Not sure the brand, but you can find lots of these USB microscopes in the usual places. They have a light that shines down onto your subject rather than shining light up through a glass slide.

Funny, "USB microscope" actually finds it. Thank you.

The term for these types of microscopes, at least in the industries I've worked in, is an inspection microscope. They're normally lower power than a typical binocular scope like you would see in a biology lab, but work on opaque materials. Inspection scope probably isn't the technical name, but even the vendors have them listed as such.

The cheap USB ones work pretty well for home use, just get one that either has a monitor or can hook up to a monitor, the eyepieces tend to suck. For top of the line professional ones, Mantis makes the best ones I've ever used. I think they are in the 2k+USD range though, I definitely don't have one at home.

That's МБИ-3

See https://www.microscopemuseum.eu/catalogues/LOMO_1970s_Micros...

I was asking about the microscope in the article, not in my link. I linked only to show that the one in the article is unlike what Im used to.

But thanks for the link, such a cool find :-)

well, glad you liked it

fwiw one can make a microscope out of a webcam and a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enlarger with some duct tape and thermal glue. It won't do 3500x, but will be comparable to those small USB ones.

Edit: I actually have one where focus is contolled by the camera being mounted on a 3.5" floppy drive chassis in place of the drive head. that was some fun project to do. But don't use polish enlarger lenses, soviet are the best.