Hello All,

Sorry to bother everyone with these questions but what is a better resource 
than confocal users and specialists! I tried searching for similar topics but 
didn't get much useful information. 

We will be adding confocal microscope to our facility here at my company. I've 
three quotes from Olympus, Leica and Carl Zeiss. The models are Olympus 
FV1000/IX81, Leica TCS SP5 and Carl Zeiss LSM710.  Olympus and Leica are 
almost similar in costs whereas Carl Zaeiss is relatively costly for similar 
instrumentation. 

My experiment will range from cellular uptake studies of nanoparticles to some 
FRET experiments. The nanoparticles will be multi colored and hence spectral 
unmixing will be important. There will be not many users, perhaps 3/4 at max. 

My questions are how good are these systems when compared to each other, 
which one you will recommend consideing the ease of use, reliability and 
service, any specific advantage of one over another. 

I really hope you will take some time out and reply to these questions. Thank 
you in advance.

Best,
Amol