I was checking out Amazon’s Warehouse site last week and noticed a pair of Brunton Echo 7x50 porros that were available for half price, $39 with free shipping. Brunton’s don’t get a lot of attention here on the forum. I searched for reviews of the Echo’s and came up pretty much empty. There were a few posts about the Echo roofs, but none about the porros. The Echo’s are the Brunton’s high end porros, with the Lite Tech’s being the entry level models. That should put them in the same class as the Bushnell Legends and Nikon Action Extremes, although they are less expensive.
I’ve amassed a nice collection of budget porros over the last few years. I developed a simple two step process for adding to my collection. First, I let FrankD do all the work of buying and reviewing the bins and then I buy whatever he recommends. This has worked well for me. I acquired the Bushnell Legend 8x42, Celestron Ultima DX 8x32 and Orion Ultraview 8x42 this way and I’ve been impressed by all of them. Unfortunately, Frank has been too preoccupied of late to be my personal shopper
, so I decided to take a gamble on the Brunton’s and try to do my own review.
When I opened the box from Amazon, I was horrified to find that the Echo’s were in one of those clamshell/blisterpack things. I’ve always operated on the assumption that any bins hanging on a rack in one of those things were too chintzy to even be worth looking at. I was even more horrified to find that the idiots at Amazon had not used any packing material. They just put the clamshell in the box and shipped it. So, I figured they were crappy binoculars and probably broken or out of collimation to boot.
I was wrong! The Echo’s survived the trip unharmed. The build quality turned out to be excellent and the optics are spectacular. They have the smoothest and lightest focusing I’ve seen in a waterproof external focusing budget porro. Their field of view is narrow at 367 ft (7 deg), as is typical of 7x50’s. They weigh 31 oz, focus to 13 ft and have 19.6mm of eye relief. The image is very bright and sharp as a tack almost to the edges. I’d say 95% of the field is sharp. The depth of field and 3D effect are very pronounced and remind me of the Leupold Cascades porros. It really produces a WOW effect at times. I’m astonished that they can deliver this level of optical quality at this price.
The accessories are junk, though. The neck strap is a strip of cloth. The case was folded up in the bottom of the package. Completely unpadded. The eyepiece cover is of the individual type with a flexible bridge. Not terrible, but too tight. The objective covers press inside the barrels instead of being caps. They would actually be nice if they were tethered. The accessories and packaging are bottom of the barrel but the binoculars themselves are top notch.
I was so impressed with the 7x50’s that I decided to check out the other bins in the Echo line. They also make a 10x50 and an 8x45. The 10x50 has a FOV of 6.5 deg and 16mm eye relief. Weight and size are the same as the 7x50. The 8x45 has a FOV of 8.3 deg (435 ft), 16mm eye relief and weight of 23 oz. The 10x50’s are $90 and up at most sites, but I found a place called Bud’s Gun Shop in Kentucky that made a special purchase and has them for $44! With shipping, that works out to $55 delivered, so I ordered a pair. The best price I found on the 8x45 was $72 delivered from Optics Planet.
I noticed that the 7x50’s looked kind of familiar. I pulled out my Minolta Activa WP/FP 12x50’s and laid them next to the Echo’s. They are almost exact clones! Aside from the twist up eyecups of the Echo, the only physical differences are cosmetic differences in the focus wheel (more textured on the Echo) and the armor on the prisms. I got out a pen light and looked down the barrels. The construction is virtually identical. The Activa’s have two blobs of glue on the prisms but the Echo’s don’t. Otherwise, they are the same. I decided that the Brunton Echo porros are an updated version of the Minolta Activa WP/FP being sold in blister packs at give away prices! Minolta sold their camera division to Sony, but I’ve never heard what happened to the binocular line. If Minolta or Sony sold the porro rights to Brunton at a bargain price, that could explain the low cost of the Echo’s. Since Minolta has recovered or written off the development and tooling costs, Brunton’s cost would just be the manufacturing cost. The specs for the Activa and Echo 7x50’s and 10x50’s are just about identical, but the Activa 8x was an 8x42 not an 8x45. It had a 8.2 deg FOV rather than 8.3 deg. It’s possible that they redesigned it a bit because they thought it would be the biggest seller. It’s also possible that the Echo’s are produced by the same factory in China that the Activa’s were, but are slightly different designs.
I called Brunton’s customer service and the guy I talked to denied that they had bought the design from Minolta. He did admit that he really wasn’t familiar with the binoculars. Brunton imports a lot of stuff, so I’m not sure if he really knows what he is talking about. The Echo’s and Activa’s are so similar that I can’t distinguish between them aside from the magnification and a few cosmetic details. So, I think they must at least have been built by the same factory if they aren’t actually the same bins. The 10x50 Echo’s are due to arrive on Wednesday, so I’ll see how they stack up against the Activa 12x50’s.
At any rate, the Brunton Echo porros are a spectacular bargain at the discounted prices they are selling for. I paid $120 for my Activa 12x50’s USED! Does anyone know what they sold for new? Here’s a link to the 10x50’s at Bud’s:
https://www.budsgunshop.com/catalog/product_info.php/products_id/411538272
OpticsPlanet.com has the 7x50's and 8x45's for $72 each.
I’ve amassed a nice collection of budget porros over the last few years. I developed a simple two step process for adding to my collection. First, I let FrankD do all the work of buying and reviewing the bins and then I buy whatever he recommends. This has worked well for me. I acquired the Bushnell Legend 8x42, Celestron Ultima DX 8x32 and Orion Ultraview 8x42 this way and I’ve been impressed by all of them. Unfortunately, Frank has been too preoccupied of late to be my personal shopper
, so I decided to take a gamble on the Brunton’s and try to do my own review.When I opened the box from Amazon, I was horrified to find that the Echo’s were in one of those clamshell/blisterpack things. I’ve always operated on the assumption that any bins hanging on a rack in one of those things were too chintzy to even be worth looking at. I was even more horrified to find that the idiots at Amazon had not used any packing material. They just put the clamshell in the box and shipped it. So, I figured they were crappy binoculars and probably broken or out of collimation to boot.
I was wrong! The Echo’s survived the trip unharmed. The build quality turned out to be excellent and the optics are spectacular. They have the smoothest and lightest focusing I’ve seen in a waterproof external focusing budget porro. Their field of view is narrow at 367 ft (7 deg), as is typical of 7x50’s. They weigh 31 oz, focus to 13 ft and have 19.6mm of eye relief. The image is very bright and sharp as a tack almost to the edges. I’d say 95% of the field is sharp. The depth of field and 3D effect are very pronounced and remind me of the Leupold Cascades porros. It really produces a WOW effect at times. I’m astonished that they can deliver this level of optical quality at this price.
The accessories are junk, though. The neck strap is a strip of cloth. The case was folded up in the bottom of the package. Completely unpadded. The eyepiece cover is of the individual type with a flexible bridge. Not terrible, but too tight. The objective covers press inside the barrels instead of being caps. They would actually be nice if they were tethered. The accessories and packaging are bottom of the barrel but the binoculars themselves are top notch.
I was so impressed with the 7x50’s that I decided to check out the other bins in the Echo line. They also make a 10x50 and an 8x45. The 10x50 has a FOV of 6.5 deg and 16mm eye relief. Weight and size are the same as the 7x50. The 8x45 has a FOV of 8.3 deg (435 ft), 16mm eye relief and weight of 23 oz. The 10x50’s are $90 and up at most sites, but I found a place called Bud’s Gun Shop in Kentucky that made a special purchase and has them for $44! With shipping, that works out to $55 delivered, so I ordered a pair. The best price I found on the 8x45 was $72 delivered from Optics Planet.
I noticed that the 7x50’s looked kind of familiar. I pulled out my Minolta Activa WP/FP 12x50’s and laid them next to the Echo’s. They are almost exact clones! Aside from the twist up eyecups of the Echo, the only physical differences are cosmetic differences in the focus wheel (more textured on the Echo) and the armor on the prisms. I got out a pen light and looked down the barrels. The construction is virtually identical. The Activa’s have two blobs of glue on the prisms but the Echo’s don’t. Otherwise, they are the same. I decided that the Brunton Echo porros are an updated version of the Minolta Activa WP/FP being sold in blister packs at give away prices! Minolta sold their camera division to Sony, but I’ve never heard what happened to the binocular line. If Minolta or Sony sold the porro rights to Brunton at a bargain price, that could explain the low cost of the Echo’s. Since Minolta has recovered or written off the development and tooling costs, Brunton’s cost would just be the manufacturing cost. The specs for the Activa and Echo 7x50’s and 10x50’s are just about identical, but the Activa 8x was an 8x42 not an 8x45. It had a 8.2 deg FOV rather than 8.3 deg. It’s possible that they redesigned it a bit because they thought it would be the biggest seller. It’s also possible that the Echo’s are produced by the same factory in China that the Activa’s were, but are slightly different designs.
I called Brunton’s customer service and the guy I talked to denied that they had bought the design from Minolta. He did admit that he really wasn’t familiar with the binoculars. Brunton imports a lot of stuff, so I’m not sure if he really knows what he is talking about. The Echo’s and Activa’s are so similar that I can’t distinguish between them aside from the magnification and a few cosmetic details. So, I think they must at least have been built by the same factory if they aren’t actually the same bins. The 10x50 Echo’s are due to arrive on Wednesday, so I’ll see how they stack up against the Activa 12x50’s.
At any rate, the Brunton Echo porros are a spectacular bargain at the discounted prices they are selling for. I paid $120 for my Activa 12x50’s USED! Does anyone know what they sold for new? Here’s a link to the 10x50’s at Bud’s:
https://www.budsgunshop.com/catalog/product_info.php/products_id/411538272
OpticsPlanet.com has the 7x50's and 8x45's for $72 each.
