- Joined
- Jan 13, 2011
- Messages
- 143
- Points
- 28
I'm a computer geek and software engineering nerd from Utah. My username online has always been andrewProgrammer (since at least 2007), but you can call me Andrew for short. I came up with that name when I was young and first getting serious into writing software, mostly Flash games at the time.
I've been drooling over lasers since 2003, so I guess that means they've been my thing for 20 years... wow. I had a cheap 1mW red pointer for a while that I bought for $5 with my allowance. And then when the Wicked Lasers Sonar came out I drooled over that, fantasizing about buying one, but of course never had that kind of money. I lurked the forum since 2009-ish but only to drool over what other people had.
2010 rolls around and the Wicked Lasers Arctic shows up... $199 for 1W of BLUE - unbelievable. I needed one, I had to have one, I even had some money to buy it from mowing lawns. But the internet does its thing and orders are instantly two years out. So I instead bought a 400mW 808nm that year as my consolation prize. I finally join the forum in 2011 and learn just how dumb an 808nm laser is; I'm lucky to still have both eyes especially at that kind of power. Then I got a real job that year writing business software full time and I bought a 250mW 650nm, a 100mW 532nm, and even an Arctic copycat 1W 445nm.
Then came the golden years (in my opinion) of the forum between 2012 and 2016 where there were amazing group buys all the time. Shout out to @offroadfreak8582 and also Kevin of SkyLaser for making some of the best quality lasers ever available to us at unheard of prices. My collection grew substantially during this time. My profile picture comes from this time on a fun foggy night with friends. I even acquired my grail during this time - a Laserglow Rigel.
Since joining the forum I've learned tons from all the people on here. Little bits over the years and gaining more knowledge and more of a desire to build my own laser which I finally did in 2018 when the 488nm diodes became a thing. Then I built another with a 520nm diode. Then another with the most powerful single-mode diode - the hidden gem that is the 405nm BDR-209. Later that same year the OptLaser 575nm modules arrive on the scene and I ordered a few, excited to dive even deeper into building my own lasers (since there'd be little documentation/knowledge about these, I'd have to learn a lot). But then they didn't actually arrive...
The gloom era sets in... I always check in at least once a year to see how things are going. But nothing new happened for while and my passion started to dim with the OptLaser disappointment. We lost many members to disinterest... to drama... many years like this went by...
Then BOOM! Nobody saw it coming... In 2023, 593.5nm became accessible through some new process and the forums feel more energetic and I'm getting excited all over again for lasers. 555nm is now accessible, too. Insanely powerful bright blues are available in the 460-470nm range as well. The hobby is alive again! I even took the time to sit down and really learn how a semiconductor laser diode turns electricity into beautiful coherent photons, something I had often wondered about but couldn't seem wrap my head around. Then to put the icing on an already wonderful year, @tinkertavernco pulls off something nobody thought would ever happen... the triumphant return of the 575nm! Erasing all of the pain of the gloom era and giving me tons of hope for 2024.
Happy New Year, LPF!
- Andrew
I've been drooling over lasers since 2003, so I guess that means they've been my thing for 20 years... wow. I had a cheap 1mW red pointer for a while that I bought for $5 with my allowance. And then when the Wicked Lasers Sonar came out I drooled over that, fantasizing about buying one, but of course never had that kind of money. I lurked the forum since 2009-ish but only to drool over what other people had.
2010 rolls around and the Wicked Lasers Arctic shows up... $199 for 1W of BLUE - unbelievable. I needed one, I had to have one, I even had some money to buy it from mowing lawns. But the internet does its thing and orders are instantly two years out. So I instead bought a 400mW 808nm that year as my consolation prize. I finally join the forum in 2011 and learn just how dumb an 808nm laser is; I'm lucky to still have both eyes especially at that kind of power. Then I got a real job that year writing business software full time and I bought a 250mW 650nm, a 100mW 532nm, and even an Arctic copycat 1W 445nm.
Then came the golden years (in my opinion) of the forum between 2012 and 2016 where there were amazing group buys all the time. Shout out to @offroadfreak8582 and also Kevin of SkyLaser for making some of the best quality lasers ever available to us at unheard of prices. My collection grew substantially during this time. My profile picture comes from this time on a fun foggy night with friends. I even acquired my grail during this time - a Laserglow Rigel.
Since joining the forum I've learned tons from all the people on here. Little bits over the years and gaining more knowledge and more of a desire to build my own laser which I finally did in 2018 when the 488nm diodes became a thing. Then I built another with a 520nm diode. Then another with the most powerful single-mode diode - the hidden gem that is the 405nm BDR-209. Later that same year the OptLaser 575nm modules arrive on the scene and I ordered a few, excited to dive even deeper into building my own lasers (since there'd be little documentation/knowledge about these, I'd have to learn a lot). But then they didn't actually arrive...
The gloom era sets in... I always check in at least once a year to see how things are going. But nothing new happened for while and my passion started to dim with the OptLaser disappointment. We lost many members to disinterest... to drama... many years like this went by...
Then BOOM! Nobody saw it coming... In 2023, 593.5nm became accessible through some new process and the forums feel more energetic and I'm getting excited all over again for lasers. 555nm is now accessible, too. Insanely powerful bright blues are available in the 460-470nm range as well. The hobby is alive again! I even took the time to sit down and really learn how a semiconductor laser diode turns electricity into beautiful coherent photons, something I had often wondered about but couldn't seem wrap my head around. Then to put the icing on an already wonderful year, @tinkertavernco pulls off something nobody thought would ever happen... the triumphant return of the 575nm! Erasing all of the pain of the gloom era and giving me tons of hope for 2024.
Happy New Year, LPF!
- Andrew
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