You can find these old digital microscopes on eBay for under $20. Here’s a blog that catalogs some of what you can see with them – “Last week, I got myself a toy I’ve wanted to play with for many years — the Intel Play QX3 Digital Microscope. When I was a kid, the old medical microscope my parents bought for me at a garage sale was my favorite toy. I would spend hours putting whatever I could find underneath it… and now, with the digital microscope, I’m doing it again as an adult. I am adding new pictures every day and will continue to do so until I run out of things to look at with the microscope”… [via] Link.
2 thoughts on “Amateur Microscopy”
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A few years back, I worked for a chemical company as the network manager. The head chemist came to me one day and asked me to hook up the QX3 he’d just bought. I said, “you want me to hook up a TOY?” His response, “You’d be surprised. This thing has about the same visual quality as the $1800 microscope we have here AND I can hook it to the computer. Also, I’d rather carry this $100 toy around to conferences because I don’t have to worry as much about it being broken.” This guy is one of the top-rated chemists in the country, so if he likes it, it’s gotta be a good piece of equipment. :)