Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

First of all I must confess that I didn't buy this on Amazon since it's five bucks more here than on the company website, but I wanted to offer a review because it seems to be getting an undeserved bad rap here. I bought it for my wife, who has several magnifying mirrors and she is delighted with it. It is a fully articulating mirror with a regular face on one side and a 10x magnification face on the other. The circular light around the mirror illuminates both sides wonderfully. To address some of the issues raised by other reviewers: how close you can get to the mirror depends on (a) where you put the mirror and (b) where you put yourself. If you want to stand up and use it, then put it on a chest of drawers or something. If you want to sit down and use it, then put it on a vanity table. How is it that you blame the mirror because it isn't in the right place? Move it! My wife has a vanity table and bench and it works perfectly for us. You could even wall mount it by drilling one or more small holes in back and screwing it to the wall. It does not come with batteries, true. Did it claim to? How many things come with batteries? It takes four AAs and the light output is excellent. Tell me how many 10x lighted magnifying mirrors you find in this price range. My wife has a non-lighted 10x magnifier which is practically useless because when you get close enough to actually use ANY magnifying mirror you wind up blocking out most light. With this mirror the light is directly on your face so you can see everything up close and very clearly. It's great that it folds up compactly and comes with a carry bag for traveling as well. And despite one claim, you can tilt the magnifying side to any angle you want if you take a second or two to figure out how the articulation works. Quite frankly I am amazed at how nice this thing is considering that most lighted articulating mirrors of this magnification are going to cost you two or three times the price of this one...or more. I very seldom buy anything based on an advertisement I saw on TV, but we've been looking for a good magnifying mirror for quite a while and have been disappointed by several. At this price I figured it would be worth a shot. It was. This is exactly what we've been looking for - and the price is outstanding. BTW, the website experience was fine. There are no extra charges for shipping, handling, etc. True, you have to wade through about a dozen attempts to upsell you before you actually checkout, but you can just ignore them. One upsell is for the same mirror in a larger size. This might interest some people, but the advertised mirror is the same size as the larger magnifying mirrors we have and quite a bit larger than some, so it is fine for us. Update as of January 2018: Several months later and my initial 5 star rating stands firm - this is a great bargain for a 10X lighted mirror. I'm updating primarily to address some comments I've received on my initial review. One person's comment was very helpful and I wanted to point out what he/she said: one of the pictures in the ad (the one showing the woman looking into the mirror) shows a different mirror than the one being sold - you can tell because the mirror in that picture has an additional joint in the center of the shaft. I expect that this is an oversight and the seller really ought to correct this. They do sell another 10X lighted mirror that is larger than the one being sold here and this picture is probably of that mirror. But it's about twice the price of the one being sold here. Another accuses me of being a shill for the company. I do not shill for anyone - I try to help the Amazon community by writing honest, comprehensive reviews of products I have actually purchased and used. There are a number of reviews that downgrade this mirror because of "distortion" in the magnifying side - one saying it was terrible because you have to get so close to the magnifying side to use it. News flash - this is the nature of a 10X magnifying mirror! In order to see the image clearly in a 10X mirror you have to be very close to it! This is also why a 10X mirror really needs to be lighted to be useful - if you're close enough to see the image correctly you're blocking out most of the ambient light and need a close up light source to see the image clearly. It has also been downgraded by some people because they like a different 10X mirror better. The problem there is that the mirrors to which they compare it sell for three times the price of this one - or more. A significant part of many of the reviews I've done is the cost/benefit factor - I'm far from wealthy and I suspect that many of the people who read these reviews aren't either. Yes, I'm sure you can find other mirrors out there that are higher quality than this one - but FOR THE PRICE I don't think you're going to find one better than this at performing its primary function. Finally, an astonishing number of reviews state that you can't properly adjust the position of the mirror. Yes, you can - it just takes a minute to figure out how to do it. It has a joint at both the top and the bottom of the shaft and it swivels as well. The laws of simple mechanics dictate that, with this combination of adjustments, you should be able to achieve pretty much any angle you want. Figure it out. Sorry, but I heavily rely on product reviews myself when I want to make a purchase and it really bothers me when so many people write terrible reviews of a product for reasons that are either inaccurate or have nothing to do with the actual quality of the product. I've seen one star reviews because a product was delivered in a box that was dented or the delivery person was rude. I even saw a one star review of a kite because the buyer thought they were buying a plush toy. Seriously. If you're going to write a review, please try to make it truly helpful to other people.