DX $16 50mW green pointer technical review

Hello! I've bought some 5mW ($10 each) and 50mW ($16 each) pointers from DX recently, they arrived four days ago. Shipping to Poland took exactly two weeks. First pic shows the pointers. On the second and third pic you can see what the 50mW one has inside. There was no glue so it was very easy to take apart. The expanding lens is not glued to the crystal holder as it was in other pointers I've had before. Diode is in TO-18 and seems to be open can when I look through a slot near the crystal (sixth pic). There is no lens between the diode and Nd:YVO4 so it has to be open can anyway. The driver (fourth and fifth pic) is based on a LM358 opamp. The third pin of the diode is not connected so the driver is only a simple current regulator (no light feedback). Current draw from new batteries is around 260mA so it can't be really 50mW of green, especially when there are mounted the cheapest crystals surely (low efficiency). But it's much brighter than 5mW pointers, you can see a comparison on the last pic.

I though such review may be useful for someone who is looking for a cheap DPSS module, so here it is

The insides of my true 5mw was very different not to mention it came in a waaay better gift case.

Great info and pics! +1

very cool

thanks for sharing it's very interesting to see the inside of my laser with out taking it apart, much app....:thanks:

have a good day ! Pyro...:eg:

Thanks for the information, it's interesting, cheers.

Just a quick question, don't know if it's possible but could you rip out the crystals and have a high powered IR pointer? I have the true 100mW and a 1W or 500mA IR laser or what ever is inside would be pretty cool to have

Some lens modifications would be needed to collimate the IR light properly, but yes, it's possible. The only question is, what do you need an IR pointer for? :|

I bellieve he wants burning pointer ;p

But it won't really be, because as you can see it draws 260mA which propably suggest it's 200mW diode.

Hey, I just made a 650nm pointer of a DVD-RW diode and housing and driver from that 50mW pen It works! Two AAA is a bit too little to power a red diode with that driver but it lights quite nice anyway at max 120mA. I'm going to extend the battery tube so that three AAAs will fit there, then it will easily deliver even 300mA to the diode and that will give about 160mW of red light I think. That halo around the red spot appeard only on a photo, I don't know why...

Its funny how these lasers are again different from the ones sold a year or two ago.

In a way its pretty annoying they keep shipping lasers with totally different insides under the same sku numbers - makes it difficult to tell if a review is about the product you are actualyl ordering. Chances seem to be it is not by now

Benm said:

Its funny how these lasers are again different from the ones sold a year or two ago.

In a way its pretty annoying they keep shipping lasers with totally different insides under the same sku numbers - makes it difficult to tell if a review is about the product you are actualyl ordering. Chances seem to be it is not by now

Click to expand...

I'm also very disapointed with this. They should announce these changes...

5Mw greenes

I just recived a order of ten of the 5Mw green poiners and had a couple on hand and heres the results of some testing on them. I ran the test three times on each laser befor recording the results, and used different new cells for each laser all cells were in the 1.6 volt range.

#1 11Mw avg started at 15Mw
#2 22Mw avg started at 24Mw
#3 8Mw avg
#4 8Mw avg
#5 12Mw avg started at 13Mw
#6 10Mw avg started at 10Mw
#7 12Mw avg started at 22Mw
#8 7Mw avg started at 8Mw
#9 <5Mw avg started at 11Mw :cryyy:
#10 9Mw avg started at 10Mw
#11 26Mw avg started at 30Mw
#12 10Mw avg started at 9Mw this one started out at below 5Mw for several seconds then went right to 9Mw ?

so thats pretty good only one less that 5Mw outa the bunch.


Peace Pyro...:eg:

Are you measuring total power or filtered green only? I've measured total power (with thermopile sensor) of my old 5mW bougnt on ebay and it was 12mW (see the attachment).

c4r0 said:

Are you measuring total power or filtered green only? I've measured total power (with thermopile sensor) of my old 5mW bougnt on ebay and it was 12mW (see the attachment).

Click to expand...

I'm using a Laserbee 1 thermopile sensor...

would be great if you could repeat the measurements with a IR filter...

Great pictures, man!
Tech Analysis threads is what we are missing in LPF, last thread I read like this one was for the DX True 30

I have adequate filter but unfortunately I don't have access to that LPM anymore

Here's the driver's schematic: