So after having found it on youtube and seeing what looked like a Blue lens... I had to get it. My old Jackson lens was on its way to death and I'm finding the puke green color of the speed glass more and more annoying to the eyes... Yet the constant flipping of the heavy glass silvered lens was starting to kill my neck. Soooo I ended up getting the new balder lens. A little pricey, but the boss has a real nice policy about buying tools where we can have it taken out of the paycheck week by week.
It is The best filter I've ever owned. Ever. I have never gotten to see an original AO cool blue lens but a few of the old timers at work said that it is the closest match they have seen yet. Now they all want one...
Also as advertised the optical clarity is noticeably better than other ADF's, just like running a fixed glass lens... But the more important fact is that it turns Blue.
The shade adjust says 9 to 13 but I think its more like 8 to 14 but because the dial sweeps instead of clicks, you can land in between 2 settings. Right now mine is set at about 11.5 because GTAW is really bright when its blue! ( ~180 amps) The puddle on various steels has a very dull orange hue to the otherwise grey surroundings while the arc and leading edge of the puddle are almost a shade of grey. 
GTAW on aluminum looks really strange now, the puddle is a bright silver/blue and the surroundings have a light blue/grey haze. Really hard to describe... bear with me...
GMAW on steel again needed to be turned up due to brightness, again about 11.5 vs the shade 9 to 10 I was running before.
SMAW is where the lens stood out the most. All of the smoke that clouds up the view of the puddle through any other lens is gone. It vanishes. Also missing is the bright yellow sodium flare that I notice through every other lens I've owned. It is replaced with a very pleasing blue/green/grey glow around the very visable puddle. I almost wish we used more SMAW at work... Almost.
Haven't gotten to try it with FCAW yet... Can't wait.
To summarize,
The new jackson balder lens is an electronic AO cool blue lens, and if you are going to buy a new ADF that is the one to get.
Oh and the headgear is really comfy and the over all weight is pretty light on the neck. Much lighter than my old setups.
And no I have nothing to do with Jackson or Balder or whoever owns what, just a welder that found an amazing new toy and wanted to share

So this isn't just a standard 2"x4 1/4" lens?

I have had the new Jackson Balder hood about three weeks or so now. It does seem to have good optics.  However when I first tried it I did not have an OMG moment thinking I can see like Superman.
I could see the weld just like always. Clearer? Maybe.  I have not taken the time to weld with my old Miller Digital Elite then the Jackson to compare.

With welding hoods I guess I'm a glass half empty kind of guy. If it works I'm not aware of it, just welding along. But if it bothers me then I am aware of it.

The Balder does not have settings for Grind or Torch. If it is on the least sensitive setting and you keep your distance from the sparks it doesn't trigger much. You get a little more triggering with a cutting torch. But with the filter setting on the lowest number and the hood triggers, you can see well enough to follow a fine soapstone line in decent light.
I like to torch cut with a hood. My face doesn't get as sunburned as with just goggles. I don't even know where my old goggles are. And it is nice to just drop the hood to grind and not stop for a shield.

The Balder is automatic on. No On-Off switch. Good news is you never forget to turn it on. Bad news is that if you could turn it off you could grind and flame cut with out it turning dark.

Now the headband. I agree it is comfortable. It has a hinged piece in the back that nicely adjust to the back of your head. And the headband adjustment knob is easily turned with gloves and stays where you put it. The headgear has a fore aft adjustment so you can position the lens closer or further away from you head or nose.

Like to weld without a cap. Forget it. It will PULL you hair OUT. I normally wear a welding cap but I put the Jackson Balder on when I first got it and it jerked out some of the VERY few hairs out that I have left.

But the real issue I have with the head gear is that it has a little notch that it clicks in when all the way up or down. The old Huntsman hoods had something similar. Problem is if you don't shove it all the way up into the notch it will drift down. Tighten it up where it won't drift and push it in  the notch and it takes a real shake of the head to dislodge it. And the tightening knobs seem to need adjusting often. The knobs don't feel like they will last forever either. I had a Jackson Next Gen a decade of more ago and I was constantly retightening the friction knobs on it.
Maybe I will learn to hit that notch more often. I'm pretty slow though.

Both the old and new Jackson hood (others too) have a stop that keeps them from rotating back far enough for me. If you are going to be doing something other than welding, without that stop, you could raise the hood up high enough so that when you leaned over it would not drop down when you did not need it. But this and other hoods stop at an angle that when you lean over the whole weight is ninety degrees to gravity and has full leverage to drop it down. If you could raise them up higher I think they would be less likely to unexpectedly drop. Tighten the knobs where it will stay up and it is hard to get it to drop.
My first hood, a Jackson, would rotate all the way back. That was WAY back in the 19ought70s.
So the one part made in the USA I like the least.
This is not the biggest problem I have in life. But many, many times in the past I've had my hood come down when I did not want it and I feel like I've  worn the knobs smooth adjusting them.
It just seems to me that a better functioning hood and headband could be made.

If you want to use a cheater (magnifier) you will need to order (extra) the Magnifier holder. No real instructions with the cheater holder. You would not think you would need instructions but I guess I did. Without thinking I threw away two little tape like strips that were in the package. Now I'm thinking they were suppose to apply to the inside of the cheater holder to keep the cheater from sliding all the way down in it's generous adjustment slot.
I could be all wrong about the tape but my cheater always slides down to the bottom. If I did a lot of overhead I might like it to stay up to the top of the holder.

Weights: All with a plastic cheater and some type of sweat band on head gear and some dust and smoke residue.

Jackson Balder        616 grams
Miller Digital Elite    615 grams
Speedglas              550 grams
      One thing that make the Speedglas so light is its FLIMSY  head gear. When welding pipe and on the side and bottom of pipe, the FLIMSY  head gear let the hood SAG way over so you had to twist           
      your head around like an owl to get the weld back in view. I reinforced the headgear then lens quit working for some reason. I bought the Speedglas about 8 years ago I think. Maybe it has changed.

I am pretty sure this lens will not drop in other manufactures helmets. It would be nice if they did but each one has its own special shape and cover lens.

Jackson Balder. Good hood but not great for all situations I think.

Floyd

Saw a video of it on Amazon and like the blue color while welding, looked pretty clear. Might have to look into that one but don't like that it does not have a grind/torch function. Good write up Paladin!