tenex
reality-based
The Victory Pocket 8x25 seems like a great compact travel binocular, bright, solid, smooth focusing -- although nearly 2 turns of travel, and eye relief so high I can barely use it. (An increasingly common problem today.)
But I've received two defective units in a row. The first had obvious, multiple blemishes in the coating of one ocular. The second had something on it also, but it cleaned off... and then I found a thin strip/loop of metal (about 1/4", 6mm) protruding into one barrel from machining the baffling. That will be fun when it falls off and gets onto a lens. How can Zeiss possibly have such terrible quality control? This is a premium ($750) bino made in Japan, not the third world.
Incidentally, focusing on a map on the wall, I saw something odd in the optics also. The resolution wasn't as good near the bottom of the field as near the top -- and the same remained true with the bino upside down! What misalignment would cause that? Don't know whether the first unit had the same problem, didn't check... but I'm not really inclined to try a third. Caveat emptor!
But I've received two defective units in a row. The first had obvious, multiple blemishes in the coating of one ocular. The second had something on it also, but it cleaned off... and then I found a thin strip/loop of metal (about 1/4", 6mm) protruding into one barrel from machining the baffling. That will be fun when it falls off and gets onto a lens. How can Zeiss possibly have such terrible quality control? This is a premium ($750) bino made in Japan, not the third world.
Incidentally, focusing on a map on the wall, I saw something odd in the optics also. The resolution wasn't as good near the bottom of the field as near the top -- and the same remained true with the bino upside down! What misalignment would cause that? Don't know whether the first unit had the same problem, didn't check... but I'm not really inclined to try a third. Caveat emptor!