how long do you wait for something that may never happen.
im pretty sure a high powered red diode with a good beam spec does not exist, so are you going to wait for it to be invented?
Eat Sleep Lase Repeat
yes... I'm never spending $3k on a laser again... bought that blue and got burned, bought that kvant 1.2W 642 and then got burned again (638's came out a little while after and had more mW/$)
the 638's arent the biggest break through in the world so i wouldnt say you got burnt.
the 445 diode have been around for years, no red diode exists
Eat Sleep Lase Repeat
lower wavelength so more lm/mW, and you get more mW/$... ya I would say they are better...
anyway you just wait till someone uses one of these in some CE gear... so the stripe is 2x 445... if you can get them some day for $40 like the 445's just use something to block half the beam, thats still 250mW 638 for $40, see?
or get fancy, use a mirror to pick off half the beam, then recombine it with a waveplate and a PBS
it exists, we just need to wait for the price to be at a point it makes sense to find a solution
i know its better, but i think saying you got burnt is a little extreme
Eat Sleep Lase Repeat
ya well, if you saw the output from the kvant you might agree... still trying to get that resolved... beam is bigger than my 1W 650nm flashlights