What did you buy today? Post your latest purchase!

[Specmaster]

Reverse Mounting is quite common for macro photography on a budget, so yes, it can be done.

Mostly people use older lenses with the manual aperture ring and you need a adapter from your camera mount to whatever mm your filter thread is, then you use the camera in manual mode.


Edit

https://digital-photography-school.com/reverse-mounting-your-prime-lenses-for-affordable-macro-photography/

I see, thats a interesting article as well, however, I still would not dream of using a DSLR in such a fashion. the whole point of a microscope is that you can adjust them with ease to suit the job in hand and might mean that one minute it is showing a good depth of view the next you want to zoom real close to inspect something that maybe suspect or really small on a PCB so it needs to be easy to adjust.   

[blueskull]

A HiFi magazine. $11 worth of pure commercial bullshit.
Well, I bought this one as a reference to write marketing material for my DAC.

[dryjoints]

• A bus pirate
• An Asus DSL-N24U ... £55 router for £5!
• A D1 Mini NodeMCU board (thanks for the video, Dave)
• A Scrabble word verification book for Mum's friend (how they play this game without falling asleep, is beyond me.)

[JoeN]

Simple and quick video recording using the Adonstar ADSM302. This view is similar to that available on the 5" monitor. Recording via the USB link to PC will be lower quality (USB2 link is bandwidth limited!). USB3 would have been preferred.. Anyway, hope you can assess the view quality from this..

https://youtu.be/sJPNqudyVjw

I like your tweezers.  Mine look more beat up under magnification.  Those are beauties.

[McBryce]

Hi,

Not to be negative, is it me or you are spending a hell of a lot of money on what a second hand Canon EOS 600D ($250 on eBay) and a $25 software can do?

 

So you need:
A Canon DSLR
Special Software
Reversing rings
Macro rings
Some sort of homemade wall mounting.... etc, etc...
And then spend most of your time fiddling with settings every time you change the situation?

And that's somehow a better solution than buying a purpose built microscope??

McBryce.

[Bendba]

Well, to me it would. Not everyone can afford a $1000+ microscope.

[blueskull]

After some tweaking, my microscope gives me those images.
Keep in mind that these are all not photoshopped, all processings are just copy and paste as well as scaling.



Scope: Shenzhen generic 60fps microscope with lens and body AF, $400
Light: Cree 100W equivalent, $12
Video capture: El gato CamLink, $130
Software: OBS

That looks good enough for my purpose -- documenting boards.

Added: a 3G17 in DSBGA8 package.



Also added: the same 3G17 taken with a Sony A6500+E3.5/30 macro lens at ~15cm distance, F3.5, 1/1000, ISO200.

[ChrisLX200]

Had to buy a replacement video card for my main desktop PC today as it had died - very gracefully, the display simply faded off like a normal power save mode then wouldn't come on again. I spent the next hour trying to figure out what was wrong, rebooting, plugging and unplugging stuff, eventually I logged in remotely from another PC and confirmed it's running fine otherwise but just no display. Device manager still thinks it has a functioning Nvidia 580 (otherwise it wouldn't have booted) but both monitors it feeds show nothing. Very strange. Anyway, a new 1060 will be delivered tomorrow as a replacement and then I can look at the old card. Clueless as to where the problem might be..

[cdev]

Most video cards have multiple output modes, and often multiple outputs, did you try the others?

For example, mine can output to an HDMI monitor if I use a Mini Display Port adapter.

[ChrisLX200]

Most video cards have multiple output modes, and often multiple outputs, did you try the others?

For example, mine can output to an HDMI monitor if I use a Mini Display Port adapter.

I think the card has mini-HDMI (or whatever, didn't look too closely) output in addition to the two DVI sockets, but I don't have a suitable HDMI cable anyway. There was no drama when it stopped working - no pops, bangs or magic smoke released. Whatever has gone wrong is affecting both DVI outputs. It has been running 24/7/365 for about 3 years though - apart from down times for servicing of course.

[URI]

A 256x64 dot matrix display on a controller board, just turned up in the mail.

Apparently it does both ASCII text and graphic dot per dot or a mix of the two

Nice one! What are the outer dimensions of pcb and viewing area? What manufacturer and type is it?
Looking for one to repair old HP test gear.. 

[Towger]

Clueless as to where the problem might be..

If it is running Windows 10 check if the drivers have been updated.  If so, it should let you roll back to the previous version.  Until next time they update. ..

[ChrisLX200]

Clueless as to where the problem might be..

If it is running Windows 10 check if the drivers have been updated.  If so, it should let you roll back to the previous version.  Until next time they update. ..

It's Win7-64 but there is no output at all - no BIOS boot up display so nothing to do with the OS..

[Bendba]

Nice one! What are the outer dimensions of pcb and viewing area? What manufacturer and type is it?
Looking for one to repair old HP test gear.. 

Here is a half decent datasheet: https://www.digchip.com/datasheets/parts/datasheet/2000/GU256X64-372_amp.php

I got it for $15+$8 postage so I'm really lucky, they are pretty expensive displays.

[URI]

Nice one! What are the outer dimensions of pcb and viewing area? What manufacturer and type is it?
Looking for one to repair old HP test gear.. 

Here is a half decent datasheet: https://www.digchip.com/datasheets/parts/datasheet/2000/GU256X64-372_amp.php

I got it for $15+$8 postage so I'm really lucky, they are pretty expensive displays.

Winner, that's a very good price! 
Thank you for linking to the data sheet. No luck for me, it's to big for my purpose. 

[firewalker]

A TL866A "universal" programmer.

Alexander.

[Specmaster]

Just bagged this on eBay so I can experiment with my microscope to see if I can rig these LEDS up and reduce the amount of direct reflection back to the screen.

[gamalot]

I am very satisfied with the Texio (Kenwood) power supply I bought last time, so I bought another one. 

[VK5RC]

I have put up an antenna (horizontal loop) that seems to be a bit quiet re all the *******. SMPSU hash around here, so am firing up my boat anchor, an Yaesu FT 101E.  I found an external VFO unit (FV101B) to go with it. I have the receiver FRG-7, the monitor scope YO-100, now for the PA

[Calambres]

I just received this (fake) Hakko FG-100 soldering iron tip thermometer. It arrived in just 11 days which is amazingly fast compared to other purchases I've made in ebay so far.

I've opened it up as per Dave's famous motto and it's the typical fake circuit without the trimmers or jumper to switch fom ºC to ºF (this one is in ºC). The make quality is not top notch, a bit on the cheap side but not that bad whatsoever. In the back of the PCB there are some unpopulated marks for a couple of thru-hole lytics, paralelling C3 & C7 SMD capacitors and a trimmer (VR1 - 1K).

The sensors blister clearly states: "contents 10pcs." but only includes 5    To be fair, the original ebay ad clearly indicated 5 sensors, not 10.

It seems to work well although I have not a means to compare the temperature reading (yet... awaiting  ) . Goes up to 400ºC with my old trusty JBC iron.

Some photos below.

By the way... how can I put the attached photos in the text, not just at the end? 

[paulca]

Have you noticed how hard it is to judge the scale of things from pictures and youtube videos?

I remember being surprised when I got my first 18650 cells at just how much bigger than AA's they actually were, but I'd seen dozens of youtube videos of people handling them.

Tuesday night I got a surprise when I opened the DSO112A scope.  It's absolutely TINY!  I'd watched several reviews of people handling them, but it never looked just that small.  It will literally it in the palm of my hand with virtually no overlap.

[ChrisLX200]

Just bagged this on eBay so I can experiment with my microscope to see if I can rig these LEDS up and reduce the amount of direct reflection back to the screen.

That could be just the thing to improve lighting, Let us know if it works

[Specmaster]

Just bagged this on eBay so I can experiment with my microscope to see if I can rig these LEDS up and reduce the amount of direct reflection back to the screen.

That could be just the thing to improve lighting, Let us know if it works

Will do, it states that the inside diameter is 60mm and with those long screws it might just clamp onto the barrel of mine which is 34mm, failing that I should be able to source some longer screws, at least thats the plan.

[Specmaster]

This arrived today, although I already have a few ways to measure everything that this using more expensive equipment, I still like these cheap Chinese testers for quick tests they are actually more accurate then a lot of people give them credit for.



Here is the actual value using far more accurate meter but as you will see its not that bad.



And here is the same resistor being tested with another Chinese tester I got a while ago.

So all things considered I don't think there are that bad after all?



And now on my bench LCR meter

[Specmaster]

Now for a test using Caps







I don't think the results are to shabby at all.