I still think people fail to recognize how good we have it, as far as access to lasers and laser parts goes.
I contacted Ophir about one of the same thermopiles that is used in the Kenometer Pro that I have.
They wanted $900 just for the thermopile.
Bare, full-lead diodes probably still cost this much in low quantities. The only reason we get access to them for less is because their purchase quantities are subsidized by huge corporations like LG, Sony, Toshiba, etc. and put into their drives.
There's no way that AixiZ can sell new stock, untouched diodes for what we pay for "pulls". Nor should they.
We're not paying market prices here. We're paying used, surplus and pull prices. Are the results good enough for our needs? Often, yes.
But the laser hobbyist market doesn't really reflect the reality of the real commercial market.
I deal with vacuum tubes for my ham radio stuff. At a ham radio swapmeet, a used Eimac 3-500Z may be $150. You go to some audiophile meet, and that very same tube may be "market" at $800. Why? Because the ham radio guys don't care how it sounds, they just care how many watts it can handle.
We don't have a need for brand new untouched diodes; AixiZ however isn't the sort of company to deal in "pulls". I highly, HIGHLY doubt that AixiZ is "scamming" anyone. Their margin on these probably isn't even as much as you would think. They may have placed an order with Nichia for 100 units. Maybe. Probably more like 50. And they're probably doing 10% or 20% markup if that. And there's no price break at those levels.
This is true with all semiconductors. If I want a Burr-Brown OPA627 op-amp, it costs me, in single digit quantities, $27 a pop. If someone orders 100,000 -- that goes down to something like $8 a piece. There are a lot of reasons for this including yield and tooling. But that doesn't mean that I'm getting "scammed" if I dont get the 100ku price break when ordering qty. 1.