That said, I looked though several scopes, 60 mm and larger, even some made by renowned manufacturers, that went mushy at 40x. Sample variation. Lemons. That's why I wouldn't buy a scope without carefully checking the optical quality. And that's where Henry's and Kimmo's tips on how to test a scope are really, really useful. Because you can't really judge the quality of a scope without doing some thorough side-by-side comparisons with a scope of known quality or, even better, a star test.
Hermann
Agreed - have seen my share of lemons too - including top models of alpha brands - interestingly enough no Kowa among them yet.
Joachim