I can easily see the beam of my 18x running at 220mA in the night sky so I would think
a 16x would show pretty good too. As far as how it compares to a 5mW green I don't know
because I don't have any greens. I am sure someone else here can give you a comparison on
that though.
My DX30 is only brighter than my 16x when it's working well(very sensitive to temperature) but the beam is still more visible.A blu-ray is a pain to try to focus on.I only have one ~100mW phr though, maybe the longer wave 150mW+ are easier to see. :-/
In daylight, a 100mw blu-ray will be much less visible than a 16x red, but at night a blu-ray beam will look MUCH brighter than a red, if your eyes are dark-adapted. This is because of the photopic/scotopic vision.
Switch: Actually, as far as you're looking at a blu-ray beam closer than a couple of feet, it's pretty easy to focus on, actually. The trick is to focus your eyes as if you would be watching an item a long distance away, do not try to look at the beam, look beyond it.
i could see my 16x laser just fine in the night sky, i never got to trie it on a foggy night or anything though.....
but people next to me always had trouble seeing it....so i think you pretty much need to be looking down the beam.