Blue lasers for little green

[142laser]

I e mailed the sales at lasever.com and found that 80 mW @ 473 nm is $1190 ans 100 mW @ 473 nm is $1390 with 5% power stability and fast blanking. These should be about right for a blue laser show or RGB projector. How can they sell them for that? They test them for 100 hours before shipping. Sounds too good to be true but who can tell until someone buys one, runs it and posts a review. www.lasever.com is their site and they have green and red very cheap also. Anyone have opne yet?

[yaddatrance]

I believe spec and marconi has bought greens from lasever before...
It looks like they got a technology boost in the last few months though.

That's very interesting I wonder if they found a cheap source of BIBO.
The thing that's traditionally keeping the prices high is the cost of
the BIBO crystal itself...

[jayDC]

They are most likely not paying royalities on the design either. Thats one of the things that make CNI more expensive. I think its 5% or a bit higher..

[Spec]

And the Church of the Photon said "Let loose the floodgates"

None of the manufacturers can settle on a going price and its been getting a lot worse. Ive received offers of similar/same units with more than $1000 between them. I dont know about you however I find it hard for there to be $1000 worth of "love" in the unit. The method for producing blue is quite specific, so there cant be *THAT* much of a differentiator.

Everyone is at the point where they are trying to hock their products by using meaningless details and product badges. For example: go to a computer show in a civic center. The EXACT same hardware will be different prices all over the room for different price.

The last time events like these happened was a couple months before the 532nM units dropped drastically in price. I believe that 473 is ready for its own "dot com bust"

Sadly, the crystals are *readily* available in large quantities. The biggest problem i see at this point is the coatings. Thats one of the main reasons why Coherent and Melles Griot are able to charge what they can. People go to them to get coatings applied. They are the only players with the experience and machinery. I honestly dont know how China does it and something tells me if i visited CNI and tried to find an ion sputtering machine I wouldnt be able to.

Not simple AR coatings either... Frequency specific angle sensitive ones that act like modern day magic.

Remember that when you are using a crystal as the oscillation chamber you still need to make it act like the bore of a gas laser bouncing "un spent" photons back and forth. Easist example of this is the KTP/YAG crystal in proper 532nM units.

Crystal(Entrance > exit)

YAG/YVO4(AR808 HR1064 > AR1064 HR808) to KTP(AR1064 HR532 > HR1064 AR532)

From my understanding you dont *have* to use BIBO for blue However its crystaline structure more willingly lases at a specific freq thus causing lower gain in other lines. I think of this in terms of the "magnet trick" in hene tubes on a much more intersting level

[sbk]

Strange, they said to me that 80mW is 1590US$ and 100mW is 1890US$...

[yaddatrance]

Heh, that'd be the starting quote and they expect you to haggle from there

Me personally, I'm not much of a haggler, I have a set idea of how much
I want to spend and I buy things when they reach that price level...
Luckily the 473 blues are only a few hundred bucks off of what I want to pay

[frothychimp]

There are a few things to look for when purchasing a system.

1) Know who the manufacturer really is. Distributors sometimes claim they are the manufacturer.

2) Know what the specifications mean and try to verify the specifications when you receive the unit. Some distributors (some sellers on eBay come to mind) will state one thing and deliver another.

3) The best systems from China are general purpose only. This is not derogatory as these systems will accommodate about 90% of the DPSS laser requirements out there.

4) Pricing varies widely. If you are purchasing direct from the manufacturer you will get a good price but remember there are fees in wire transfers, shipping, customs, VAT, etc. You also have to pay return shipping and customs if you must return the unit for warranty work. Those charges are not covered under warranty. Local distributors will have higher prices but they cover all those hidden costs. Keep that in mind if you don't want to deal with China directly. Low priced distributors will generally tell you to send warranty work directly to China...avoid these guys. Ask about this. Middle range local distributors provide the best mix generally as they will provide some support or other free services supporting your purchase. High end distributors often do engineering and design work some of which is covered by the costs of the laser system. Some expensive distributors are there just to gouge the buyer. With the honorable distributors you have to decide if the value-add costs are something you need when paying for a laser.

5) Distributor pricing is (should be) determined by the wholesale cost of the unit, markup for estimated percentage of units to fail during the warranty period, markup covering shipping, customs, VAT, markup covering supporting services (such as 24-hour on call staff, ordering staff, etc), markup covering general operations, markup for profit. Yes distributors make a profit. Get used to the idea. Keep in mind that no matter how many giveaways or specials they run...they always make a profit. That is the nature of business.

6) Frankly, if you are buying a laser direct from the manufacturer, enjoy it while you can. The Chinese still don't have that manufacturer/distributor/customer relationship down yet but they will at some point and their manufacturer price will jump up to retail and/or they will send you to one of their distributors. Many of them short their distributors by selling at factory prices because they don't know any better.

7) I think most people on boards such as these do their due diligence but you can still be stung.

[andy_con]

my lasever 100mw green and 100mw blue is sitting at home.

im going away tomorrow so wont be able to play till weekend

[Zoof]

Strange, they said to me that 80mW is 1590US$ and 100mW is 1890US$...

It has come to mind that the chinese are also trying to profit of the strong euro: quoting the same figure in euros as they would in US dollars. I know you are in Switserland but 'they' might still perceive that as a Euro country

[bridge]

Oh, that's not cheaper at all.

Strange, they said to me that 80mW is 1590US$ and 100mW is 1890US$...