RoadsterGirlie
Active member
Greetings!
This is my first post so please bear with me. I have been into astronomy since I was 12 and while I've owned numerous telescopes over the years, I've never owned a good pair of binoculars. My husband gave me a pair of what seem to be 25 year old Bushnell 7x35s. This ARE old and as such aren't perfect, but it's shown me how much I could probably cross over into birding with whatever I end up getting.
We have an extraordinary bird sanctuary and nature center nearby where these would be a lot of fun.
So what I'm trying to do is find a middle of the road pair that can be used for both astronomy and birding. These will be solely handheld and I do not want to go bigger than 10x50. 8x won't probably be enough for astronomical purposes which is why I'd like to stick with 10x. I don't want to go into 12x or higher due to these being handheld and won't be good for terrestrial viewing.
I originally had my eye on the Nikon Action Extremes 10x50. Unfortunately no store carries them for me to test them and I have concerns about the weight at 2.5 lbs.
I went to Cabala's yesterday and was able to test the Prostaff 5 10x50. I understand the difference between roof prism and porro prisms so I get this is a entirely different design. Roof's tend to be more expensive because they're more complex but even for the size of 10x50 these felt like a feather in my hand. They're 3/4ths of a pound less than the AEs.
I'm also interested in the Prostaff 7 10x42 as I see it has better coatings and is slightly cheaper, but the 10x50 would better used for astrnomy.
If anyone has used both the prostaff and the AEs I'd like to hear from you. I'm surprised to see there's no such comparisons on the Internet after a good search.
All in all I'd like to keep this under the $200 mark. I would like to stick with Nikon solely because their warranty is unmatched, but if anyone has suggestions that aren't Nikon, please feel free to share your thoughts. Thank!
This is my first post so please bear with me. I have been into astronomy since I was 12 and while I've owned numerous telescopes over the years, I've never owned a good pair of binoculars. My husband gave me a pair of what seem to be 25 year old Bushnell 7x35s. This ARE old and as such aren't perfect, but it's shown me how much I could probably cross over into birding with whatever I end up getting.
We have an extraordinary bird sanctuary and nature center nearby where these would be a lot of fun.
So what I'm trying to do is find a middle of the road pair that can be used for both astronomy and birding. These will be solely handheld and I do not want to go bigger than 10x50. 8x won't probably be enough for astronomical purposes which is why I'd like to stick with 10x. I don't want to go into 12x or higher due to these being handheld and won't be good for terrestrial viewing.
I originally had my eye on the Nikon Action Extremes 10x50. Unfortunately no store carries them for me to test them and I have concerns about the weight at 2.5 lbs.
I went to Cabala's yesterday and was able to test the Prostaff 5 10x50. I understand the difference between roof prism and porro prisms so I get this is a entirely different design. Roof's tend to be more expensive because they're more complex but even for the size of 10x50 these felt like a feather in my hand. They're 3/4ths of a pound less than the AEs.
I'm also interested in the Prostaff 7 10x42 as I see it has better coatings and is slightly cheaper, but the 10x50 would better used for astrnomy.
If anyone has used both the prostaff and the AEs I'd like to hear from you. I'm surprised to see there's no such comparisons on the Internet after a good search.
All in all I'd like to keep this under the $200 mark. I would like to stick with Nikon solely because their warranty is unmatched, but if anyone has suggestions that aren't Nikon, please feel free to share your thoughts. Thank!