I have a pair of 4.5x surgical style binocular scopes that I
purchased from Designs For Vision. They were pretty expensive, around
$1250. I already had a usable microscope (not a Meiji), but wanted
something to increase my vision at stations where I had no
magnification. I’ll use the binoculars when I’m bead setting, to a
point. I’ll do layout, drill holes, roughing out seats and initial
azuring, but not for detailed azuring, final seating, bead raising or
bright cutting of stones. For those operations I still use my
microscope. The binoculars are great for soldering, polishing,
fabricating, etc. To be sure, these scopes will beat the crap out of
an optivisor. A really high end pair, like those from DFV, won’t take
any time for your eyes to adjust to, but the weight is another
matter. I don’t like wearing them all day, but will wear them a lot.
Karl Linger, a fellow Orchid member has the 6x wide field binoculars,
but they are even heavier than the 4.5’s. What I gleaned from Karl
was that the added magnification and wide field didn’t make up for
the added weight. Hope this helps.
Larry