Scannermax 506s

[WookieBoy]

Yes. But this is a hobbyists forum... sure there are a few 'Pro' members and a few who do shows for money, but not many 'Pro' companies here buy 'cheap tat' to base their business on...

I don't see what your point is... other than a moan...

Five or six years ago the influx of cheap Chinese lighting and sound gear hit the UK market and everyone became a lighting designer/rental company. The market for hiring low end quality 'disco' gear pretty much disappeared overnight. Plenty of long established companies threw in the towel and gave up, but plenty more adapted and thrived. Sure you can do a gig with a bunch of $50 LED cans, but will it look good? Will it still look good in 10 gigs time?
I see plenty of kids in bands ask me for pa & lights for pub gigs then say 'but I can buy it from Maplin for that!' when I give them a quote. My answer is always 'off you go then, but do you know how to use it?'


Quality costs money in all areas of life. Plenty of people do things for reasons other than money though.

Hence you have a hobby.

Hobbies can become businesses, but at that point you usually have invested in 'quality' or built it yourself.
I don't see the problem. If your business is suffering because of someone else's hobby, maybe you need to take a good look at your business model and ask yourself why, rather than complaining that 'nobody wants to spend money on my stuff anymore!'
Anyway, that's how I started in lighting and sound all those years ago... with a hobbie using cheap/second hand gear cobbled together with love and gaffa tape. Now I have a warehouse full of Quality gear... but also some cheap lasers from China because that's my current hobby...
Sure I might use them on a gig or two, but not because I'm doing Laser Shows, but more because I like Lasers and it's one of the few times I can get to play with them... I tend not to charge for the lasers, just my overall 'package' and the lasers come as a bonus...

One day, maybe, in 5 or 10 years time I might have built or bought Quality lasers and control gear. At that point my hobby will become part of my business and I'll worry about it making money...

By the way, the kids in my example usually come back after their third or fourth bad gig when they've blown up their cheap PA starting their gig night off and can afford to hire me and my equipment...

[edison]

Well moaning is not the word i would use. Its a discussion weither doing lasershows is a hobby or a bussiness. If you don,t like that discussion i would suggest to look the other way, your not obligated to participate.

Most people say its just a hobby , well why complain then that its so damn expencive. Its just perspective what the definition of a hobby is. Many new people start with saying its just a hobby but in my opinion it can,t be that since people finance their equipment with doing shows. So its a small bussiness, a little one but still. When people want to buy stuff they usually say its just a hobby but that is only a way of defending that they are not making enough to finance their small bussiness. People need a lower price it seems to keep their so called hobby going but isn,t the real problem that they are not asking enough for doing a show? Don,t get me wrong i admire the guys who take up the challenge of doing shows every weekend and trying to climb up to the level they want to be!

Even if people would do things just to finance their equipment there should be enough cashflow to buy RGBlasersystems or other high quallity stuff that lasts. I see people here cheering about the good deal that they made with some chinese supplier and 3 months later there follows a thread how much problems it has. What do they expect then? It just amazes me that the majority never seems to climb up to a level where they can afford good quallity systems like mentioned before. Maybe that also has to do with the fact that everyone tries to beat their neigbours price. That is also something where everone seems to complain about..........

[planters]

I have a different take on this quality issue. Some of the people I work with will gladly spend over $5,000 on a road bike. These are avid, but amateur bicyclists (personally, I think they're a little off their nut). None of them make any money from this hobby, but the quality, the graphite, matters to them. I'd rather have a quality South Bend lathe rather than a Grizzly and I do not make any money in the machine shop.

Without a limitless supply of money, we all have to allocate what we have to hopefully, get the best value. That's hard because that doesn't always mean buying the best. But, it still is a choice even if you are not working to clear a profit.

Regarding China, you can get some extremely high quality components if you go to that market. You can get some pretty poor quality as well (Welcome to Wall Mart). I just bought some super polished optics from a firm in China for nearly the same cost as standard optics from Coherent. I have never seen an optical surface reflect a laser with NO scatter, none,. You cannot tell the laser is on. Are these as good as the "best" from a "European" source? I do not know as I can't afford those, but is it better than the standard optic from Coherent? You bet.

[dsli_jon]

...Its a discussion weither doing lasershows is a hobby or a bussiness.

Hmm.. well, I actually agree with many of your 'pay now, or pay later' sentiments, buuut.. I thought this was the "SCANNERMAX 506" thread.. which is what I just clicked here to read more-about, aaand.. So, perhaps you and the good-arguments could kindly... 'get a room'?

Thaaanks..
j

[edison]

Well unless you have some new info there i think we can conclude that there is not much going on. Second, when there is a thread about eyemagic scanners the big boss himself doesn,t hesitate to jump in to promote his products. Planters, now that i think of it maybe that,s the PR guy that he was talking too!!! Since that,s his way of doing things arround here and more and more people doing this i,m just trying to fit in

[edison]

Well unless you have some new info there i think we can conclude that there is not much going on. Second, when there is a thread about eyemagic scanners the big boss himself doesn,t hesitate to jump in to promote his products. Planters, now that i think of it maybe that,s the PR guy that he was talking too!!! Since that,s his way of doing things arround here nowadays i,m just trying to fit in To keep you updated about scanners to be helpful here is link to the new scanners from Eightonlight in case your interested.......

http://www.eightonlight.cn/products/...ents/Scanners/


http://www.phenixtechnology.com/



Mirrors size:6ⅹ12ⅹ1.0mm, 4.0mm apertures
● Mirrors size:7ⅹ12ⅹ1.0mm, 5.0mm apertures
● Scanspeed:30Kpps@60degree,Max:80°@25Kpps
● Linearity: 99.9 %, Minimum over 20 degrees, 99.5 %Typical, over 30 degrees
● High quality dielectric mirrors reflectivity>97at 400nm-700nm

●镜片尺寸1：6ⅹ12ⅹ1.0mm(30Kpps)，适用4mm光斑激光器
●镜片尺寸2：7ⅹ12ⅹ1.0mm(30Kpps)，适用5mm光斑激光器
●线性度：99.9 %, Minimum over 20 degrees, 99.5 %Typical, over 30 degrees
●扫描速度:标准60°@30Kpps,最大角度80°@25Kpps
●镜片材质：介质膜反射镜片效率>97% （400-700nm)

[absolom7691]

For the first time ever, I have ignored someone here on PL. Long overdue, actually.

Anyway, looking forward to getting my amps from Steve and my next set of 506's from Pangolin. Which PSU are you guys using for these? ...And please don't link a page with 35 different PSUs from Farnell. Any specific model# you like to use for these?

Jon, I am in Rowland Heights, if you have not seen these scanners in operation (and you don't attend SELEM this year), I would be happy to bring them by so you can test drive them.... provided you let me take a gander at one of your Laserium rigs

[dsli_jon]

..Second, when there is a thread about eyemagic scanners the big boss himself doesn,t hesitate to jump in to promote his products...

..and I've bitched about the 'EMS-bashing' just as well - whether there are 'fair-points', or not - especially when the posts turns into a 'political-debate' or one that derails the core-topic over and over and over and.. In fact - I'm certainly not going to 'go back thru 24 pages of shoo-shoo to do-it', but.. I feel like I'm repeating myself, here (?) even in this very-same thread, about this very-same gripe.. Am I? We're all - including me - guilty of a bit of 'thread-railing' here and there, but.. My point was, Umm, No, this threads' core-topic was not supposed to be a roundtable about 'best-practices in pricing', whether for-hobbiest or 'pro' endeavours, etc, etc.. *that's* the point, ya dig?

Heya, m8..

...I am in Rowland Heights, if you have not seen these....I would be happy to bring them by so you can test drive them.... provided you..

Right on, Thanks.. Yes, I am keen to see them in-action, especially with 'big, BIG' mirrors.. Like, 10-12mm-aperture-big... '..eye hav a Pflan....' <stands-up, rigidly goose-steps away from chair..> ..Though, I will likely wait 'till these are avail. with the PangoAmps, as a nice, all-in-one 'box-lunch'.. Yes, have several 'top-shelf' amps (T2; CT 'MicroMax'; HB Apollo; LaserMedia dual-axis, etc..) we 'could' send-in for mods / mod-ourselves, but.. I'd prefer to 'drive them with their intended soul-mates', etc.. And sorry, but there's just no-way I'm 'banking' Laserium-shows on Chivo-amps, regardless of how-much 'cooler' these might allow the amps to-run, etc.. Sorry, not until, ie: I see people re-selling 15+ yr old Chivo-amps - like people do with 6580s / 678s, etc - along-with 15+ yr old sets of 6800s - and there's zero 'ZOMG my Chi-amps blew up, help!!' threads about them.. KnowwhatImean?

..Anyhoo, Yes, you - any many-others - will always be welcome to come-by and chill-out in the 'Cradle of Laserization'.. Shooting to have the 'Studios' back-open, this Fall / Public-shows running again.. We'll see.. Lots to-do / too-much on my plate, as-always.. But, yes, I am very-keen to see 506's running next-gen Laserium-spirals thru fields of 462/520 Lumia-wondermint.. Oh, and + some 568..

..Oh, crap, I'm 'derailing' aren't I?
j

[planters]

Right on, Thanks.. Yes, I am keen to see them in-action, especially with 'big, BIG' mirrors.. Like, 10-12mm-aperture-big... '..eye hav a Pflan....' <stands-up, rigidly goose-steps away from chair..>

Me too. There is not a lot of aperture-option out there despite all the different models. Can you get away with 3mm aperture or do you need 5mm? That's about it. We have projectors from sub watt to >50W and the choice is 3mm or 5mm unless you want to adapt some one-off from a GS based infrared welder. I really want to see scanners with apertures from 3mm to at least 12mm. This is one of the most important controlling specs for any projector.

[MIIKKKLLLL]

On their website, the mount for 506 are now X-orthogonal, like common "Chinese" scanners (take a look at the new datasheets from August '14). Do you think it is the reason why the beam aperture reduced to 4-4.5mm for large mirrors ? ... And the reason could be to intentionally "decrease" performance of 506 to let a bigger gap between Saturn 1/3/5 series and these "more affordable" scanners ?


When they advertised "till 1 inch mirrors", how do you think they mount these mirrors ? The scanner itself is smaller than that, I guess they have to install the scanners in the mount, and then they set the mirrors. This mean we can't unmount the scanners without dissasemble scanners from mirrors.
Or... the design of this specific mount is maybe different, with a piece that lock the scanner from above and 2 screws to lock the piece, not a twist-locking but a press-locking design.


I asked Phenix Technology, the A-10 scanners with very large aperture can reach 12-14kpps when controlled for lightshow application @t 20° angle. The speed is low, but enough for beamshow use.