Customer Reviews

EyeClops BioniCam

5 star:		(78)
4 star:		(38)
3 star:		(25)
2 star:		(13)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

If they would have had this thing when I was a kid (a few decades back), I would have gone crazy with it. It is a TOY, not a real scientific instrument, but it's the kind of toy that can good and truly make a kid fall in love with science. It turns the world into a puzzle--What would that thing look like if I were the size of an ant? It offers the ability to capture and share images, and compare them with each other. This little device is flawed--I wish it were a little bit easier to use, the instructions could be more comprehensive and easy to understand, and I've only had it for two days so I can't vouch for its durability but suspect considerable care will be required to protect it--but for an 8- to 14-year-old child, this is a portal into interesting worlds, and a possible introduction to science and nature that could result in a lifelong appreciation of discovery. I don't want to praise it too much or someone could order it and be disappointed that it's not more than advertised, but I just want to get across the point that, limitations and all, I found the thing to be pretty delightful.

The good..
once you get a resolution focused you can see light objects fairly well.

The bad...
Lighting is very poor. the very small leds make any darker material impossible to see.
Very hard to focus, need to turn the entire front of the housing, can't do it "on the fly"
Changing magnification requires refocusing.

most kids will need assistance using this.

NEEDS BETTER LIGHTING, you also can not increase lighting with a flash light or anything, so it's light material or nothing

I bought this for my 5-year-old granddaughter. It's probably a little advanced for her age, but I think this will be a fun activity for her to pursue with Grandpa's help.

Once it was focused in, anything that you place the surface of the "eye" against comes into clear focus. The white LEDs work best at lower magnification. One negative I can see is that it takes 5 AA batteries - this is an unusual number and will make it inconvenient to try to run it off of rechargeable batteries since you usually charge 2 or 4 at a time, not 5.

This is a great toy for the whole family. Once you get the focusing part down and taking a picture at the same time, it is great. We also bought some pre-made slides that are great to look at as well. Have not used the video function yet, but that should be pretty cool once we get there. Great toy for Christmas.

Length:: 4:01 Mins

This toy is awesome. We got this for my son as his birthday gift. He liked it very much. And of course the old kid in the house (you guessed it right, me) loved it too. We took quite a bit of videos and pictures. The microscope really works. All you have to do is to make sure it is well-focus which is not too hard either. It even comes with a little circular card with text in small print on it that you can use to correct focus. But you can use anything you want to focus. Also note that the focus seems to change with the magnification settings. So if you focused it at 100x, and then you change it to 200x, make sure you refocus it. The 400x seems to have too much digital component to it and hence does not generate very good videos and pictures. The 100x seems to be perfect.

We have seen cool things under this microscope and have already learned some new things on our own. For example, the white color on your computers LCD screen is not quite white. See the video in the review section or the pictures in the Customer Pictures section, and you would know what I am talking about ;) You may watch this video with full comments on You*Tube by going to any video and then changing the video id after 'v=' to plms8Wpzv7Y in the address bar of your browser.

I bought this toy expecting it to be something that my 8 year old explorer-nephew would love. I gave it a test drive to avoid a sad face on Christmas Day, and am so glad that I did. The lights on the unit are way too dim. It takes infinite patience to capture any kind of magnified image, and even when you're lucky enough to get one, you lose it as soon as you move your hand to take a picture. It's a great concept, but until the lights are improved, it's just not worth it.

I just wish this was around when I grew up. No kid should be without this one. Very educational and fun to play around. Every kid becomes a curious geek after 10 min with this toy. I understand some of the negative reviews, they must have paid the full price. At the price Amazon is selling there is nothing to complain, cheaper than a used video game. If you need extra light use a flash light. I love the usability of this toy. You can take magnified pictures, watch it in TV any thing you ask is there. Very well designed equipment.

This was a surprise favorite gift for Christmas 2008 at my house. I bought this at the last minute as a nice filler gift and didn't expect too much after reading the reviews here. Boy was I surprised. This "toy" is definitely worth the $20 I paid. It has an LCD screen, plugs into the TV for real time viewing and playback and has a removable USB key, for goodness sakes. The only disappointing feature was the lack of an autofocus mechanism but I wouldn't expect that feature for this price. My 12 year old son loves this thing and I sneak off with it to examine the world close-up, too. I uploaded a few sample pics here on this product page and a few videos on Youtube (search for the product name). Picture and video quality are excellent. I think the three LED lights are plenty bright most of the time, though may be a little lacking for 400x magnification.

I recommend this as a great educational toy, especially if you're looking to give a child something that doesn't have them sitting at a video game console or computer for long periods of time. Though the ability to share what they've discovered with online friends will definitely add interest for the modern child. Ironically this might be just the thing to get them outside, learning about the world beyond the ubiquitous electronics of the day.

I'm a naturalist at at Nature Center, and couldn't believe the price of this thing for what it does. Unfortunately, it's very frustrating for what it doesn't do and should. The magnification is way too high for a handheld device, and THE ONLY WAY TO USE THIS IS AS A STATIONARY MICROSCOPE. You may be able to get a clear picture by sheer luck if you hold it by hand. It has a fixed focal length, so you have to hold the camera at that length to get a clear picture. This would be great if the magnification was way lower, maybe about a 1/3 or 1/4 of what it is (I don't know where they get their numbers of 100x,200x,400x). Then you could look at bugs and things. As it is, you can't look at anything much larger or 3 dimensional than an aphid at the lowest magnification (looks good if you hook it up to the tv). Even the scales on butterfly wings, relatively flat, were partially out of focus. The highest magnification is useless. I don't know what the manufacturers were thinking when they made this. It's like they had never used a microscope before, or indeed, even their own device. I can't imagine how frustrated and quickly bored a kid would get with this device.

At an incredible price and interesting concept, I really was excited about this gadget. However my six year old son and I were both disappointed.

This is a digital microscope and nothing else. You have to hold the bionicam right on top of the object. The 100x was the only view that worked well enough for us to actually use and that was only on top of SOME things with us holding the camera a certain way. The 200x and 400x were basically useless for me.

We could see our jeans, hair, and skin pretty well. That was about it for us.

My batteries did not last that long in this, so you may want to consider rechargeable batteries.

I would only consider purchasing this for an older child who really loves microscopes.