My thoughts on the Zeiss 10X42SF (1 Viewer)

Bwana1 said:

Jerry,
Appreciate the help,,,thought I was out-of-bounds hijacking, didn't want to tick anyone off.

I have a great opportunity at a pair of 10x42 SF's now, but have been bouncing around on the HT.

I originally had narrowed it down to 3 models, the RB that I'm concerned with was a SV 10x42...which is why I just bought a new pair of SB 8X42's(mint 2009, to eliminate any RB issue)...and the Leica UV HD+, but the eye relief worries me.

I'm a Zeiss guy in the heart, and own 3 pair that I'm happy with..but now is a good time for me to expand my collection, thus the HT vs SF shuffle.

I have to get out and look thru them, it's the only smart way to go. I've bought ALL of my optics un-seen/un-handled, and it's worked out fine because of excellent advice from BF. But that gamble is going to bite me at some point, as you say the SF may just feel that much better in my hands.

I have a new pair of FL T 8x32's, and enjoy their view and handling a lot...perfect for bowhunting. But the larger 10x42's may lose that balance and ergonomics as size grows.

Bottom line: I've got more glass than brains, and need more...maybe I'm "chasing the dragon" o

Click to expand...

Eric:

I am thinking you may be chasing the Dragon. I have owned several EL's
including the latest 2009 EL 8.5 and now the 8.5 SV. I have not experienced
RB, in any optic, and try to do my best to not even talk about it. It only
affects less than 5% of the population, but on this forum, it is just a
common nitpick issue.
I will ask, why have you placed RB into your consideration ? Have you
experienced any issues ?

As far as the Leica, you will quickly be able to tell if the eye relief
will work for you. It is only a concern if you wear eyeglasses, and you
may not find you have enough eye relief, to gain the full field of view.

Jerry

Eric,

Get the SF over the HT. Don't worry about the rolling ball, it is there but at the very edges and most likely you will get used to it. The brightness difference is negligible and there will be no low-light situations where you don't see something with the SF but could have seen it with the barely perceptibly brighter HT. The SF has a wider field, is nicer to hold, is lighter, and the image is sharper much further away from the center.

For what it is worth, I see more rolling ball in the old Zeiss 10x40 Dialyt than in any of the Swaro SV's or the Zeiss SF.

Kimmo

kabsetz said:

For what it is worth, I see more rolling ball in the old Zeiss 10x40 Dialyt than in any of the Swaro SV's or the Zeiss SF.

Click to expand...

I see more rolling ball in the SF 8x42 than in the SF 10x42. In the 10x42 I also see less than in the old Dialyt. The 8x42 bothers me a bit - for about half an hour, and that's it.

Hermann

By far the worst rolling ball I've seen was in the Leupold McKinley. I'm looking through the poster child for rolling ball right now, the 8.5X42 SV, I see little to none in it. I also saw none in the 10X SF.

Had a couple of interesting days in the U.K. recently comparing my 15 year old Swaro 10x42s with some potential replacements. These days quite often my wife carries the camera and I carry the bins so she hardly ever uses her 8x32 Leica anymore, this usually works out fine - but it does mean that any replacement for the Swaros would have to suit both of us as most of the time we are sharing bins.

I've had a hankering for the Canon 10x42 IS L since I tried them a few months back but my wife didn't get on with them at all - despite admiring the image and extraordinary resolution she declared they seemed to be designed by (or for) aliens! I have also had my doubts that they would be able to match the Swaros for reliability - 15 years of daily use without a hitch is a hard act to follow. Also a few years ago I happened to witness a very unhappy owner being told that the repair of the faulty IS on his 10x42s was more than half the cost of a new pair - that didn't go down well!

A couple of days later I compared my old Swaros with the latest version and also the 10x SF. On a dull overcast day at Lakeside Optics I spent about an hour going back and forth between them trying to justify a "trade up". I concluded that while there was a noticeable difference between old and new Swaros in brightness and the flatness of the field it wasn't enough for me personally to justify the expense (over £1,000) of trading mine in (I was offered nearly what I paid for mine 15 years ago which is quite impressive). Incidentally despite several attempts to induce RB I couldn't detect it.

The 10x SF were a big disappointment to me, the twist-up eye-cups were just really poor, with one side stiffer than the other and a really hit and miss feel to them - I was even told to try twisting them all the way in and holding the bins away from my face! Apparently works for some people! We played around with the eye-cups for a while and one seemed to get kind of stuck half way out, so I had to follow the salesman's advice and screw them both in. Then the nail in the coffin for me was when I noticed play in the focus - this was not something I was looking for - after all I think a tiny bit of play is almost inevitable - but what surprised me was that it was so much more than my 15 year old Swaros! To be honest this ruined the viewing experience for me and although I tried to make a genuine comparison of the optics I just couldn't get past the flaws with the build.

I asked the salesman if these were a well used demo pair and he made things even worse by telling me that they were a new pair as the previous ones had been sent back because the armouring had deformed!

Surely the build quality that I encountered is not typical? but hoping to get another 15 years faultless service from my next bins I couldn't expect that from what I saw of the SF.

Our visit wasn't a complete waste of time though, before we left we tried the Swaro 10x50SV and we are both agreed that they are simply stunning. The extra weight and the rather poor CF are (for us at least) more than offset by that view!

Another 10x50 SV convert? Welcome to the club.

Rather than hijack Jerrys Good, Better, Best... thread any further, I will use this older thread I started last December to comment on the pair of 10X42SF I'm looking at presently. It's been difficult to find much viewing time, but I don't ever recall another optic this free of CA, they are notably better than the 10X42 HT I had here recently and even a little better than the 10X42 FL, also seen very recently. Going by memory, and also comparing to my Minox 10X44 Porro that I've also compared to all of the binoculars I've had here, the SV and HT have a little more contrast, the SV is a little more saturated, but this pair of SF I believe have the best overall optical performance I've seen. I have never been particularly convinced of much of a sample variation possibility in Alpha binoculars, but seeing these two SF makes me wonder, I'm convinced that these are sharper and exhibit considerably less CA than the other pair. IP adjustment on the SF has to be spot on for me or the view really suffers, too wide and I start to see a lack of convergence, to narrow and sharpness goes away, just right and the view is magic. With the FL I could never hit a setting that quite worked, the HT and 10X50 SV were more forgiving in that regard, it probably has more to do with my glasses than anything else. I'm not suggesting you get rid of your SV, HT, etc in favor of these, but they are definitely another top option for sure. As far as the yellow cast I saw with the sun setting behind my back, I haven't had a chance to try and replicate that scenario yet, so I'm nth sure if there will be a difference.

Robert

SuperDuty said:

Rather than hijack Jerrys Good, Better, Best... thread any further, I will use this older thread I started last December to comment on the pair of 10X42SF I'm looking at presently. It's been difficult to find much viewing time, but I don't ever recall another optic this free of CA, they are notably better than the 10X42 HT I had here recently and even a little better than the 10X42 FL, also seen very recently. Going by memory, and also comparing to my Minox 10X44 Porro that I've also compared to all of the binoculars I've had here, the SV and HT have a little more contrast, the SV is a little more saturated, but this pair of SF I believe have the best overall optical performance I've seen. I have never been particularly convinced of much of a sample variation possibility in Alpha binoculars, but seeing these two SF makes me wonder, I'm convinced that these are sharper and exhibit considerably less CA than the other pair. IP adjustment on the SF has to be spot on for me or the view really suffers, too wide and I start to see a lack of convergence, to narrow and sharpness goes away, just right and the view is magic. With the FL I could never hit a setting that quite worked, the HT and 10X50 SV were more forgiving in that regard, it probably has more to do with my glasses than anything else. I'm not suggesting you get rid of your SV, HT, etc in favor of these, but they are definitely another top option for sure. As far as the yellow cast I saw with the sun setting behind my back, I haven't had a chance to try and replicate that scenario yet, so I'm nth sure if there will be a difference.

Robert

Click to expand...

Robert:

Those are certainly good marks for the SF, you have compared them to
many of the best.

And you did not even mention, some of the things I like and well known
about the SF, the nice ergonomics, and balance in hand.
The large diameter focuser knob, which makes the smooth, smart focus do the job very well.
I like a flat field view, and the Zeiss does it right, the SV, 42mm is just a bit too flat, and makes
the view a bit different and not as comfortable.

These are things I like better about the Zeiss SF, compared to the Swaro. SV.

Jerry

I have the zeiss SF in use since summer 2015 after the first troubles likes focusdrive were solved.I use the bin for birding and to be honest this my best bin in my collection, and no issues whatsoever.
To compare with the SV 10x50 from my wife, I admit this is a great instrument , but more bulky for daily continuous use
The zeiss is sharper , lighter , better balanced and smoother focusdrive.

I agree with your assessment.

NDhunter said:

Robert:

Those are certainly good marks for the SF, you have compared them to
many of the best.

And you did not even mention, some of the things I like and well known
about the SF, the nice ergonomics, and balance in hand.
The large diameter focuser knob, which makes the smooth, smart focus do the job very well.
I like a flat field view, and the Zeiss does it right, the SV, 42mm is just a bit too flat, and makes
the view a bit different and not as comfortable.

These are things I like better about the Zeiss SF, compared to the Swaro. SV.

Jerry

Click to expand...

Choosing between the SV, HT, and SF is like choosing between the newest Corvette, a Lamborghini, and a Ferrari, each a somewhat different takes on the state of the art, each one an equally worthy contender. If I had all three here at the same time I might go off the deep end trying to choose, I think I'll call it a day for now with the SF.|:d|

arran said:

I have the zeiss SF in use since summer 2015 after the first troubles likes focusdrive were solved.I use the bin for birding and to be honest this my best bin in my collection, and no issues whatsoever.
To compare with the SV 10x50 from my wife, I admit this is a great instrument , but more bulky for daily continuous use
The zeiss is sharper , lighter , better balanced and smoother focusdrive.

Click to expand...

SuperDuty said:

Rather than hijack Jerrys Good, Better, Best... thread any further, I will use this older thread I started last December to comment on the pair of 10X42SF I'm looking at presently. It's been difficult to find much viewing time, but I don't ever recall another optic this free of CA, they are notably better than the 10X42 HT I had here recently and even a little better than the 10X42 FL, also seen very recently. Going by memory, and also comparing to my Minox 10X44 Porro that I've also compared to all of the binoculars I've had here, the SV and HT have a little more contrast, the SV is a little more saturated, but this pair of SF I believe have the best overall optical performance I've seen. I have never been particularly convinced of much of a sample variation possibility in Alpha binoculars, but seeing these two SF makes me wonder, I'm convinced that these are sharper and exhibit considerably less CA than the other pair. IP adjustment on the SF has to be spot on for me or the view really suffers, too wide and I start to see a lack of convergence, to narrow and sharpness goes away, just right and the view is magic. With the FL I could never hit a setting that quite worked, the HT and 10X50 SV were more forgiving in that regard, it probably has more to do with my glasses than anything else. I'm not suggesting you get rid of your SV, HT, etc in favor of these, but they are definitely another top option for sure. As far as the yellow cast I saw with the sun setting behind my back, I haven't had a chance to try and replicate that scenario yet, so I'm nth sure if there will be a difference.

Robert

Click to expand...

Are these the new black edition sf's?

They're the gray model, it's my understanding that the glass is the same in both colors.

zzzzzz said:

Are these the new black edition sf's?

Click to expand...

In http://scopeviews.co.uk/Zeiss10x42SF.htm the reviewer, Roger Vine, suggests that Zeiss's specification fo this bin, the 10x42 SF, for eye relief of 18mm is the same as measured by him from the rim to the eye, and thus greater than the EL Swaros I should be grateful if those who own this bin could advise if he is right, or otherwise on these points.

The-Wanderer said:

In http://scopeviews.co.uk/Zeiss10x42SF.htm the reviewer, Roger Vine, suggests that Zeiss's specification fo this bin, the 10x42 SF, for eye relief of 18mm is the same as measured by him from the rim to the eye, and thus greater than the EL Swaros I should be grateful if those who own this bin could advise if he is right, or otherwise on these points.

Click to expand...

The 10X42 SF (black sample) definitely has more eye relief than the Swaros. Also, the eyecups on the black model have been improved...they work beautifully. I was quite impressed with this iteration of the SF.

PS
I use SV's which have enough eye relief for me but the 10X42 SF had more. I'd probably use the first click if I owned one.

The-Wanderer said:

In http://scopeviews.co.uk/Zeiss10x42SF.htm the reviewer, Roger Vine, suggests that Zeiss's specification fo this bin, the 10x42 SF, for eye relief of 18mm is the same as measured by him from the rim to the eye, and thus greater than the EL Swaros I should be grateful if those who own this bin could advise if he is right, or otherwise on these points.

Click to expand...

To me the 10x42 SF (MK I) worked better with glasses than the 10x42 SV.
Most likely due to the eye cup being slightly shallower.
Generally I'm not into 10x bins, but the SF has the most comfortable view of the 10x42:s I have tried.
But you really have to try it for yourself.