500mW 532nm RPL-Style only $519 ?!?

[BrewCityMusic]

If you haven't stopped by Susies site lately, take a gander - they've added a bunch of new products that don't look so bad (especially considering the output is always 100% guaranteed) - This one in particular caught my eye: http://www.o-like.com/b2b_cpinfo.asp?id=993

Half a watt for half a $K? Not too shabby compared to the other options out there for this kind of power, most of which are $1400 or more, IMHO

Just thought I'd share this one!

 

[Deleted member 8382]

WOW thats a really good price. Sure someone is alredy buying xD

 

[Deleted member 8382]

Price list: AWESOME LOL


600mW Portable green laser

price:$750



550mW portable green laser

price:$639


500 mW portable green laser

price:$519


450mW portable green laser

price:$439


400mW portable green laser

price:$365

 

[yobresal]

I saw that too. It looks good though it does not have an IR filter and I am thinking that is contributing to the reading of 500mW. If that is not the case I will buy one of the lower powered non IR filtered ones. 400mW for $365 I will buy that right now if that is the actual green output.

 

[BrewCityMusic]

Worse case scenario you could always buy a 96% efficiency IR filter from Opto and glue it inside the head for a buck ... Even if the entire 500mW was IR you'd leak about 20mW (which of course, isn't the case

I'd sure love to have the power of my herc without having to drag around a laser the size of my arm, that's for sure!

 

[yobresal]

That would be the fist thing I did if I bought this laser. That is not what I am woried about. I am worried about the 500mW rating of the laser. Is that 500mW all green or is it half green/half IR measured in. We will have to ask Susie about this to find out how much actual green output there will be from the laser. Yeah the Herc never was an option for me because of its batton size housing. I am pro RPL. I just bought the 500mW from rayfoss.com here is the link http://rayfoss.com/pro_info.asp?id=1472 . I will probably buy one of these from susie though as well. Got to have one for each hand you know.

 

[bootleg2go]

If you haven't stopped by Susies site lately, take a gander - they've added a bunch of new products that don't look so bad (especially considering the output is always 100% guaranteed) - This one in particular caught my eye: http://www.o-like.com/b2b_cpinfo.asp?id=993

Half a watt for half a $K? Not too shabby compared to the other options out there for this kind of power, most of which are $1400 or more, IMHO

Just thought I'd share this one!

Yea right.
Maybe I should use cheaper optics to make the RPL divergence twice as bad and take it from 1.0mrad to 2.0mrad (this is a enormous decrease in beam quality), only offer a 90 day warranty as chance are they won't last much longer than that unless it's sitting a drawer most of the time, and lastly lie about the power and never mention if it's average or peak and only limit it to a 100 second duty cycle.

Funny thing is that the 350mw they list that is IR filtered costs $20 more than their supposed 500mw. What this most likely means is that their 350mw is just the same as the their "500mw" except it's filtered, which means that they are counting 150mw of IR in the 500. These also use cheap diodes that won't last long at all.
I'm getting pretty tired of this places advertising way more power than they can provide, if 500mw were easy to come by I would surely be selling them on our website. I've only had a hand full of them in literally thousands of units, they are very few and far between even with the yield of our higher quality components that are used.

Give me some feedback back here, is this the kind of laser everyone wants; short or no warranty, much lower beam qualilty, over statement of actual output power?
I'm sure everyone wants the best support, top quality/performance, long warranty and to be surprised that the average output power ends up being more rather than much less, have a laser that a year or 3 down the road still performs and on top of all of this at the lowest price, but in most cases you get what you pay and you can't have those kinds of prices and have a good long lasting product.

So I'm open to suggestions here as a good business person should provide their customers with the products they want.
Do you want a very low cost laser that competes with the o-like, boblaser and others?
I can provide it at just as low a price and probably even lower, but all the specs would same as these, warranty would be the same, over rating the power and quoting peak power without IR filtering would be the same too as the playing field would need to be level.

Or on the other hand would you want an RPL-260 and even though rated at only 260 would be outputting more than 260 and over a long period of time (average output power) have much better beam quality so it's would have better long distance burning power and actually have a higher average output power than most of those others on the market with lousy specs and overrated output power that claim to be "500mw" just so that you can have the bragging rights that you bought a "500".
Yea, I kinda pissed at these places for lying through their (not flaming any particular company here) teeth about their specs, output rating and performance and then when the customer gets their product and it fails within a few months of regular use they email me wishing they would have gotten an RPL and wondering if I can fix the laser they bought from some other retailer.
Most people out there think they know what real green laser power looks like, but not until they buy or use someone elses RPL do they really know.

Just looking to provide what the customer wants, let me know, it's much easier and a heck of alot cheaper to build lower quality lasers tahn is is to do it right and have to price them accordingly.

 

[BrewCityMusic]

Easy, Amigo - there's no question as to the superiority of your products whatsoever, heck if it wasn't for the duty-cycle issue and external power in, TTL, etc I'd have more than likely gone RPL instead of Hercules myself.

I don't think there has EVER been a post regarding anything from Susie being underspec, but you do have a good point (also touched apon above) that the potential for large amounts of IR being included in the rated output is very real, and I'm sure at these prices it won't be long before we have several members testing and publishing the results here. Thank god there are companies such as yours that offer low-cost IR filters for incorporation into lasers that fit that category!

I believe these lasers occupy a certain "niche" market, namely a market where perfectionism in regards to clean output and divergence aren't the predominant issue, but cost is. The capabilities in regard to most uses of a green laser in the 300+mW category aren't very different from model to model, except of course beam appearance (divergence) and the potential for harmful IR leakage, which can easily be negated by using one of your IR filters. The difference to many "hobbyists" though, is very real in regards to the $1K price tag increase.

Optotronics isn't being (nor should it be) challenged in regards to offering the same product at 3X or more the price, that obviously isn't the issue as the Opto products are clearly superior to anyone with a modicum of laser knowledge.

Noone here was comparing the products offered to yours, and noone specifically targeted or "flamed" your company, I sincerely hope it wasn't taken that way.

 

[john_lawson]

i have bought two of these rpl looking hosts they are smaller and not as good of quality
ex threading aperture top tail cap ect i think jayrob got one of these the 350 the beam is real fat like two mm so burning capabilities are scarce .. they are definately not a viasho or jacks viasho which is specially made for jack .. and i know dale your just pointing out a deal hey a deal dale lol anyways not that i own two rpl's or nothing
but these are completly different hosts and i am 100% sure do not use simular internals

 

[bootleg2go]

Easy, Amigo - there's no question as to the superiority of your products whatsoever, heck if it wasn't for the duty-cycle issue and external power in, TTL, etc I'd have more than likely gone RPL instead of Hercules myself.

I don't think there has EVER been a post regarding anything from Susie being underspec, but you do have a good point (also touched apon above) that the potential for large amounts of IR being included in the rated output is very real, and I'm sure at these prices it won't be long before we have several members testing and publishing the results here. Thank god there are companies such as yours that offer low-cost IR filters for incorporation into lasers that fit that category!

I believe these lasers occupy a certain "niche" market, namely a market where perfectionism in regards to clean output and divergence aren't the predominant issue, but cost is. The capabilities in regard to most uses of a green laser in the 300+mW category aren't very different from model to model, except of course beam appearance (divergence) and the potential for harmful IR leakage, which can easily be negated by using one of your IR filters. The difference to many "hobbyists" though, is very real in regards to the $1K price tag increase.

Optotronics isn't being (nor should it be) challenged in regards to offering the same product at 3X or more the price, that obviously isn't the issue as the Opto products are clearly superior to anyone with a modicum of laser knowledge.

Noone here was comparing the products offered to yours, and noone specifically targeted or "flamed" your company, I sincerely hope it wasn't taken that way.

Hi BrewCityMusic,
No it wasn't taken that way at all.
I guess I was just ranting about the fact that most buyers are concerned with nothing but the lowest price and the claimed output power. Not the build quality, actual average output power over time, divergence or warranty. So I made a suggestion to for anyone to post as to what they really care about, so I can provide it to them as well.
It just happened that olike was the topic of the original post, so they ended up somewhat in the firing line so to speak.
I did want to correct you on one thing though and some of these may have been before your time on the LPF, so you probably were not aware, but there have been issues with her products being less than described, I think if you search the forum you may find some of them. From what I've read, (didn't do a search or anything on olike), that in general the modules from her are not too bad, but the pointers are sometimes less than desireable.
Awhile back one of my customers got into it with sandstone11 and a severly under-powered 200mw green laser he got from Susie at olike and the way she handled the whole situation. Here's the link to the thread he posted and emailed to me back in October on the subject. I did have to convert the link to direct to the new forum.
http://laserpointerforums.com/laser_pointer_forums_3/forum/showthread.php?t=38033

 

[BrewCityMusic]

Whew - glad we got that cleared up! Believe me, I totally understand where you're coming from, in my line of work we are constantly having to deal with other entertainment companies offering their services at insanely low costs (mainly to most of them it's a sideline or "weekend warrior" job, not a full time legit company like us) - It's a drag trying to explain why our $20K+ production is a deal for their wedding at $1200/night when every knucklehead with a couple of speakers on sticks and a laptop is quoting $3-500... Apples and Oranges, just like this topic

That's a post I hadn't seen, BTW - thanks for the info!

 

[Deleted member 8382]

i think we need susie to enter this thread.

 

[Benm]

I saw that too. It looks good though it does not have an IR filter and I am thinking that is contributing to the reading of 500mW. If that is not the case I will buy one of the lower powered non IR filtered ones. 400mW for $365 I will buy that right now if that is the actual green output.

I think it might be green power: when you look at the big modules they sell, it specifies them as IR filtered... afaik those modules are the guts of their baton style lasers as well.

 

[nikokapo]

I guess I was just ranting about the fact that most buyers are concerned with nothing but the lowest price and the claimed output power. Not the build quality, actual average output power over time, divergence or warranty.

You're 100% right.

But buyers learn across time, you start to appreciate good build quality after you bought a cheap product that worked well but fell apart each time you wanted to change batteries, which rattled inside because of a bad design, etc.