LPS Model 890 - Nice Bang for the Buck

[Dundee]

Ok, so I've been wanting a nice 400+mw handheld for years but I didn't feel like spending a sic amount of money on it and neither did I want a rip-off with a nice fat label but putting out only a hundred mw or so. LPS did it for me and then some. Their Model 890 comes in a few flavors, and I chose the green@500mw for only 99 stinking bones.

I mean, 99 bones? Really? Really?? Well, it's for real. They gave me some good and fast coms and the shipping was stinking quick coming from China. The Host is a nice lightweight aluminum and takes either one 18650 or two 16340's. Works best with the dual 16340's. As shown in the pics it has nice plug-in as well as soldered connections inside. And it has a focus/defocus front end. It comes just by itself, no batteries or case.

It blew my i-balls out with it's brightness and clean beam. Both my Laserbee and my new LPS LPM have it outputting over 660mw and a max of 674mw with batteries at full charge. After batteries a bit drained from use the Laserbee showed 412mw and the LPS LPM showed 405mw. I'd say that's a nice bang for the buck. Very pleased with this nice handheld for the money. LPS sent me good product at a great price. Too bad they don't sell pressed modules.

First 2 pics in a lighted room and semi-lighted room.

 

[paul1598419]

Congrats on your new acquisition. I'm happy you are satisfied with it. Seems strange that it varies so much with the input voltage. Most CC drivers won't do that.

 

[Dundee]

Congrats on your new acquisition. I'm happy you are satisfied with it. Seems strange that it varies so much with the input voltage. Most CC drivers won't do that.

You're right brother, totally my mistake. After digging out my old toy box, I did so many comparisons I got a single brain circuit crossed. It was an old cheap "Gatling" host that works off of either a single 18650 or two 16340's. It maxes out at 70mw with the 18650 but 92mw with dual 16340's. This LPS Model 890 with 520nm 500mw won't work with a single 18650 although it's host is designed to fit one. It only works with the dual 16340's. Likely voltage hungry because of the more powerful "brain" inside. And I need to order new lithiums as most of mine are at least 10 years old and don't hold their charge for very long and drop voltage quite a bit with little use. Probably why the drop in laser power.

 

[paul1598419]

Yeah, Li-ion batteries won't last forever. I've had to toss out many recently that I've had for several years as they simply wouldn't recharge any longer.

 

[Dundee]

I have recently discovered that not all batteries are equal, lol. I have a couple LPS 3-Watt blue 450nm that wouldn't put out more than 1.5-Watt. I thought I got "tattooed" by LPS but, alas, it wasn't so. I had ordered a cheap brand of 16340 batteries on eBay (yellow colored ETSAIR brand) that put out a good 4.2v when fully charged, to replace my 14 year old batteries. I then ordered some UltraFire brand to try and poof! Both lasers put out 3.2-Watts easily. Put the other brand back in and they both wouldn't go past 1.5-Watts. So, the wrong lying bad brand of cheap battery can totally make a huge difference in the performance of high-powered lasers. Interestingly, both brand of batteries provided the same results in my green 520nm half-Watt lasers. Just the 3-Watt blue 450nm was the huge difference.