The AmScope T490B-DK compound trinocular microscope has a sliding head, interchangeable pairs of 10x widefield and 20x widefield eyepieces, a forward-facing nosepiece with four DIN achromatic objectives, Brightfield and Darkfield halogen illumination, and a double-layer mechanical stage with a stage stop to protect slides and objectives from damage The trinocular viewing head has a vertical camera mount and a compensation-free binocular viewing head with interchangeable pairs of WF10x and WF20x eyepieces and sliding head to adjust inter-pupillary distance, a fixed 30-degree vertical inclination to reduce eye and neck strain, and a 360-degree rotation capability to provide a more comprehensive view and enable sharing. A Siedentopf binocular head enables the viewer to change the interpupillary distance without changing the tube length, eliminating the need to re-focus the image. It has an interpupillary range of 55 to 75mm to accommodate individual eye differences, and bi-lateral dioptric adjustment accommodates individual eye-strength differences. The vertical trinocular port accepts a camera with a 23mm or C-Mount adapter (camera sold separately). The forward-facing nosepiece has 4x, 10x, 40xS (spring), and 100xS (spring, oil) DIN achromatic optical-glass objectives that combine with the eyepieces to provide color correction of magnified images. The 40xS objective is spring loaded to prevent slide damage when focusing. The 100xS spring-loaded oil-immersion objective uses oil between the specimen and the objective lens to provide increased resolution over a standard objective. A compound microscope is used for inspection and dissection of specimens when two-dimensional images are desired.

The microscope has lower (transmitted, diascopic) Brightfield/Darkfield (BF/DF) illumination that transmits light up through the specimen for enhanced visibility of translucent and transparent objects. Brightfield (BF) illumination allows the specimen to