The Scope USB microscope
By Donald Melanson 
posted Feb 7th 2005 9:54AM
posted Feb 7th 2005 9:54AM
There are plenty of uses for a USB microscope, but one of the main selling points of The Scope seems to be for inspecting men's hair loss. But hey, if there's a market, who are we to argue? The device is Windows and Macintosh compatible and has a 1/4-inch color CCD (effective 310,000 pixels) and 50x magnification. No word on price yet or availability outside of Japan.
This USB microscope has been out for years in the US as the ProScope. The Proscope has detachable lenses and a stand. There are drivers and software for both Mac and Windows.
See http://www.theproscope.com/
I swore I saw this the other night on CSI. (The original one.)
I had to laugh though, they had the imagines being feed into a clear mock up of a Mac OS X screen, pasted onto a Dell monitor. I'm surprised that one of the two didn't just explode on screen.
I have had one for years and it is great - works great on my Thinkpad and PowerBook.
If I remember correctly it cost me $179
It is very easy to use.
You can buy it here in the states from retailers like CyberGuys. Lenses are available for magnifications up to 200X. Just search for "microscope" on www.cyberguys.com
As director of marketing and development for the ProScope we have been in the US for nearly 5 years. We have global sales to over 96k schools and 4,000 law enforcement agencies. Wired TEST gave us a 5 star rating and yes you did see us on CSI. In fact the ProScope is on all three CSI series here in the US and is a regular on talk shows.