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Conquest 32 mm owners thread / reliability, durablity (1 Viewer)

james holdsworth

Consulting Biologist
Conquest 32 mm owners thread / reliability, durability

I have a 8x32 Conquest on order - just had to see what all the fuss was about - but I do worry about the robustness of this model. A friend of mine had a 8x32 Conquest with a defective eye-cup straight out of the box and have heard of others, as well as Holger's reported focus shift issue.

So, what has your experience been so far? These threads tend to be bitch-fests, so I encourage those with positive experiences to report as well.

Thanks.
 
No issues so far but I've only had mine a couple weeks. The eyecups on this line were poorly designed and are being redesigned with no charge replacements due early next year according to two USA customer service reps (Kristi and Carol IIRC). They otherwise *seem* quite robust in their build quality.

I haven't seen this focus drift that a couple of the German BFers have mentioned.

Optics are very, very good. I keep these on a table next to my HT's and go back and forth looking at the feeders. The HT's are clearly better but not by as big an amount as one might think. When I had the 8x42 HD's the amount was even smaller. The HT's are built better though with a better focuser, eyecups, and ergos. Not surprising as they cost over twice as much. But optically? Closer than farther apart.
 
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James you have the HT's and I think the Conquest 8x32HD will be a good complement to these.I have the 10x42 HT's and also the Conquest 8x32.I find the 8x32 very bright and almost equal to the HT's in this respect and I keep them in my car and also when I am searching for warblers.I cannot fault them they do what they are intended to do no fuss no problems with focuser but they do not rise to the HT's in my opinion in overall performance with regard to glare, contrast, and of course the HT's performance in low and tricky light.Try a pair and see what you think.I did and I am not dissapointed....Eddy
 
I'm an 8x32 conquest hd owner and no issues so far.

Had them attached to my face from before sunrise to sunset for four straight days and worked the focuser plenty. Mostly clear skies and sunshine during the day.

Caught myself saying "wow" on occasion.

CG
 
ZEISS Conquest HD 8x32 is a keeper

Caught myself saying "wow" on occasion.

CG


I would agree with that, for me the ZEISS Conquest HD 8x32 is a keeper, nice and wide and bright, slick handling.

Ironic that with tens of thousands of these sold this thread is likely to attract comment from only a handful of owners ...
 
So, what has your experience been so far? These threads tend to be bitch-fests, so I encourage those with positive experiences to report as well. James Holdsworth #1

It is unfortunate that any attempts to provide constructive criticisms of a binocular may produce a disproportionate and defensive response from the binocular's protaganists. This may actually discourage those with unfavourable experiences from posting on BF. Of course there are loads of satisfied owners who don't post their experiences either, so it may be difficult to obtain a balanced view. Over the years I've had good and bad experiences with Zeiss, Swarovski and Nikon bins, not to mention several other makes.

My own experiences with the Zeiss Conquest HD 8x32 were unfavourable. The dioptre adjustment was faulty right from the start, progressively migrating to the + side over the course of 6 hours use in the field; another 6 hours and they would have been unusable. I returned them and didn't purchase another pair.
 
So, what has your experience been so far? These threads tend to be bitch-fests, so I encourage those with positive experiences to report as well. James Holdsworth #1

It is unfortunate that any attempts to provide constructive criticisms of a binocular may produce a disproportionate and defensive response from the binocular's protaganists. This may actually discourage those with unfavourable experiences from posting on BF. Of course there are loads of satisfied owners who don't post their experiences either, so it may be difficult to obtain a balanced view. Over the years I've had good and bad experiences with Zeiss, Swarovski and Nikon bins, not to mention several other makes.

My own experiences with the Zeiss Conquest HD 8x32 were unfavourable. The dioptre adjustment was faulty right from the start, progressively migrating to the + side over the course of 6 hours use in the field; another 6 hours and they would have been unusable. I returned them and didn't purchase another pair.

Thanks, this is the type of feedback I'm interested in. How long ago did you but them? Zeiss claimed to have fixed the problem, so I'm interested to see if later samples are defect-free. I don't think I have heard of this problem on this side of the pond [yet] but I know the eye-cup issues are ongoing.

As I have said, I have one on order. If it is faulty, I will be the 1st to raise bloody hell, as I think the brand should be better than this. I have many Zeiss bins, some over 40 years old, and all are perfect with zero failures in thousands of hours of field use. For the what they cost, this is how it should be and we should accept no less.

If Mr. Jensen can answer some of these questions, that would be great.
 
I have a 8x32 Conquest on order - just had to see what all the fuss was about - but I do worry about the robustness of this model. A friend of mine had a 8x32 Conquest with a defective eye-cup straight out of the box and have heard of others, as well as Holger's reported focus shift issue.

So, what has your experience been so far? These threads tend to be bitch-fests, so I encourage those with positive experiences to report as well.

Thanks.
I have the Zeiss Conquest's 8x32 HD.No issues at all with mine which were just purchased in October as Demo's from Cameraland. I have no focus drift or diopter problems at all. The binoculars are very robust and well built. I regard them as the best buy I have ever seen in a binocular purchase for price/performance. I constantly compare them to my Swarovision 8x32's and honestly see little difference except the Swaro has sharper edges. I think they are the first binocular I have purchased for less than $1K which I could honestly call alpha. They are that good. I like them better than the Zeiss FL's. They obviously have resolved any problems they had in the beginning of production.
 
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So far I think they're a gem and my attraction to them keeps increasing thr longer I have them. I purchased them from Cabelas and they shipped direct from the manufacturer which took aroumd 10 days after the order was placed. I have had them since late summer I think?? I had store credit and a cc perk so I was out of pocket about $675 after using both.

The objective covers do not stay in place. It appeared that they would, but they didn't. The strap is the most comfortable I have experienced. Went pre sunrise to post sunset with them around my neck and forgot I had them on till I spilt that nights dinner down my front side.

CG
 
No issues at all with my 8x32. Not much else to say since it's all been said already, so just count me as another very satisfied owner.....
 
I have the Zeiss Conquest's 8x32 HD.No issues at all with mine which were just purchased in October as Demo's from Cameraland. I have no focus drift or diopter problems at all. The binoculars are very robust and well built. I regard them as the best buy I have ever seen in a binocular purchase for price/performance. I constantly compare them to my Swarovision 8x32's and honestly see little difference except the Swaro has sharper edges. I think they are the first binocular I have purchased for less than $1K which I could honestly call alpha. They are that good. I like them better than the Zeiss FL's. They obviously have resolved any problems they had in the beginning of production.

That's the point, Dennis: You purchased them as Demo's - of course they would pre-select them before presenting them to the public, nobody would possibly use a defective device as his demo. That is why your experience does not imply anything regarding quality issues of the binocular.

Cheers,
Holger
 
That's the point, Dennis: You purchased them as Demo's - of course they would pre-select them before presenting them to the public, nobody would possibly use a defective device as his demo. That is why your experience does not imply anything regarding quality issues of the binocular.

Cheers,
Holger

A bit harsh Holger. Certainly Dennis's experience doesn't necessarily tell us anything, but it might.

There have been reports of HDs being OK out of the box and then developing issues over a few hours or days or even longer. So selecting them for demo duty doesn't necessarily mean they were free of possible issues.

We don't know how much work Dennis's HDs did as demos, assuming they did any at all, and assuming the 'demo' tag was genuine and not just a way of discounting to move stock.

But if Dennis's enthusiasm for bins in real life is anything like his enthusiasm here on BF we can guess he has been using them quite a bit and we can say: so far so good.

Lee
 
That's the point, Dennis: You purchased them as Demo's - of course they would pre-select them before presenting them to the public, nobody would possibly use a defective device as his demo. That is why your experience does not imply anything regarding quality issues of the binocular.

Cheers,
Holger

So Cameraland hides the bad ones back to sell to an unsuspecting public :t:
 
I now have mine.........time to judge for myself.:t:


So far, so good - they haven't broken yet!;)

Hinge tight, diopter tight, focus smooth and lash-free. Eye-cups so tight I thought I might break them trying to screw them up one stop. But, good news! No black-outs on the 1st stop, so there they will stay.

1st impressions very positive - very sharp, bright, contrasty, nice sweet spot and with CA control much better than I expected. So far, very FL like but a tad warmer.

More to come.
 
I've had mine a couple weeks now and they've had a LOT of use. Regardless of a few internet comments from certain quarters, so far they are excellent in all respects (save for the sucky eyecups).
 
The ocular rainguard is terrible - thin and far too sticky. It doesn't slide up or down without great effort and is very hard to get off the oculars. For a few dollars more, they should use the excellent HT rainguard.

Still waiting for a bright, sunny day to make some final conclusions - maybe tomorrow. So far, overcast, snow and rain has been constant. Good news is the 32's have done very well in these dim and gray conditions.
 
Well, I'm very pleased. The HD's seem to be a well-rounded binocular, with no real vices - if you can work with the eye-relief. For me, they fit very well.

Focus is smooth, very fast and light but with nice damping. If you have used an ultra-fast focus before, no problem as this one is very precise - if not, you may not be able to adapt easily as the tendency is to overshoot and backtrack.

Compared to the FL, the HD's have numerous advantages - the sweet spot is larger, the area of sharpest focus seems almost twice as big, and edge of field quality is higher. CA in the HD is nearly as good - lateral colour only appears at the edge of the sweetspot, and doesn't become obvious until the outer FOV. Sure, there is some fringing in this area, but it's there in the FL as well, although a bit paler perhaps. I'm not sure if the 32's are better than the 42's in this area, as some have mentioned it as weakness. [and I am very sensitive, and expected it to be worse]

The HD's have better contrast than the FL, giving a more lively view, with more 'pop', more transparency to my eye. Sharpness would be equal, as near as I can tell.

The HD, in apparent brightness, always looks slightly less bright than the FL, with a very slightly warmer bias. White rendering is OK, a bit ivory and warmer than the FL. Overall presentation would be very similar to the FL, with sweetspot size / contrast [HD] and whiteness of the image / brightness [FL] perhaps the only things that would stand out.

The HD's handle stray side light well, better than the FL, with any flare occurring as a small crescent, at the very edge of the FOV and not impacting the view much. Veiling glare is well controlled, again better than the FL's, really only present in those blinding situations of low, bright and scattered light.

Compared to the much more expensive HT - the HT is obviously brighter - all the time, white's are much whiter, overall colour more neutral [less warm], sweet spot similar but area of sharpest focus bigger, a hair sharper with better contrast and better [ideal] stray light control. I would think most users would never see the difference without owning both. If I didn't have the HT, I would have probably been very content for the Conquest to be my primary field binoculars.
 
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