Disappointed in Mantis Elite

[Bzzz]

So you are saying there is no dizzyness at all when using the Lynx? Or its still there but less so.
I can't stand using the Mantis for more than a few minutes, just a quick inspection tilting the PCB around is all I use it for. Any work done under the proper stereo microscope, which is comfortable to use if ergonomics are setup correctly.

Nah, the Lynx is fine for hours, including manual inspection of boards with lots of tilting in and out of focus. I think the Mantis has some optical axis misalignment, so that it doesn't really match the stereoscopic view paths, especially when going out of focus. It's like those 3D side-by-side crossview images when one is rotated by a degree or two, but increasingly so with head movements out of the perfect viewing position. Totally messes me up 

Yeah if its older LEDs the CRI will be crap compared to halogens. I used proper 95+ CRI LEDs.
Lynx also looks very spot lit in the center, not really that even lighting. Might be worth replacing them at a later date, or using an external light.

I second that spot lighting observation, although it's not visible with the naked eye. Everything is well illuminated and certainly way too bright to view directly without that glare shield. But it's certainly possible the LEDs are ageing and some might drop out sooner or later.

Attached is a spectrum of the Lynx LED ring vs. the fluorescent tube above that table with very obvious banding. Spectrum usually reads like 10nm too high. Clearly there's a gap between blue and green which explains the dull PCB color, plus pure yellow is absent as well. Not an issue for the usual inspection work, although I again side with you in that I'd change this to high-CRI LEDs if it was my personal unit at home.

[kermitfrog]

You're not the first one I've heard say they are unhappy with their Mantis.

[ddavidebor]

I tried the Mantis (in fact, I tried 6 of their microscopes) and was not impressed.

The optical quality was pretty poor. Sure, the visor has great ergonomics, but I don't use the microscope 6 hours a day every day, so I don't care too much. Anything I tried from them that had a camera was terrible - 10 years behind everyone else.

it was particularly bad for soldering due to the unimpressive depth of field, working distance, and the lack of zoom!

at 2x it has 160mm working distance, but 2x is useless. Their 6x SLWD lens is good, with a working distance of 112mm.



I ended up buying a Leica S9D instead. Here is why:
- The optics quality is great. It's full Apochromatic optics microscope, far superior to the Mantis.
- The depth of field AND field of view is amazing due to a clever thing they call FusionOptics
- 9 to 1 zoom. Nine ! most microscopes do 6 to 1 at best.
- By default, it comes with the same working distance as the mantis on the 6x SLWD lens. But unlike the mantis, you have 6.1 x – 55 x magnification!
- in my case, I added a 0.5x lens, I have 250mm of working distance ! 250mm!!!!!
- Camera mount for external camera (provided you buy a slightly overpriced camera adapter), compatible with any of the awesome chinese cameras you can find on aliexpress
- Compatible with all standard microscope lights, polarizers, etc etc.

And the depth of field and field of view is so good I can solder at 15x or 20x magnification like a breeze. Try doing that on an Amscope...

[thm_w]

The optical quality was pretty poor. Sure, the visor has great ergonomics, but I don't use the microscope 6 hours a day every day, so I don't care too much. Anything I tried from them that had a camera was terrible - 10 years behind everyone else.

Agree. And even if you had to use it 6 hours a day, as I said above, I'd rather use something else. Many people are working under biological stereo microscopes for hours a day, so its not like this problem is not cared about in other fields.

Leica looks like a great unit with decent ergonomics. 9:1 zoom is very good.

And the depth of field and field of view is so good I can solder at 15x or 20x magnification like a breeze. Try doing that on an Amscope...

Yes and for that it costs $3k+, to compare to an Amscope ($300-600 with boom stand), its not surprising its way better.

Can you measure the FOV at 8x to compare with what I've posted above?
The datasheet states 37.6mm at 6x, which is not far off from the Amscope (36mm or so). You should be able to get the same FOV on the Amscope by replacing the stock eyepieces with 24mm ones.

[toybuilder]

If you think it's cross-eyed, it probably is.  I've found that I originally had my eye-spacing dialed wrong and was looking at the board cross-eyed.  When I closed each eye and looked carefully at the vertical edges of larger inductors, I was able to confirm that the left and right eyes were seeing the wrong image.   

I have a "salvaged" one that I'm working on -- the original Mantis design -- the image quality on my beat up unit is definitely not as sharp as my Amscope (bought new), but the ease of viewing is great.

I don't think the image quality issue on mine is simply because it's a "beat up" unit, though.  I remember seeing a Mantis at a CM more than a decade ago (same model) and thinking at the time that the image quality was not quite as good as my stereomicroscope and that it felt a little off.