i have the same laser you have and it's not 200 mW it burns but.
do you see the <200mW the < sign means maximum 200mW if it was >200mW would mean minimum power 200 ect. ect.
plus i made this pic to show you that i removed the diode + driver and you can do the same only the grey glue is difficult to remove
plus you can damage the driver board,so be carefull removing the diode+ driverboard
( good luck )
and to help you a lilbit more i have a spare driver from the laser
( i blew 1 of those pointers myself lol )
so i will see what the max current the driver can give
so we can figuere out if you maybe can put a 250mW diode inside
( ok those will cost more then the 1 i showed you in the link )
or maybe we can upgrade it to a 300mW version if we can find a 300mW diode
answer is NO NO NO! that blu ( not blue ) is crap ok it burns but it's way under 200 mW and far from visible ( ok on video's and pictures a 405 is visible but) in real it's the same as a 5 - 10 mW green beam , i have that 1 to just for fun.
as you can see in this video
@0:02 second they both turn on and the blu laser is weak , add smoke and it brightens up kinda good but in real it has not that "WOW" like i said on pics and video's lasers show more intense then in real.
these are the 2 deal extreme lasers you are talking about.
Hell yes it's necessary!! You've been doing close-up burning, so I'm surprised you haven't had any ill affects yet. Don't use any laser for burning without glasses.
Do You see a bright point of light while you're burning? Well that bright point of light is going to damage your eyes. If You don't want to take me word for it; just wait until other members jump on you for thinking that it's ok.
But it really can permanantly harm your eyes?
Because I have read posts of people who accidently stared into the beam for 1/10 of a second or even shorter, and then they had a 30 sec that they couldn't see anything, and then permanently a black spot...
YES you ! ( bad bad words ) you're pissing me off here
I'm dutch and we dutch people always make jokes about belgium people cuz they are dumb and you're getting close to prove that myth...
that reflecting light and your face close to the burning spot will eventually leave eye damage STOP doing that