Alexis Powell
Natural history enthusiast
...My only gripe with the Nikon is that the eyepieces are very hard to find.
I already have the Nikon ED50, so I won't be needing the MM3 myself, but it looks like the scope to recommend to folks who see my ED50 and want one. If the optics are good, it seems a direct competitor--only a bit more expensive than the ED50 (which recently dropped back down to $650 at the major sellers, maybe a sign that it is soon to be discontinued), only several oz heavier, slightly more bulky, but with better focus knob. I can't recommend the ED50 in good conscience to anyone who doesn't want the zoom and doesn't already own the fixed eyepieces. But that raises the question of availability of Opticron eyepieces in the USA. Are they available? I suppose even if they had to be ordered from the UK it would still be easier than shipping Nikon eyepieces via Tenso from Amazon Japan. I'm having flashbacks to when Bushnell (a USA based brand!) offered fixed eyepieces for its Elite scope and showed them on the USA website but only distributed them in Europe. There have been similar issues with other brands in the past.
--AP