Veho Discovery DX-2 USB Digital Microscope | 5 Mega Pixels | x300 Magnification | Photo/Video Capture & Recording | Up to 2592 x 1944 Resolution | 8 LED's | Adjustable Stand (VMS-007-DX2)

I just bought this microscope and after some initial disappointment, because I didn't really know how to use it and the documentation that comes with it is almost useless, I am now quite pleased with it. There is some confusion in reviews here over what this microscope can do -- is it really a 400x power microscope? The advertising describes it as "Magnification: 20x - 400x (Plus digital zoom in 640x480 mode)" Does that mean it can continuously zoom from 20X to 400x? The manual that comes with it does not really tell you how to use it. So I did a little experimentation, and found that it really has two fixed magnifications, appx. 20x and appx. 400x.There is a cylindrical drum you can twist for focusing the microscope. As you turn it an internal lens moves up and down the barrel, changing the distance to the specimen. On the drum, there's a scale, with markings from 20 to 400 on it, that is quite misleading -- it suggests that you can optically zoom continuously from 20x to through 400x. But that is not the case. Instead, there are two fixed magnification levels, one nominally 20x and one about 400x, corresponding to two different focus locations, and they do not correspond to the locations on the scale you would expect!Using it at 20x power:If you place a specimen, like a piece of paper, directly under the microscope and place the clear plastic end of the microscope directly on the paper, the 20x focus occurs when you turn the drum beyond the top of the scale, past the 400, then a little past the 20 mark as the scale starts repeating. At this focal point the internal lens is moved up the tube, far from the specimen. The field of view is 13.5 mm. You can then move the microscope farther from the paper, readjusting the focus as necessary. You can even move the microscope quite far from the specimen, and still be able to focus it with 20x magnification. When it is focused at infinity, (at the extreme end of the scale, about 60 over the top), the field of view is 11.2 degrees, or about 3" wide when the subject is 12" from the end of the microscope.Using it at 400x power:To get the the 400x magnification, again place the clear plastic end of the microscope directly on the specimen, say a dollar bill. The 400x focus location occurs when the drum is rotated beyond the bottom of the scale, to the 400 below the 20 mark. At this point, the internal lens is moved down the tube, to nearly as close to the specimen as it can get (about 22mm). The field of view is only about 0.8 mm, or 2 degrees. Most users would never notice that the microscope can focus at the 400x magnification: to attain it you must move the focus lens to nearly the full bottom of its travel; it is easy to go through the focal region too quickly to see it; and the documentation makes no mention of it. People may think the higher magnification is obtained by zooming in digitally on your computer screen, without realizing that the microscope focuses with high magnification itself. You'll need to turn on the LED illumination for the 400x scale to get an image. (There are eight white LEDs that provide good even illumination, not four as advertised.)Zooming:As well as these two focus regimes, there is a software zoom option. If you choose a capture size of 640x480 you can go to the preferences menu and choose zoom to zoom in digitally. The field of view zooms from 13.5mm down to 4.2 mm.Measuring actual magnification:The 20x and 400x are only approximage values, but you can measure the actual magnification by viewing a millimeter ruler or finer reticule if you have one. If the image capture size is set to 1280x960, I find that the width of the field of view is 13.5 mm at the "20x" focus, and about 0.8 mm at the "400x" focus. (about a 17x difference) The resolution, that is, the size of a single pixel in the field of view, is 13.5mm/1280= 10.5 microns for the "20x" focus, and 0.8mm/1280=0.6 micron for the "400x" focus. (Of course, the optics aren't perfect, and it appears to me that at the "400x" focus the optical resolution is about 3 pixels, that is, the smallest features you can see are about 2 micron in size. The magnification you see on your computer screen depends on the screen pixel size, also called the pixel pitch. Mine is 0.282 mm (or 90 pixels per inch, most LCD screens are 90-100 pixels/in.). For my screen, the two actual magnifications are then, 1280*0.282mm/13.5mm = 26.7x and 1280*.282mm/0.8mm = 451x. This is for viewing on the computer screen at "actual size", not zooming in.Measuring object sizes:The software allows you to measure objects with rulers you can draw over a picture, but you need to enter the actual magnification to calibrate the software ruler. They suggest you take that reading from the scale on the microscope, but there's so much up and down play in the focus drum that you can't rely on its readings for the true magnification. It's best to calibrate the field of view by taking a picture of a millimeter ruler. Then you know what true size the full width of the captured image corresponds to. That works well for the appx. 20x focus point. Unfortunately, the magnification box allows entry of only integers up to 220, so you can't enter an actual magnification, like 451, to get accurate numbers.Even so, you can measure object sizes and do the math yourself. In particular, you can use the software ruler to measure sizes in pixels with a magnification factor of one, and get an accurate pixel measurement.Saving images:The software lets you save the images in uncompressed *.bmp or compressed *.jpg file formats. You can choose the level of compression for the *.jpg files; remarkably, the 3.7 MB files (1280x960x3bytes) can be compressed to about 100KB without much loss of resolution.Image resolution:Despite the ad hype, the sensor is not a 2 megapixel (Mp) sensor -- the spec sheet in the instruction manual says it is 1.3 (Mp). The maximum resolution is attained when you choose an image size of 1280x960 = 1.23 Mp. Although there is an option for capturing images at 1600x1200, those images are interpolated, and don't result in any greater actual resolution.With these considerations in mind, you'll find that this microscope is a great value for the money, and you can take some really good photomicrographs with it.

Paul gave a very good review of the product and a great mini-lesson on how to use it.It is a great little toy to play with and is a lot of fun. However, I am a teacher and had hoped to use it in a more serious manner in the classroom. I liked the idea of being able to make on-screen measurements and unfortunately, that is the most lacking feature of the product. With my version of software, I am able to enter in a magnification of 400 while making measurements. It was pretty accurate showing .97 mm for one tic mark on a ruler. I know my degree of accuracy in drawing the line was certainly not within .03 mm so I am happy with the results. The reason I am rating it a 3 is simply because of the difficulty in this measurement process. Because the measurements can only be made at 0 distance (i.e. the object at 0 distance from the end of the clear plastic ring) it limits the types of measurements that can be made. For example the field of view at x20 is about 13mm as Paul points out. If I want to take a picture of anything bigger than a dime (or even a dime) I can't do so because a dime is 18 mm in diameter and won't fit in the field of view. If I back off a little bit and refocus, I can get an entire dime in the image, but then I have no means of determining the actual magnification ratio. Because this limits my use in a school lab setting, other than just capturing images and video which in itself is useful, I rate it down to a three. In all fairness, I don't know the capabilities of competing products such as the high priced pro-scope so they may all work this way.Another issue is the funky stand that comes with it. It is too short and inflexible to be useful. It really needs to be twice as long as it is with a second joint between the two arm segments. This would allow the user to actually position it in usable positions. A snake type stand would be better and I am looking for a trashed desk lamp to convert it into a stand. The base of the stand also needs to be weighted more heavily to keep the scope upright.This is a fun scope to play with but these issues are really aggravating and take away from the true utility of the scope. It is a shame that Veho didn't take the extra step to make the zoom actually work and to make the stand more robust. It couldn't have added another $5 or $10 to the price of the product which I would have gladly paid to get a truly useful product.For now, it is fun to play with and I am looking forward to the next generation of USB products.

The information provided by the manufacturer is misleading and inaccurate with regard its compatibility with Apple computers.The information both on their package and also in the instruction booklet included with the microscope states that the software (Micro Capture Plus) provided on the CD or downloaded via Veho’s Download website is compatible with Mac OS X 10.12 or later. In fact, Mac OS X 10.14 or later is required. Furthermore, downloading the application from their website is blocked on Apple computers even when running Mac OS X 10.14 and higher as it is not an Apple approved application. Direct contact with Veho Customer Service did not provide either an explanation for this misinformation or a solution to the problem. I suspect the problem is more related to Apple marketing pressure on Veho but Veho have a responsibility not to recommend their product to Apple device users.

The resolution of the microscope is low compared to any contemporary digital camera but is good enough for some purposes. You are unlikely to capture any stunning images but you should be able to see many types of small things with a useful amount of detail.When examining wet or otherwise reflective things, you will also to see a reflection of the microscopes illumination LEDs. Often you will see many reflections ... one from each surface in the image.The 400x magnification is difficult to employ usefully. This is because at such magnification the area in view and the depth-of-field are both tiny and therefore it is very hard to find, and very easy to lose, sight of the target object. Ideally you would have the microscope firmly held in a retort stand and the retort stand firmly mounted on some sort of X-Y-Z sliders. Alas, such a stand and sliders would probably cost far more than this microscope.I bought the microscope for examining electronic circuit boards. In this role having the Veho VMS-004 microscope is much better than not having any microscope, but issues with depth-of-field, illumination, and reflections mean that a better instrument would still be welcome.The stand provided with the microscope isn't heavy enough to hold the microscope in position unless you balance everything well and therefore it is mostly not useful, especially at the higher magnification.

Bought this for my work which involves examining broken, faulty or otherwise dubious materials. Very useful USB connection and with help from IT person got it up and running. Struggled a bit to find out how to take stills and video, and had to reinstall software on the PC (that's IT for you). It is a bit tricky trying to get focussed at high magnification and I haven't worked out how to use the scale on the twist action adjustment in conjuction with the scaled photos.Once I worked out I needed to remove the clear cover from the lens, the LED illumination came into its own and images are clear. Detail is awesome for something so cheap - very useful for ad hoc investigation work.

I had some problems getting all the software downloaded on to my Mac. The disc provided was smaller than the slot in my computer. I tried to download the software from the Veho site and partially succeeded. I couldn't find a phone number on the company's website so I sent them an email. They responded quite quickly and were very helpful, but I think I'd have found it easier to talk to someone when I was trying to get the microscope to work rather than type questions and wait a day or so for answers. Turns out that on a Mac the snapshot button on the microscope doesn't work, which I hadn't realised, and you have to use the menu onscreen for that function.

I'm not sure what inspired me to buy this. Just a whim really, I wanted to look at something under a microscope, and looked at how much modern microscopes cost. £40, half the list price looked like a bargain.As other reviewers have notes, the software is a little clunky, but it does work. I use a Mac, so had to download the software from the Veho website. It comes on a mini-CD, which doesn't work with slot loading CD drives.There are two magnification settings, 20x and 400x. But it's important to note that this doesn't mean it zooms all the way between the two. Microscopes don't work like that, it's one or the other. You need to focus carefully, it's a very fine adjustment, and the stand is a little wobbly, which makes it harder. But it does work, and it is fun.I took some stills and video of a bank note, and my hair, and anything else I could find. It's great fun, and I'm sure kids would find it very educational.If I had paid £100+ for this, I might have been a little disappointed, but the minor flaws are entirely acceptable at this price. So I would unreservedly recommend it. So long as you manage your expectations.Mitts