Steiner Nighthunter XP? (1 Viewer)

Hello all,

I see pairs of Steiner Nighthunter XPs show up on occasion for quite a bit less than their asking price and always wonder: how is the view? I looked through a coworker's Steiner Merlins once and found the view lacking any exceptional qualities but that the overall build quality was wonderful, a trait I value just as highly.
I've read great reports about the optics of the Peregrine and Peregrine XP binoculars, and was wondering how the Nighthunter XP may compare? The specs are quite good with dielectric coated prisms, ED glass, hydrophobic outer lens coatings, a nice 400'/1000yd FoV and 18.5mm ER on the 8x42 model, but I know that Steiner sometimes has coatings that dull brighter colors while making more neutral/earth tones standout more and I was wondering if such an issue was present here.

Happy birding,
Justin

I have the Steiner Peregrine XP and they are fantastic, durable, rugged, great low light performance, super smooth focus, ergonomics perfect for me, most important excellent eye relief. Crystal clear view, but relatively slightly sweet spot and smooth but slow focus for fast birds. My everyday carry bins over Leica and Swarovski due to eye relief

To clarify, small sweet spot makes IPD adjustment important. My Leica 10x42 has too short eye relief( for stand hunting ok take off glasses). Similar ergonomics for me with Swaro 8x32EL but like the Steiners light gathering (so gave EL to wife).

I just got my hands on a 10x56 Night hunter xp.

Here are my findings compared to other premium 8 and 10x42 binos I have in my possession and have had in the past.

The handling of CA is not good enough for me to believe it has ED lenses.
My Meopta Meostar B1 10x42 had slightly less CA than the nighthunter. My Leupold 8x42 golden ring HD was quite a bit better. The nighthunter shows no CA in the center of the view just the outer 10 percent. Its just that the CA is more pronounced.

The nighthunter also has a very small sweet spot, roughly around 60- 70 percent.

Color rendition is a little flat. Colors do not look vibrant compared to my other binos. The view during the day in full light and in lower light levels actually makes the nighthunter appear more dim than my other binos because of this. As the light level decreases though I found out the nighthunter was actually plenty bright.

The big shock to me was that the Meostar and Golden ring HD were just as bright in very low light levels and they are only 42mm. Perhaps my 44 year old pupils have no use for larger objective binoculars?

The sharpness of the nighthunter was on par with the Meostar and Golden ring HD, another surprise. I assumed the Steiner would be better with its large objective lenses and diaelectric prism coatings.

I wonder sometimes, when chromatic aberration is a key worry, that there
might be a problem with the interaction between the eyes and/or glasses and
the eyepieces. I have almost never noticed CA in binoculars.....at least not the
super-cheap ones, and those are expensive ones you're mentioning. Most Steiners
I've tried have been razor-sharp.

Alternately, my cortex might be automatically removing CA or something.
That doesn't seem as likely, though. Just mentioning it, in case there is a way
to get to a root cause of it all.