-a see what I am doing when soldering

[gregariz]

I am considering getting one of those bench lamps.. For a small hobbyist with limited lab space they seem the best deal.

Luxo and like bench magnifiers are great. I have a couple of them on my bench. Most seem to be in the 2x to 4x range, but if you can find them they used to make optional snap in lenses. (you insert them underneath to double up the existing lens). These will then get you something pretty similar to a Mantis.

[Wartex]

For anyone thinking about buying: I was on the fence for a long time, and for the money you can build a much better rig. I use Canon T2i with an HDMI cable and some lense rings to turn it into a microscope, I'm getting maybe 2-5 ms lag on the 1920x1080 screen. I can take video and pics at the same time too.

Wartex, I am not dissing your setup! just making people aware of no depth perception with a screen setup.

I have a trinocular microscope with a 5Mpixel video/still camera and it can do 30fps at lower resolution. BUT any flat camera view is not stereo therfore no depth perception and it is much more difficult to work without depth perception.

More on my microscope camera setup and complaints here

depth perception is fixable with 2x USB cameras on a cheap amscope, a laptop and a small LG 3dtv with passive 3d glasses. It would still be much cheaper than mantis and have massive screen.

[EEVblog]

depth perception is fixable with 2x USB cameras on a cheap amscope, a laptop and a small LG 3dtv with passive 3d glasses. It would still be much cheaper than mantis and have massive screen.

"I'll just mod this little thing quick, hang on while I wait for the computer to boot... where the bloody hell are my 3D glasses?... now I can't see the scope for the 32" TV..." 

Dave.

[SteveyG]

Am I the only one who can solder perfectly fine without any magnifiers? uMAX packages are fine

[robrenz]

Yes

[mikeselectricstuff]

depth perception is fixable with 2x USB cameras on a cheap amscope, a laptop and a small LG 3dtv with passive 3d glasses. It would still be much cheaper than mantis and have massive screen.

"I'll just mod this little thing quick, hang on while I wait for the computer to boot... where the bloody hell are my 3D glasses?... now I can't see the scope for the 32" TV..." 

Dave.

Once the Raspbery Pi camera is out, that could make the basis for an interesting setup. 

[mikeselectricstuff]

Am I the only one who can solder perfectly fine without any magnifiers? uMAX packages are fine

I used to be able to do TSOPs with nothing more than a bright light, then Old Age strikes....

[robrenz]

depth perception is fixable with 2x USB cameras on a cheap amscope, a laptop and a small LG 3dtv with passive 3d glasses. It would still be much cheaper than mantis and have massive screen.

"I'll just mod this little thing quick, hang on while I wait for the computer to boot... where the bloody hell are my 3D glasses?... now I can't see the scope for the 32" TV..." 

Dave.

Once the Raspbery Pi camera is out, that could make the basis for an interesting setup.

Processing power is definitely an issue.  With the Amscope software my laptop could JUST do 30 fps at the lowest resolution of 640 x 480 and that looks a little grainy on a display. So doing 2 feeds simultaneously at a higher resolution is going to take way more power.

[tom66]

My old laptop had a 3MP (2048x1536) webcam, no problem with doing that at 20fps over the internal USB bus.  May just be crappy drivers...

[nitro2k01]

My old laptop had a 3MP (2048x1536) webcam, no problem with doing that at 20fps over the internal USB bus.  May just be crappy drivers...

20 fps means at the very least a latency of 50 ms (1/20 s) assuming the rest of the chain is zero latency. (In practice there's probably a minimum of another 33 ms lurking there, 2 frames at 60 Hz) So it probably wouldn't feel instantenous by any stretch of imagination.
(Point is, 20 FPS would be enough to create pretty fluid motion, but the latency in the whole chain would be annoying because feedback of hand movement is delayed.)

[robrenz]

From my experience anything less than 30fps is going to be very annoying to work under. In my microscopic videos I work looking thru the single right eyepiece while videoing. It is better than looking at the screen even at 30fps. The camera is in the trinocular position but when you switch the optics to have the camera engaged you loose the view thru the left eyepiece. 

[kyndal]

was already mentioned.
but ya i think it should be a near no brainer to hack into  or externally
a dimmer circuit..

/Kyndal

[EEVblog]

Am I the only one who can solder perfectly fine without any magnifiers? uMAX packages are fine

No, I can do it too. uMax, 0402, whatever.
It's just MUCH nicer with a good magnifier.
And inspection is an entirely different ball game.

Dave.

[albertdeen]

Hello and good day to all.

I need help. Does anyone know the usb pin out for this microscope on the board? Someone managed to yank out the usb cable and I have been tasked to find out the usb pin out on the microscope to solder back the cable.

Any help much appreciated. Thank you.

[nitro2k01]

Hello and good day to all.

I need help. Does anyone know the usb pin out for this microscope on the board? Someone managed to yank out the usb cable and I have been tasked to find out the usb pin out on the microscope to solder back the cable.

Any help much appreciated. Thank you.

Which microscope? The one in the video is not equipped with any kind of camera.

[albertdeen]

Sorry. This model.

Mantis Elite-Cam

http://www.eis-inc.com/files/pdf/supplier_showcase_page_downloads/visioneng/Mantis_Elite_Cam_Datasheet.pdf

[SteveyG]

Am I the only one who can solder perfectly fine without any magnifiers? uMAX packages are fine

No, I can do it too. uMax, 0402, whatever.
It's just MUCH nicer with a good magnifier.
And inspection is an entirely different ball game.

Dave.

Maybe for inspection, but I really dislike the 'feeling' of something between me and what I'm doing. We have these at work, along with various other inspection equipment but I can't say I've ever felt fatigued or felt eye strain by opting not to use them when soldering

[NiHaoMike]

depth perception is fixable with 2x USB cameras on a cheap amscope, a laptop and a small LG 3dtv with passive 3d glasses. It would still be much cheaper than mantis and have massive screen.

"I'll just mod this little thing quick, hang on while I wait for the computer to boot... where the bloody hell are my 3D glasses?... now I can't see the scope for the 32" TV..." 

Dave.

Once the Raspbery Pi camera is out, that could make the basis for an interesting setup.

Processing power is definitely an issue.  With the Amscope software my laptop could JUST do 30 fps at the lowest resolution of 640 x 480 and that looks a little grainy on a display. So doing 2 feeds simultaneously at a higher resolution is going to take way more power.

What about a pair of high framerate cameras connected to a FPGA, then send the result directly to a 3D LCD? The latency would be minimal and as long as you pick cameras with the same resolution as the LCD, the processing would also be minimal. As for startup time, a few seconds is more than good enough. There are even LCDs that can display 3D without glasses, but I have only seen cell phone sized panels so the technology must be quite expensive.

[PChi]

I am a fan of the Mantis when used for soldering but unfortunately haven't had access to one in the last few jobs.
I haven't seen a unit with the USB socket. Is it the USB connector pin out that is required which are listed at www.usb.org? But I guess that it is something more complicated that you want to know.

[PeteInTexas]

What is that horse shoe shaped thing under the view port?

[cgbrowne]

Its an anti-glare shield

[Lawsen]

The Mantis seems a bit pricey, first the LED is not long lasting and the objectives are sold separately.  The Compact Mantis costs $2574.98 at All Spec Company.  This will not include the objectives.  The price for a popular 4X is $121.88 and 6X is $210.94.  The magnification is maximum at 10X and lower.  The resolution is lower, but the depth of field and wide field of view, low N.A., numerical aperture, but the benefit is eyepieceless, ocularless, thus great for soldering and parts ID.  This is basically the ultimate hand lens, which a hand lens on a good neck or articulated arm does the same function for less than $100.00 in the 2X, 4X, and 6X.  The Mantis is special in the 10X.  It is not for the hobbyist, more for an industrial factory.  Your 1970s Olympus SZ greenough principle stereo microscope has more resolution and magnification, but less working distance and depth of field and need to look though an ocular.  You can place a digital camera or video camera on the eyepiece and view through a larger panel LCD or LED screen.  I am currently working on a Nikon Coolscope, but that is a compound for slides robot drone microscope with a broken power supply.  Thanks for posting the video, totally fun to view you set one up and use one. 

[all_repair]

Any comments on old mantis M-001 head, stand M-003?  I have quite a few head mount magnifiers already, and may have a chance to get a M-001 and M-003 here.