Review on 🔍 Celestron - Pro 5MP Digital USB Microscope - Handheld Magnifier for Windows PC and Mac - 20x-200x Magnification - Ideal for Stamp and Coin Collecting by Antonio Bacon

It was a terrible experience. The first microscope I received was dead on arrival. It's fair that this can happen. I asked for a replacement and got one by paying double the amount ($30) for return shipping which Revain will refund ($15). Edit: See the bottom of this review for my Revain customer experience (which was very good). The second microscope worked. But the software effectively renders it unusable. First, you cannot use this device with Photo Booth. Photo Booth recognizes the USB device but does not receive any images. The microscope can only be used with the Celestron software. The supplied software is on the CD. CD drives went away about a decade ago, and many people don't have them anymore. The software can be downloaded from the Celestron website. However, the download page is a mess. It is not clear which software goes with which product. There are actually two downloads for the microscope, one labeled "MicroCapture Pro" and the other labeled "MicroCapture Pro (Model B)". I searched the microscope and box for the model number, but no joy. I downloaded and installed the "MicroCapture Pro" software only to find that it doesn't work. Then I repeated the same thing with the "MicroCapture Pro (Model B)" version. It ran and actually created an image. Everything is fine with the hardware. Depending on the screen size, you get about 50x to 100x magnification. All claims beyond that are fantasy material. If you try to magnify an image about 100x on a large screen, all you get is pixel blocks that are larger than the pixel blocks you were just looking at. But the real problems are in the Celestron software (it's the only way to use a microscope on a Mac). The software is an absolute disaster (to say the least). Completely useless, even with a lot of patience and tolerance. Problems I encountered in the first 30 minutes: - Frequent and random crashes. - Complete Freeze. Nothing in the software reacts to inputs anymore. The program can only be closed with "Force Quit" in the Finder. - Slow down to the point where the menu responds to a mouse click after 15 (yes, 15) seconds. - Two processors constantly rotate at 100%. respectively, with the software doing nothing other than displaying a still image. - Crash corruption so that the program immediately crashes again on restart. Recovery requires deleting all data files and deleting and reinstalling the application. - The microscope is not recognized when connected to the network. - The app crashes immediately when the microscope is unplugged. - No keyboard shortcuts for any of the commands. - Terrible frame rate, up to about 2-3 frames per second. - Severe JPG compression artifacts in saved images. - Calibration/measurement support is useless as there is no way to save calibration settings. Even after calibration it is not possible to use the (now calibrated) software to measure anything on another image. In other words, the only thing you can calibrate is the image of the ruler that comes with the kit. After that, you can measure the ruler, but no other picture. It is not possible to use this microscope for more than a few minutes before the application freezes or crashes. (Your mileage with Windows may vary.) How dare Celestron sell something like this I don't understand. I am a software developer and have a lot of experience with images. The student could have written the application better. (I wouldn't be surprised to know that this was actually written by a high school student. If so, it was a high school student with mostly C and D grades.) Stay away. Edit: I contacted Revain support and explained that I lost almost what I paid for the microscope when I sent two instruments back to Revain. Revain refunded my actual postage (instead of the $15 flat rate), included a $5 store credit, and (of course) refunded my purchase price.