Ok, so here's the scoop for all of you, since this thread makes me chuckle as I read it more and more. This isn't new stuff. Its just never been practical until recently. This stuff was explored ages past using powerful Argon lasers. The advent of 445nm diodes have just allowed it to be able to be done in a small sustainable format. But, no offense, let me get this out of the way - a few hundered bucks? try more like a few thousand. Making one of these makes a 561 look cheap. The cheapest one I've seen anywhere was about 3K+ for a few mW...very specialized stuff, and beam quality leaves something to be desired somewhat. Is it possible in a handheld? Kinda. The format would fit, and is possible, but not on any practical or cheap level, and operation of it would downright suck...HARD. like yellow and 561, its fairly touchy from what I understand, and needs a fair bit of cooling and specialized mirrors to get anything worthwhile and keep it. Plus on top of that, like ruby - which is also a pretty dead medium, reabsorbs its own output, so its very inefficient. Its main peak absorption is ~444 and possible lines include cyan ~480, green 534, orange (604.2, 607), and red (639.4, 696), and NIR (720) IIRC. Cost of parts would likely be insane, as they'd all be specialty stuff, was actually just having this conversation with someone the other night. Unless you have deep DEEP pockets....its not likely happening for a long time to come, and even then orange is just not all that popular, it never was. that's why 612 HeNes have bit the dust, and the people who do still make them at request, it's still cheaper than one of these, by quite a lot. (about $1600 ballpark) It's still a technology in its infancy, and will likely develop, like the yellows sadly, very slowly at best due to the limited uses and very small demand.
