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Message: <blockquote data-quote="APSmith" data-source="post: 1311942" data-attributes="member: 52350">Sweet Spot =~ZONE of critical sharpness.  It is the portion of the FOV which is sufficiently focused and sharp at the same time that the center is.  I suppose "what's  sufficient" might vary somewhat from user to user.  There do seem to be very significant differences in the ZONE between different models of the same configuration.  I suspect that almost all users would more or less agree on the ranking order between different given models (unless the models incomparison were truly very closely matched concerning this criteria).  However, I don't expect that everyone would agree on the actual measured size of a particular model's ZONE (due to individual eyesight variation).  I'm becoming more and more convinced that the best warbler glass is indeed the one with the largest Sweet Spot, provided that the view is not so difficult to achieve and maintain that it constitutes a significant distraction (I know - personal pref., but certainly qualify-able), and provided that the stray light is well controlled.  As such, it still appears that the Nikon EII and/or SE, along with the Zeiss ClassiC 7x42 are still unmatched by today's alpha roofs (the contributions of John Traynor and Pinewood give some credence to this notion).    I don't mean to sound like Paul G., but something is wrong with the binocular market today.  If we continue to praise (and purchase) these current ultra-expensive models that are not as good as the stuff from 10+ years ago, aren't we cheating ourselves out of the better viewing experiences.  Isn't this effectively the same thing Ingrahim said (much more eloquently) over and over on BVD.  Sure, the roofs are better than ever; but, I'm not sure we're there yet.  Perhaps the EDGs will be.  But, if there were an optimised porro ...      One more thought.  I can't help but believe that the best binoculars it the world are individual prototypes lying around the R&D labs of the manufacturers.  Surely they've tried the things that seem obvious to us (the improved SE/EII, the 7x32 EL, the modernized Zeiss 7x42 ClassiC, a new 7x35 Leica).  Perhaps they just need to let the engineers have more input in the marketing so the right ones are put into production.(Sorry for the rant.)APS</blockquote>

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