BirdForum is the net's largest birding community dedicated to wild birds and birding, and is absolutely FREE!

Register for an account to take part in lively discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="CliveP" data-source="post: 3336998" data-attributes="member: 85835">Well I've been having a wonderful time with this all NOT.No Hawke still so started to query the seller. They posted it 2nd class untracked Dec 21 so it's probably lying under a pile of absolute no priority mail or lost or not sent. Anyhow it's now past the very long 5 Jan delivery date.On the other hand the Viking monocular I ordered only a couple of days ago (2nd class tracked) turned up yesterday. Unfortunately it appears to be pretty horrid to look through and seems pretty much as though that will be a return. They view is basically on the tiny dreary dull side with a nice fluffy edge blur. I don't think I will be able to stand that. From what I've seen so far over distance it doesn't seem to add anything much over the unaided both eye view in fact it isn't even as pleasing. On the other hand it is very good reversed for reading small print. Then it's nice and bright with sharp edges and a very relaxed view so I'm sort of wondering would it be worth keeping just for that.Hopefully I will receive the Optima today as it was also posted tracked 2nd class and I do expect that to be an improvement on the Viking so it will give me some more perspective on things.The Helios is another 2nd class no tracking wonder so who knows when/if that will ever arrive and I'm not that hopeful about it being much good now given the disappointment of the Viking since they are both pretty cheap retail but I'm hoping it will at least give me an idea of whether it might be worth going for the Doctor 8x21.So far only pain.Edit: Ok it's getting light now so the Viking is improving. To give it some perspective there is no doubt that I can read a street sign (about 100m away) with the monocular whereas I cannot with my eyes only but if I then try my poorest binocular my Bresser 8x28 the sign is massive in comparison (the Bresser has a small view compared to my other bins) and I can read the small print of house numbers under the main street name. It's still pretty dull so the Viking should improve some more with more light and I seem to be able to use it with both eyes open and no eyepatch <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" /> It's also easy to blink from one eye to the other and see the 4x magnification in action so it's sort of growing on me, possibly? The smallness of it is good and it's easy to hold steady and the focus is nice and smooth, just wish the view seemed bigger. I think that is the weak point and I was expecting better for a 12.5 deg fov. I've just held one side of Bresser to one eye and the monoc to the other and blinked back and forth and even the Bresser @108m fov does give a bigger seeming view even though it's APOV is about 50 compared with the monoc at about 60 so these figures alone do not reflect how the actual size of the view looks even though technically they may be correct.Just checked out a Chaffinch on the garden fence and it's sort of a little bit more clear with the monoc than eyes only but with only one side of the Bresser 8x28 it's much much better. Maybe I'll saw the Bresser up <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" />Ok more later as I get more stuff and tryouts.</blockquote>

Verification