In article <3324cc18.92287541@news.hkstar.com>, donellis@hkstar.com says...
>heather@sdcc4.ucsd.edu (Heather Ebey) wrote:
>>Loupes: Which is recommended as a good loupe for slides?

>When I first went shopping for a loupe, I was shown a variety of
>inexpensive (US$25) loupes that seemed to do the job quite nicely.
>Just before I paid my money, however, the salesman placed a 4X
>Schneider on top of my slide. Minutes later, I traded him US$100 for
>it. The Schneider was a revelation, perhaps not on the order of
>discovering light, but close. The images are so clear and sharp --
>except on the occasional fuzzy picture I take --- that I've never
>thought of the price again. I'm just pleased to own it.
>Schneider also makes a 6X loupe with equally good optics but it costs
>nearly US$300 and as much as I love to spend money I didn't see enough
>difference to buy one. If you need the additional magnification,
>however, you might like it better.

Ummm, 4X is just too low a magnification for evaluating sharpness,
I think - everything will look "clear and sharp", even if it really
isn't - and if it looks bad with 4X magnification, it is BAD. A
4X may be good for quick slide viewing (the lower magnification
allows more of the slide to be seen at once, but isn't, alas,
much good for sharpness evaluation). $300 for a 6X is just plain
a rip-off, IMO - you can buy a good camera lens for that, and
have it mounted for use as a loupe (and the optics will be
higher quality...). Making a very high quality 8X loupe just
has to be an easy design/manufacturing job - it is a mystery
to me why loupes are so poor, and so expensive.
Hope This Helps