Finally got around to getting my eyes tested (after about 15 year gap) and it seems that I need both reading (I knew that) and distance versions.[1]
Is there a 'best' type for general use and DIY. There have been mentions of difficulty when looking upwards, which I can understand.
I'll still keep the 'ready readers' scattered around, just for odd things like reading labels. 'Proper' glasses are too expensive to have 20-odd pairs!
I have the prescription and have looked at some sites but there are still some parts that I can't sort out. Also, the interpupillary distance wasn't given, so the dividers might have to be used! I don't seem to have glaucoma or AMD (if the latter had been present, I would use Intel for the next build).
[1] Not too worried about distance as I know that it's not bad (drably dressed pedestrian against a brownish hedge at 0.3 of a mile or stones on the road a few yards ahead are easily spotted)
When I started "needing" glasses I bought cheap reading glasses from various places and survived with them for years.
The frustrating problem was that when driving (without glasses) I could not resolve the odometer, or read the satnav. Now have been in varifocal territory for several years and am on my 3rd iteration.
I have concluded that with varifocals you get what you pay for.....it's worth it. Go to the High Street, brace yourself and do a deal. Furthermore take your SO to assist with choice...you'll never live it down if you spend £200 on glasses that she doesn't approve of.
Back to DIY, I have about 0.5 cubic feet of legacy reading glasses I use for that. No point in scratching or getting paint or grease on expensive glasses when it's avoidable. D
I've always needed glasses to correct short sightedness. However the last time I got a test the salesman, sorry: optician, suggested varifocals as I'm losing the ability to refocus on nearby objects. I duly did what I was told, but I'm finding varifocals to be a right PITA for computer use. Even though I told them I was a computer user, the varifocals seem to be set up to give "reading distance" correction at an agle of about 30° down (with your eyes "pointed" horizontally). This means that to see the screen properly, I have to tilt my head upwards. More of a pain in the neck than a PITA - but you get my meaning.
There's no need to pay huge amounts for new specs. There's a guy who used to post in here quite a bit but not so much now, name of Rick (posted as "R D S"). He's in Darwen, Lancashire
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if you happen to be anywhere near there, if not, you need to find your own "Rick" in your area. He's a manufacturing and dispensing optician who has all the machinery to shape, grind and polish lenses but he doesn't do eye tests - you get your eyes tested elsewhere and then take the script to him.
I got four existing pairs of frames reglazed with new lenses and bought a complete new pair of frames and lenses, all for 75 quid.
Monitors have height adjustments to cater for that sort of thing. You don't hold a book or paper up in front of your face to read it so why do that with a computer screen?
Yeah. I need "upside down" varifocal for computer use. I discussed this with the optician (becuase I can't be the only person) and he said that such a thing wasn't available :-(
(The point about adjusting screens notwithstanding...) I concur.
I got my first glasses aged 8. In my late 40s, I had to go to varifocal. Varifocals are very good for getting around generally (see below), but very soon after getting the varifocals I got reading glasses _as well_ for my work, which was based on using computers (working with type and fonts)) all day long.
The reading glasses work well (still) for the computer, but for the last several years, I take my glasses OFF to read stuff - books, labels, instructions: my reading glasses are too strong for me to read stuff close up. I also take them off (on-topic!) to do most DIY close-up tasks: my eyes relax _beautifully_ when I take the glasses off -- its'a real relief, for close-up work.
A couple of years ago I got some straightforward single-lens[?] glasses based on my distance vision: I decided that I take my glasses off so frequently for close stuff, that I'd be able to get on fine with this (much cheaper) option. Wrong: I was virtually blind for distances of a couple of feet and more, up to about 6 feet. I couldn't read the signs on the shelves in the shops. I couldn't even see me tea to eat it!! Putting varifocal into those single-lens frames would have cost
*another* 150 pounds.
OTOH, my reading glasses are so close to my distance vision, that I frequently set off out wearing "the wrong glasses". I'd have no trouble driving the car, though I wouldn't be able to read roadsigns at long distance (I *can* do the classic numberplate-at-25-metres in my reading glasses).
So as for prescriptions, as for opticians, as for the whole industry ... it seems to me to be a carte blanche for certain opticians (particularly the high-street big boys) to make a lot of profit out of what is a medical disability, and one which moreover is nowhere near as complicated as they make it seem. You cannot get a pair of varifocal glasses these days for less than two - more likely three - hundred pounds. Where, *exactly*, do the costs come from for these prices?
John (wearing not his newest pair, nor even the previous pair, but an old, scratched pair, which actually work better than any pair bought since. :-(
I solved the problem in the past by getting prescription single vision specs just for computer use. I am fortunate now that my presbyopia and myopia have merged to give me excellent vision at that range and just take my glasses off the use the computer.
Um, some do. Many don't. The problem is that more often that not your monitor height is such that you're looking through the top of your varifocals (the distance viewing section) and it's not possible to lower the monitor to make viewing through the reading section possible.
Sometimes it's simpler to just have a special pair of single vision "computer" specs optimised for focusing at one's typical monitor viewing range.
I tried varifocals some years ago, but could never get used to them. With around 11 dioptres correction, I just get distance lenses, which I can adjust from distance to reading simply by sliding them up and down my nose a bit. I do have a pair optimised for computer use, but I'm not even sure where they are.
One of my computer desks has the monitor set so that the bottom of the screen is at desk height, with the screen angled back so that you are looking at it at right angles while looking down. It is much better than the conventional screen position when you want to keep looking between documents on the desk and the screen.
Wife has ended up with 3 pairs of opticians glasses. The first pair is for everyday use and are varifocals. Second pair she bought was for reading he books and the third pair are just for using her computer.
Me? I am lucky, my eyesight for driving is becoming marginal, but I can read, without correction the deciding line on the chart very easily.
Like my wife, I have a pair of Tesco finest for reading the newspapers and other that I am using right now for the computer. My left eye still has the dynamic range to see the and read the screen.
Oy Dave - what spex do you use for work? Just using the usual varifocals, I find it almost impossible sometimes to do some bit of DIY, because the item in question is above my head and the varifocal closeup bit is at the *bottom* of the glasses. So I'd have to be upside down to work on it, rather difficult e.g. under the stairs.
I had varifocals twice. I'm sure it aided the dysfunction of my focussing muscles -- necessitating stronger ones.
I now use bifocals for everyday use, with intermediate ones for in the house/computer, and reading ones for any sustained close work.
for really close work I just remove my specs, carefully noting where I put them down so that I can find them before sitting/standng on them. The last time a sat on them I was surprised the opticians could straighten them, but they did FOC.
Not that bad; I can easily read the display on the bike's computer even in overcast weather.
Yes, that's my intention. My eyes do differ somewhat but most jobs seem to be OK in +1.25 or +2 for vernier scales. I've not yet scratched a lens - but with expensive ones...
I already look through the lower half of the specs. The monitor is on a wooden platform of which I'm very proud: it has about 1kg on it and could easily take 200kg (I might have 'over-engineered' it a tad).
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