FLIR TG297 Thermal Imaging Camera with Bullseye Laser: Industrial Infrared Camera for High-Temp Applications

I own an off-brand thermal imager some years ago when the prices dropped. Was I happy with it? It was OK. I use it for work so I was happy to have something somewhat useful to do some analysis. I've since misplaced during a move and suddenly needed it, so I started looking for a new one. I always wanted a Flir bit they were always out of my price range. But it was time to get a "good one". Common advice on off-brand customer reviews is "spend a little more and get a Flir". So I did. This is my review. I'll start with the negatives, which outweigh the positives, unfortunately. The unit was a week late, which started my anxiety over it. A thermal analysis was promised to my customer and the product was shipped without the report. I don't know if that was on Amazon or Flir. I have no idea. Once I got it, it was like Christmas and time to check it out. It took all of 5 minutes to get familiar with it. Little did I know, I had already gone through all the features of it in those 5 minutes. So this thermal imager is not very feature-rich. Other reviewers have said it is "laggy". Yes and no. At 25Hz, it seems pretty smooth, all things considered. However, it does lag at times, inconsistently. Sometimes the image overlay sticks, and sometimes the thermal image sticks. It sticks for about 5 seconds before it caught up. Even my old Chinese off-brand imager didn't do that. Given the thermal and visible cameras are two physical sensors, there isn't any way to perfectly align them. This is pretty common I suppose. However, for the amount this imager costs, compared to other brands or off-brands, it's off by quite a bit. Memory card slot, of lack there-of. This imager has Bluetooth capabilities, which I was not able to use. It wouldn't connect to my Motorola phone failed to connect to it. My Ubuntu desktop detected it, but wouldn't do anything with it. So I plugged it into the USB on my Windows PC. Windows detected it. The drivers (you have to download them online) half-installed. The driver failed to install but the Flir still managed to connect as a removeable drive. It would probably less hassle to just use a microSD card, but there isn't any option for it. Once you pull off the images, they are anything but flattering. Infrared camera resolution isn't anywhere near as good as photo camera resolution, and blowing up a low resolution image, even with filtering would result in a blob of a photo, so there's that.. What's on the images, just a low resolution image, a center crosshair and a single temperature number at the top. A lot, if not all other imagers on the market have other information, such as minimum, maximum, center temperatures, color scale to the size and other pieces of data. I get that the more data on the screen, the more it obstructs the images. Well, the images from the Flir leave me thinking, "this is what I get for an imager that costs practically $1000?" It also makes a low, ticking/chirping sound every now and then. It's one of those noises that get you hunting for where the noise comes from, for about half an hour. I don't believe my old imager did that. So, I'm not sure if that's normal or not. There are a few other negatives I can mention, but I'm sure that is enough for anyone to read. So, for the positives, which aren't many. This imager has a very nice feel to it. It feels a little rubbery, so it won't slip form your hands. My old imager was "plasticy", which is a huge upgrade. It comes with a soft case to protect the imager, but realistically, it wouldn't live there so much. And that's about all the good things I can say about this product. So, for about $800 plus tax, depending on where you are, and I don't believe I paid more than about $300-350 for my off-brand unit about 7 years ago, this product doesn't seem to be twice the performance or twice the value. If I purchased the same off-brand imager at it's current market value, I would say this Flir product isn't worth more than $400-450. So based on value, I could not recommend this imager. In fact, I will be returning this unit and looking for another product. There are a couple off-brand units here on Amazon that I am looking at, with the same specs, with the on-screen data I am looking for, a microSD slot for about 2/3 the price of this Flit imager.

Cet appareil ressemble plus un pyromètre que une caméra thermique si vous avez besoin de faire des analyses sur vos photos en lien avec les températures ceci n'est pas le bon appareil. L'appareil semble d'être de bonne qualité mais pour le prix je préfère acheter un pyromètre qui peut coûter environ 10 fois moins cher et avoir le même résultat

Couldn't sync to phone app.

Stopped working after 1 month of use

Doesn't work and need to return. I'm online looking for the provider to return it to.