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Kowa TSN-99 (40x) review (1 Viewer)

hyberboreus

Active member
Can be found from Kowa TSN-99A + 40x XW laajakulma koekatselussa

Google translate:

Kowa 99A in test view at 40x wide angle

I got a Kowa TSN-99A telescope for trial viewing on August 4, 2021 for a couple of morning hours on the ocean on a windless and sunny day. There was no ripple at all at first and the visibility was very good. The reference pair for the tube was a Swarovski BTX 35x95 telescope (the Swarovski BTX model is a two-eye model). In Kowa, I had a 40x wide angle as well as a 1.6x teleconverter, giving a telescope magnification of 64x. In Swarovski, I used a 1.7x tele-extension, giving a magnification of 60x in the BTX tube. The conditions were excellent.

Mostly I observed objects 3 to 5 km away, but also a credit just over 13 km away. I did the initial testing on both tubes with the teleconverter. First in the Kowan tube drew attention to the brightness of the image, it was clearly brighter than the Swarovski BTX (hereafter only BTX). Three and a half kilometers away, the different shades of brown in the costume of the eels standing in the side light on the islet stood out clearly, while on the BTX the birds looked uniformly dark and the hues were difficult to detect. The Kowan image was very sharp and toned and bird identification with the Kowan TSN-99A tube was more effortless than with the BTX. This was partly due to a brighter image, with simply more detail and shades visible in the subjects thanks to the brightness. Kowa also seemed sharper and more distinctive. Risks floating more than four miles on the surface of the water were much more effortless to spot on the Kowan 99A than on the BTX, and the white spot on the wing of the rooks was more easily distinguished from flying birds on the Kowan than the BTX. Similarly, the hull texts of ships at sea became clearer and farther clear compared to the BTX. This was partly due to a clearer distinction between black and white, which in turn was influenced by a clearly brighter image compared to BTX. This made it easier to spot birds against dark credit, for example, with the Kowa than with the BTX. The Kowan TSN-99A image got a similar sense of image enhancement effect as having compared Swarovski’s EL model to Swarovski’s latest NL Pure model, the image was really impressive. In addition, Kowa's field of view is clearly wider than that of BTX, which makes it easier to find objects or facilitates scanning with a telescope. The only thing Kowa lost was the ease of watching the BTX tube. I used my right left eye with Kowa while keeping my right eye closed. The result was that the right eye got tired pretty quickly. Of course, the situation is alleviated when you cover the free eye with your hand or a patch. BTX does not have the same problem, as both eyes are used for viewing like binoculars.

The power of modern pipes is understood when cormorants and seagulls standing and lying on a islet nearly seven kilometers away, as well as flying terns, were easy to distinguish. Likewise, the sea eagle would be easily identifiable from that distance. The islets and cormorants of the islet, even 13 kilometers away, stood out reasonably well, of course it was not possible to distinguish species from the logs, but it was nevertheless able to say that they were logs. Similarly, at a islet three and a half miles away, predatory swallows were easily distinguishable by both pipes. Sure, the very favorable weather played a part, but it also speaks to the excellence of optics today. I also tried the tubes without tele extensions and the Kowan 40x brightness and wide field of view (39 m vs. 32 m / 1000 m away) made an impact, but the difference in BTX in brightness leveled off somewhat. In general, 35x and 40x magnification work well in most situations, but in good conditions, for example, by the sea, the higher magnification provided by the teleconverter is of real benefit and helps to control a surprisingly large area. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to test the zoom in the terrain, but have to come back to it later. It would have been interesting to see how much brighter the fixed 40x eyepiece would have been compared to the zoom.

The next day I tried very briefly on the Kowan TSN-99A test board with both 40x and zoom with and without a tele extension. The comparison pair was the Swarovski ATX model 30-70x95. Kowa was perhaps a little surprisingly left with a hint of Swarovski, surprisingly because Kowa was so much better off-road compared to the BTX model. The smallest pairs of lines stood out a little more effortlessly with Swarovski, but both still showed the same number of patterns. Just as I put a 30-70x zoom in the Kowa, the picture looked a little dimmer than with the ATX. The trial period was very short and superficial and no conclusions can be drawn correctly. In the star test, the pattern on the Kowa was very neat in the other direction and no color was visible on the outer perimeter but the patterns were all white. This indicates excellent color aberration control. In the other direction, the star pattern was less clear, which is common to almost all the tubes I tested. We need to get back to testing even more closely with zoom, as long as the official versions of the Kowan TSN-99A go on sale in October.

Kowa TSN-99A tube is surprisingly sleek and light, the body weight is given at 1810 g and the zoom eyepiece and 40x wide angle at 370 g for a total of 2180 g. The body is made of magnesium, and the body is not rubber-coated like many other tubes today, which also helps keep the weight low. Kowa is the only manufacturer to use a lens made of fluorite crystal mineral in its telescope. Together with the XD lens, chromatic aberration has been minimized from the image. Different colors of light refract at slightly different angles as they pass through the lens, different lenses try to minimize this color scattering, and the fluorite crystal lens used by Kowa is one of the best inhibitors of color aberration. When different colors can be applied to the same point, the image becomes sharp and toned and there are no colored borders on the edges of the subjects.

The Kowaan comes with a wide variety of accessories, such as a filter in front of the front lens, various camera and phone adapters, a tele-extension and an astro-eyepiece adapter. The pedestal shoe has two screw locations, ie the telescope can be attached to the quick plate with two screws, which prevents the telescope from rotating relative to the quick plate. Dual focus is already familiar from the previous 880 and 770 models, and the same eyepieces and accessories as the previous models also apply to the new TSN-99 model. The all-time protective bag will not be available as an accessory until the end of 2021. The new 40x eyepiece is ideal for excellent telemarketing, and with the eyepiece, the image of the phone does not have black borders, but the image fills the entire image area. According to the current trend, the lens surfaces are coated with a water and dirt repellent coating (as well as the surface of the optional filter), which helps keep the lenses clean.

The model in the test was still a demo device and it may be that the sales pieces have been honed even better. At least with the new 40x super wide angle, the image was very impressive and the 40x eyepiece and teleconverter should cope with all possible situations. Let's get back to the point as soon as the sales pieces are available for testing.
 
Can be found from Kowa TSN-99A + 40x XW laajakulma koekatselussa

Google translate:

Kowa 99A in test view at 40x wide angle

I got a Kowa TSN-99A telescope for trial viewing on August 4, 2021 for a couple of morning hours on the ocean on a windless and sunny day. There was no ripple at all at first and the visibility was very good. The reference pair for the tube was a Swarovski BTX 35x95 telescope (the Swarovski BTX model is a two-eye model). In Kowa, I had a 40x wide angle as well as a 1.6x teleconverter, giving a telescope magnification of 64x. In Swarovski, I used a 1.7x tele-extension, giving a magnification of 60x in the BTX tube. The conditions were excellent.

Mostly I observed objects 3 to 5 km away, but also a credit just over 13 km away. I did the initial testing on both tubes with the teleconverter. First in the Kowan tube drew attention to the brightness of the image, it was clearly brighter than the Swarovski BTX (hereafter only BTX). Three and a half kilometers away, the different shades of brown in the costume of the eels standing in the side light on the islet stood out clearly, while on the BTX the birds looked uniformly dark and the hues were difficult to detect. The Kowan image was very sharp and toned and bird identification with the Kowan TSN-99A tube was more effortless than with the BTX. This was partly due to a brighter image, with simply more detail and shades visible in the subjects thanks to the brightness. Kowa also seemed sharper and more distinctive. Risks floating more than four miles on the surface of the water were much more effortless to spot on the Kowan 99A than on the BTX, and the white spot on the wing of the rooks was more easily distinguished from flying birds on the Kowan than the BTX. Similarly, the hull texts of ships at sea became clearer and farther clear compared to the BTX. This was partly due to a clearer distinction between black and white, which in turn was influenced by a clearly brighter image compared to BTX. This made it easier to spot birds against dark credit, for example, with the Kowa than with the BTX. The Kowan TSN-99A image got a similar sense of image enhancement effect as having compared Swarovski’s EL model to Swarovski’s latest NL Pure model, the image was really impressive. In addition, Kowa's field of view is clearly wider than that of BTX, which makes it easier to find objects or facilitates scanning with a telescope. The only thing Kowa lost was the ease of watching the BTX tube. I used my right left eye with Kowa while keeping my right eye closed. The result was that the right eye got tired pretty quickly. Of course, the situation is alleviated when you cover the free eye with your hand or a patch. BTX does not have the same problem, as both eyes are used for viewing like binoculars.

The power of modern pipes is understood when cormorants and seagulls standing and lying on a islet nearly seven kilometers away, as well as flying terns, were easy to distinguish. Likewise, the sea eagle would be easily identifiable from that distance. The islets and cormorants of the islet, even 13 kilometers away, stood out reasonably well, of course it was not possible to distinguish species from the logs, but it was nevertheless able to say that they were logs. Similarly, at a islet three and a half miles away, predatory swallows were easily distinguishable by both pipes. Sure, the very favorable weather played a part, but it also speaks to the excellence of optics today. I also tried the tubes without tele extensions and the Kowan 40x brightness and wide field of view (39 m vs. 32 m / 1000 m away) made an impact, but the difference in BTX in brightness leveled off somewhat. In general, 35x and 40x magnification work well in most situations, but in good conditions, for example, by the sea, the higher magnification provided by the teleconverter is of real benefit and helps to control a surprisingly large area. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to test the zoom in the terrain, but have to come back to it later. It would have been interesting to see how much brighter the fixed 40x eyepiece would have been compared to the zoom.

The next day I tried very briefly on the Kowan TSN-99A test board with both 40x and zoom with and without a tele extension. The comparison pair was the Swarovski ATX model 30-70x95. Kowa was perhaps a little surprisingly left with a hint of Swarovski, surprisingly because Kowa was so much better off-road compared to the BTX model. The smallest pairs of lines stood out a little more effortlessly with Swarovski, but both still showed the same number of patterns. Just as I put a 30-70x zoom in the Kowa, the picture looked a little dimmer than with the ATX. The trial period was very short and superficial and no conclusions can be drawn correctly. In the star test, the pattern on the Kowa was very neat in the other direction and no color was visible on the outer perimeter but the patterns were all white. This indicates excellent color aberration control. In the other direction, the star pattern was less clear, which is common to almost all the tubes I tested. We need to get back to testing even more closely with zoom, as long as the official versions of the Kowan TSN-99A go on sale in October.

Kowa TSN-99A tube is surprisingly sleek and light, the body weight is given at 1810 g and the zoom eyepiece and 40x wide angle at 370 g for a total of 2180 g. The body is made of magnesium, and the body is not rubber-coated like many other tubes today, which also helps keep the weight low. Kowa is the only manufacturer to use a lens made of fluorite crystal mineral in its telescope. Together with the XD lens, chromatic aberration has been minimized from the image. Different colors of light refract at slightly different angles as they pass through the lens, different lenses try to minimize this color scattering, and the fluorite crystal lens used by Kowa is one of the best inhibitors of color aberration. When different colors can be applied to the same point, the image becomes sharp and toned and there are no colored borders on the edges of the subjects.

The Kowaan comes with a wide variety of accessories, such as a filter in front of the front lens, various camera and phone adapters, a tele-extension and an astro-eyepiece adapter. The pedestal shoe has two screw locations, ie the telescope can be attached to the quick plate with two screws, which prevents the telescope from rotating relative to the quick plate. Dual focus is already familiar from the previous 880 and 770 models, and the same eyepieces and accessories as the previous models also apply to the new TSN-99 model. The all-time protective bag will not be available as an accessory until the end of 2021. The new 40x eyepiece is ideal for excellent telemarketing, and with the eyepiece, the image of the phone does not have black borders, but the image fills the entire image area. According to the current trend, the lens surfaces are coated with a water and dirt repellent coating (as well as the surface of the optional filter), which helps keep the lenses clean.

The model in the test was still a demo device and it may be that the sales pieces have been honed even better. At least with the new 40x super wide angle, the image was very impressive and the 40x eyepiece and teleconverter should cope with all possible situations. Let's get back to the point as soon as the sales pieces are available for testing.
Thanks for this! I've read the original in Finnish - the "costume of the eels" is talking about variations in the brown plumage of eider ducks at a range of 3.5km, and 'risks' and 'rooks' are Black Guillemots! Lost in translation...
 
Shame that the translation produces specification errors, eg the scope has a "filter" in front of the front (objective ) lens - filter thread or lens hood meant?
 
good to see a spotting scope company giving users a decent field of view like the astro community have enjoyed for a good while. Really immersive views.

Peter
 
Can be found from Kowa TSN-99A + 40x XW laajakulma koekatselussa

Google translate:

Kowa 99A in test view at 40x wide angle

I got a Kowa TSN-99A telescope for trial viewing on August 4, 2021 for a couple of morning hours on the ocean on a windless and sunny day. There was no ripple at all at first and the visibility was very good. The reference pair for the tube was a Swarovski BTX 35x95 telescope (the Swarovski BTX model is a two-eye model). In Kowa, I had a 40x wide angle as well as a 1.6x teleconverter, giving a telescope magnification of 64x. In Swarovski, I used a 1.7x tele-extension, giving a magnification of 60x in the BTX tube. The conditions were excellent.

Mostly I observed objects 3 to 5 km away, but also a credit just over 13 km away. I did the initial testing on both tubes with the teleconverter. First in the Kowan tube drew attention to the brightness of the image, it was clearly brighter than the Swarovski BTX (hereafter only BTX). Three and a half kilometers away, the different shades of brown in the costume of the eels standing in the side light on the islet stood out clearly, while on the BTX the birds looked uniformly dark and the hues were difficult to detect. The Kowan image was very sharp and toned and bird identification with the Kowan TSN-99A tube was more effortless than with the BTX. This was partly due to a brighter image, with simply more detail and shades visible in the subjects thanks to the brightness. Kowa also seemed sharper and more distinctive. Risks floating more than four miles on the surface of the water were much more effortless to spot on the Kowan 99A than on the BTX, and the white spot on the wing of the rooks was more easily distinguished from flying birds on the Kowan than the BTX. Similarly, the hull texts of ships at sea became clearer and farther clear compared to the BTX. This was partly due to a clearer distinction between black and white, which in turn was influenced by a clearly brighter image compared to BTX. This made it easier to spot birds against dark credit, for example, with the Kowa than with the BTX. The Kowan TSN-99A image got a similar sense of image enhancement effect as having compared Swarovski’s EL model to Swarovski’s latest NL Pure model, the image was really impressive. In addition, Kowa's field of view is clearly wider than that of BTX, which makes it easier to find objects or facilitates scanning with a telescope. The only thing Kowa lost was the ease of watching the BTX tube. I used my right left eye with Kowa while keeping my right eye closed. The result was that the right eye got tired pretty quickly. Of course, the situation is alleviated when you cover the free eye with your hand or a patch. BTX does not have the same problem, as both eyes are used for viewing like binoculars.

The power of modern pipes is understood when cormorants and seagulls standing and lying on a islet nearly seven kilometers away, as well as flying terns, were easy to distinguish. Likewise, the sea eagle would be easily identifiable from that distance. The islets and cormorants of the islet, even 13 kilometers away, stood out reasonably well, of course it was not possible to distinguish species from the logs, but it was nevertheless able to say that they were logs. Similarly, at a islet three and a half miles away, predatory swallows were easily distinguishable by both pipes. Sure, the very favorable weather played a part, but it also speaks to the excellence of optics today. I also tried the tubes without tele extensions and the Kowan 40x brightness and wide field of view (39 m vs. 32 m / 1000 m away) made an impact, but the difference in BTX in brightness leveled off somewhat. In general, 35x and 40x magnification work well in most situations, but in good conditions, for example, by the sea, the higher magnification provided by the teleconverter is of real benefit and helps to control a surprisingly large area. Unfortunately, I didn’t have time to test the zoom in the terrain, but have to come back to it later. It would have been interesting to see how much brighter the fixed 40x eyepiece would have been compared to the zoom.

The next day I tried very briefly on the Kowan TSN-99A test board with both 40x and zoom with and without a tele extension. The comparison pair was the Swarovski ATX model 30-70x95. Kowa was perhaps a little surprisingly left with a hint of Swarovski, surprisingly because Kowa was so much better off-road compared to the BTX model. The smallest pairs of lines stood out a little more effortlessly with Swarovski, but both still showed the same number of patterns. Just as I put a 30-70x zoom in the Kowa, the picture looked a little dimmer than with the ATX. The trial period was very short and superficial and no conclusions can be drawn correctly. In the star test, the pattern on the Kowa was very neat in the other direction and no color was visible on the outer perimeter but the patterns were all white. This indicates excellent color aberration control. In the other direction, the star pattern was less clear, which is common to almost all the tubes I tested. We need to get back to testing even more closely with zoom, as long as the official versions of the Kowan TSN-99A go on sale in October.

Kowa TSN-99A tube is surprisingly sleek and light, the body weight is given at 1810 g and the zoom eyepiece and 40x wide angle at 370 g for a total of 2180 g. The body is made of magnesium, and the body is not rubber-coated like many other tubes today, which also helps keep the weight low. Kowa is the only manufacturer to use a lens made of fluorite crystal mineral in its telescope. Together with the XD lens, chromatic aberration has been minimized from the image. Different colors of light refract at slightly different angles as they pass through the lens, different lenses try to minimize this color scattering, and the fluorite crystal lens used by Kowa is one of the best inhibitors of color aberration. When different colors can be applied to the same point, the image becomes sharp and toned and there are no colored borders on the edges of the subjects.

The Kowaan comes with a wide variety of accessories, such as a filter in front of the front lens, various camera and phone adapters, a tele-extension and an astro-eyepiece adapter. The pedestal shoe has two screw locations, ie the telescope can be attached to the quick plate with two screws, which prevents the telescope from rotating relative to the quick plate. Dual focus is already familiar from the previous 880 and 770 models, and the same eyepieces and accessories as the previous models also apply to the new TSN-99 model. The all-time protective bag will not be available as an accessory until the end of 2021. The new 40x eyepiece is ideal for excellent telemarketing, and with the eyepiece, the image of the phone does not have black borders, but the image fills the entire image area. According to the current trend, the lens surfaces are coated with a water and dirt repellent coating (as well as the surface of the optional filter), which helps keep the lenses clean.

The model in the test was still a demo device and it may be that the sales pieces have been honed even better. At least with the new 40x super wide angle, the image was very impressive and the 40x eyepiece and teleconverter should cope with all possible situations. Let's get back to the point as soon as the sales pieces are available for testing.
I compared my 95 stx to kowa 99a ended up buying the kowa made swaro look dull and lifeless far better image in kowa also zoom sharper and brighter on 40x with better depth of field
 
I compared my 95 stx to kowa 99a ended up buying the kowa made swaro look dull and lifeless far better image in kowa also zoom sharper and brighter on 40x with better depth of field
Me too I swapped my stx 95 for kowa 99a for the same reason much brighter and punchier image
 
Me too I swapped my stx 95 for kowa 99a for the same reason much brighter and punchier image
Did you tested the X115?
From the reports read here at BF is much easier to get a very good X95 than a similar Kowa 99... Still didn't seem a Kowa 99 star test that doesn't shows SA. The same happens with the X115 but this has much bigger aperture!
The Kowas can receive some astro-eps being that some have wider AFOVs and/or FOVs than the TE-80, most being less expensive.
 

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