Steve C
Well-known member
Just for grins I showed the McKinley's to a few different people. Thing is I put some black tape over the focus knob so they wouldn't know which was 8x and which was 10x. A couple of these guys were dyed in the wool 10x users and it was not even possible to entertain the notion in their head that 10x was not "better" than an 8x.
So all I did was to tell them I was doing a survey. All the information needed was to answer the question which do you think is the better image, binocular #1 or binocular #2, and why was it they liked whichever one it was. Nothing scientific about this to be sure .
The two 10x users dumbfounded themselves when both of them told me essentially the same thing..."it's way easy to pick out the 10x, its number 2! It is brighter, sharper, easier to focus, and clearer too". Needless to say binocular number 2 was the 8x. That's a paraphrase of both, but close to what they said. Different places and times for both of these guys. I have an exceptionally eagle eyed nephew who just turned 25 and has always been a user of 10x, although he was not as adamant about it as the other two guys were. He also picked out the 8x as the best binocular. That started him asking a lot of questions he'd never really asked me about binoculars before. I'd given him a ZRS 10x42 because he liked it best of the several I had at the time. He spent quite awhile over several days looking at stuff in general making his mind up. His deciding comments were something along the lines of..."If I look close enough, the 10x is bigger, but the 8x is clearer and shows the colors better and you can tell more about lots of things with the 8x. The 8 is easier to look through for a long time too. Now that you tell me about the difference in field of view, I can see that too".
His birthday was two days ago and he now has an 8x McKinley, as I offered him his choice for his birthday.
This sort of parallels a demonstration at our local birding show from about ten or twelve years ago. Brunton had a display and optics demonstrations of all sorts and one of the things they did was disguise 7x, 8x, and 10x binoculars and collect data from a protocol they had everybody go through. In this instance, 7x won hands down, with 8x someplace in the middle, and 10x way behind the curve in third place. This was at the time Brunton introduced the original Eterna line in 7x42 and 10x42. Not surprisingly they introduced the 7x based on their blind user tests, and the 7x proceeded to flop and was replaced by 8x in the newer Eterna line.
So at lest with these two Leupold McKinley binoculars, 8x seems to get the preference. keep in mind that in my mind this a a really good 10x too. I can see nothing to indicate it has any sort of problem that would hinder it. For a 10x it has quite good apparent depth of field. But obviously not as good as the 8x. This is my bet on the comments on the 8x being easier to focus.
I'm still pretty impressed with the Gold Ring. If forced to choose between the GR and the McK, I have to say the GR is a better binocular. The differences are slim, and I could easily do with a McKinley and really not wish for much better binocular.
So all I did was to tell them I was doing a survey. All the information needed was to answer the question which do you think is the better image, binocular #1 or binocular #2, and why was it they liked whichever one it was. Nothing scientific about this to be sure .
The two 10x users dumbfounded themselves when both of them told me essentially the same thing..."it's way easy to pick out the 10x, its number 2! It is brighter, sharper, easier to focus, and clearer too". Needless to say binocular number 2 was the 8x. That's a paraphrase of both, but close to what they said. Different places and times for both of these guys. I have an exceptionally eagle eyed nephew who just turned 25 and has always been a user of 10x, although he was not as adamant about it as the other two guys were. He also picked out the 8x as the best binocular. That started him asking a lot of questions he'd never really asked me about binoculars before. I'd given him a ZRS 10x42 because he liked it best of the several I had at the time. He spent quite awhile over several days looking at stuff in general making his mind up. His deciding comments were something along the lines of..."If I look close enough, the 10x is bigger, but the 8x is clearer and shows the colors better and you can tell more about lots of things with the 8x. The 8 is easier to look through for a long time too. Now that you tell me about the difference in field of view, I can see that too".
His birthday was two days ago and he now has an 8x McKinley, as I offered him his choice for his birthday.
This sort of parallels a demonstration at our local birding show from about ten or twelve years ago. Brunton had a display and optics demonstrations of all sorts and one of the things they did was disguise 7x, 8x, and 10x binoculars and collect data from a protocol they had everybody go through. In this instance, 7x won hands down, with 8x someplace in the middle, and 10x way behind the curve in third place. This was at the time Brunton introduced the original Eterna line in 7x42 and 10x42. Not surprisingly they introduced the 7x based on their blind user tests, and the 7x proceeded to flop and was replaced by 8x in the newer Eterna line.
So at lest with these two Leupold McKinley binoculars, 8x seems to get the preference. keep in mind that in my mind this a a really good 10x too. I can see nothing to indicate it has any sort of problem that would hinder it. For a 10x it has quite good apparent depth of field. But obviously not as good as the 8x. This is my bet on the comments on the 8x being easier to focus.
I'm still pretty impressed with the Gold Ring. If forced to choose between the GR and the McK, I have to say the GR is a better binocular. The differences are slim, and I could easily do with a McKinley and really not wish for much better binocular.
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