First green laser advice

Hi all! I wanted to get a green laser ever since I stumbled upon some pointers on DX (thought greens cost hundreds of $$$ before...). Kudos for them for putting a decent amount of warnings about power and IR, otherwise I might've ended waving around a 100+mw greenie without goggles...

After spending some reading about green lasers, IR, safety etc. I decided that I definitely want something less than 50mw (at least as a first laser), maybe even around 5mw. I've read some topics on this forum, which proved really helpful in filtering out some companies/models looking too good to be true (overpowered/underpowered/bad service etc.). IMHO if I'm getting a green laser, I should be able to have more than just a dot :yh: So here are the options I ended up with:

Kaleidoscopic/Disco laser:
Rayfoss 30mw: www.rayfoss.com
Screambuy 5mw-30mw: Full Star and Disco 532nm green laser [Full Star and Disco greenlaser] : Screambuy electronic consume products
Laserlands 30mw: 30mw 3in1 Portable Disco Laser Projector/ Drawer/Pointer - $25.00 : Laserlands

Laser pointer with star caps (patterns):
Laserlands 5mw: 5 mW 6in1 5 Patterns Green Laser Pointer with 5 Star Caps - $15.00 : Laserlands
LAserlands 10mw: 10 mW 6in1 5 Patterns Green Laser Pointer with 5 Star Caps - $17.99 : Laserlands


No burning power intended. I want a decent quality laser that would last for a year or more (if using it according to duty cycle, got no need to keep it on continuously for more than, say, 30 seconds), and can be used outside at night to point at things (not living/aircraft/vehicles/anything reflective) safely without goggles. Power shouldn't be too low, the dots should be clearly visible at least 20 meters away with stars cap on (at night).
I'm having a difficulty choosing between these models,, though.
1. I'm unsure what power is appropriate for my purposes. I'd really like having a visible beam at nighttime, maybe even with stars cap, visible dot at daytime etc., but at the same time I'd like a laser that I can use indoors safely to point at non-reflective surfaces like walls, ceiling, carpet. A totally accidental reflection of a 5mw, even if it's actually 15mw, I far less likely to cause permanent eye damage than a 30mw, which could be above 50mw in reality (and accidents could happen, especially with stars cap / disco mode...)
2. The kaleidoscopic laser looks really cool (even though it might be just a mirror on a spring), and it also has a stars cap (laserlands sell some caps separately too). Are there any cons to getting it over a regular pen? I mean, do you think it would be of worse quality of build / break quickly / have worse beam (mode hopping / convergence / power stability) if used just as a pointer?
3. If 30mv kaleidoscopic ends up the best option - what company would be better? I looks like all 3 have the same laser...

Would appreciate any advice :yh:


P.S. just in case I decide to do anything risky (like playing with prisms / reflective surfaces), I think I'll order protection goggles anyway. Seen good things written about the ones from focalprice, but which are better?
7.99$: Focalprice.com offers Professional Anti Green Laser Glassess ,discount Professional Anti Green Laser Glassess,Professional Anti Green Laser Glassess products,low price Professional Anti Green Laser Glassess,cheap Professional Anti Green Laser Glasses
9.45$: Focalprice.com offers Anti-Green Laser Glasses ,discount Anti-Green Laser Glasses,Anti-Green Laser Glasses products,low price Anti-Green Laser Glasses,cheap Anti-Green Laser Glasses,Anti-Green Laser Glasses for Sale ,Anti-Green Laser Glasses Store,Bu

welcome to the forums and good to see you are already doing research and learning some safety

welcome, and what Killer said.

even a regular green pointer will impress you, and you will see a nice green line as well as the dot.

Welcome to the forums! Always nice to see new people considering safety as a top priority

As far as lasers go, have you looked at either O-Like 50mW laser? ( Silver chrome green laser pointer 50mW [OLSGL50] - $29.99 : O-Like, Quality Products, Great Prices and and Pocket compact Green laser 50mW [OLPG50] - $28.00 : O-Like, Quality Products, Great Prices )
I have the former, and for your purposes it seems like a good fit. The beam is extremely visible at night, the dot is very bright, and it's not dangerous to your eyes unless you manage to get a direct hit or a direct reflection hit from a mirror. If I were to suggest one of the two from O-Like, I'd definitely pick the silver chrome one, mainly since it runs on two AAA batteries. And as long as you don't run it for more than 5 minutes at a time, it should easily last you for more than a year.

For the focalprice goggles, you can read a detailed review of the cheaper ones here: http://laserpointerforums.com/f52/cheap-anti-green-goggles-focalprice-o-like-43109.html
IMHO they would be more than sufficient for your purposes.

Hope that helps somewhat!

Thanks for the input, and yeah, safety definitely comes first. That's also the reason I don't want a 50mw - both suggested models look great, but are hardly safe indoors (seeing that people got blind spots from as low as 20mw, and the 50mw might be overspec). I'd like to be able to enjoy the dot/stars/disco indoors (aimed at a wall/ceiling, not pointing around) without goggles. Some people also wrote that 50mw is just too bright to look at.

Besides, I really want a laser with either a star cap or a disco mode. Why miss such a bonus? Disco ones look like the real deal (pretty cheap, disco + regular dot + star cap + more caps can be purchased), I'm just not sure whether they're also good as a general pointer, or are they worse due to the fact they were mainly designed for disco mode. Only seen 2 or 3 threads about them (don't you people like effects?), and didn't see any particular comparison to a regular pen laser. I'm just afraid they could break really easily due having a more complex mechanism, or have a worse beam...

I'm leaning towards getting the lowest necessary power, so what would that be when using a star cap for the dots to be clearly visible at evening/night, pointing 20-30 meters from me? Since the beam splits at least into 25-30, maybe even 100 dots, 5mw would be too low, right? Is 10mw enough? And if anyone has experience with the companies I mentioned, what do you think is the real power of the 10mw/20mw?

for indoor use you should not buy more than 5 mW (even at 10mW the dot is dazzling)
BUT for star effect the power is divided by xxx dots...

so you should buy a 5mw AND a 50mW star pen

i dont mean to sound irresponsable but higher power lasers can be used indoors as long as you follow proper saftey precautions. yes saftey is your #1 priority, however it can be taken to far, ive heard of ppl that wouldnt even use a 5mW in the house because they thought the dot looked to bright, ill be honest i use my viper indoors all the time, granted im alone and its only on walls with no shinny objects around, staring at the dot can cause problems, but do not think that you will get a dark spot just by shining a 50+mW laser at a white wall, just dont stare at it, and dont do it up close. laser saftey tends to be taken to one extream or the other, ppl are either so careless it makes you cringe, or so carefull you think there nuts. somewere in the middle is best, however please do not take this as an excuse to be lax with saftey, oversafe is better than not being safe at all.

yes i didn't say that 10mW is dangerous but it is uncomfortable indoor.
so i can't imagine playing with a 50mW indoor (except the star pen)...

yes, that actually is a good reaction, green lasers are very good for beginers in that way, that since our eyes are so sensitive to 532nm compared to other wavelengths, you can better judge what is like you said 'uncomforable'. if it looks too bright for you, then it most likely is, while triple the mW of blu or red will seem fine, in reality you should compare it to green, for example if your playing with a 150mW blu, the dot is bright but not blinding like a green would be, when using other wavelengths say to yourself, if this was a green laser would it be too bright to look at.
sorry for the off topic ramble.

Well, why get something that is too bright to look at? That's one more reason to settle with <=30mw. Though I didn't consider staring at the dot as dangerous, I was more worried about all the reflective surfaces at home - at 5mw an accident is quite unlikely to cause permanent damage, at 30mw that's another story...

I'm quite confident I want a 30mw kaleidoscopic one - it should have a fairly visible night-time beam (daytime too?), cool disco mode (maybe even with visible beam), a stars cap and enough power to feed it, and a sufficiently bright dot at day (indoors) and night. The downside is having to be very cautious when using indoors without goggles (and only a single star cap, but more could be ordered later).

Now, where should I order it from? I've mentioned 3 places in my first post, plus I've found it on focalprice too, for the cheapest price: Focalprice.com offers Dapper Stage Green Laser Light Show (Black) ,discount Dapper Stage Green Laser Light Show (Black),Dapper Stage Green Laser Light Show (Black) products,low price Dapper Stage Green Laser Light Show (Black),cheap Dapper Stage Gree

The laser looks exactly the same in all 4 shops, but is it? Or maybe others than focalprice put better modules inside (especially screambuy, since unlike others they have an option to choose power)?
If it's the very same laser, focalprice would be best (17.73$ + free shipping + goggles could be ordered in the same shipment to get tracking number). Rayfoss still have good deal at 22$ + 3$ shipping + 3 months warranty, but are the extra 7+$ worth it?

its better to start off small, when you get more serious with the hobby then you can upgrade. go with rayfoss, stay away from focalprice. and 30mW is a great starting power, you'd be happy with 20mW as well, still very bright, especially if you've never seen a green laser before, beam will be slightly visible in a lighted room.

I bought my nephew a 5mw green from ebay and it seems to be over spec you might want to check that out!
Best Regards,
WretchedMerc

i have a 5mW rated 532nm pen from ebay, seller in brklyn NY, paid $7, and its putting out a good cont. 20mW

Thanks to everybody for help.

I settled on the 30mw 3in1 disco laser from rayfoss. Talked to Faona over e-mail in the last few days - indeed a very nice person. That's great customer service, unlike those mass sale sites...
She said that the laser should have worse heat dissipation when compared to a pen-style laser. Lifespan is <3500 hours (is 3500 hours realistic?), but as long as I obey the duty cycle of 30-60 seconds, power shouldn't drop towards the end lifespan. IR should be 3%-5% out of the 30mw, so no filter is needed.

Eventually ordered today the laser + 2 extra star caps

Now I should get those goggles from focalprice...

I recommend these goggles - Laser Glasses - UV to Green Lasers Protection 190-548nm :: Laser Safety :: Dragon Lasers -

There for green lasers plus there OD4 and work with 532nm

These would be several times more expensive than FP (glasses+shipping), and OD4 sounds like an overkill for 30mw, I want to see the dot...