What binoculars do you think have the most WOW factor! (1 Viewer)

[bh46118]

Mine have damn near none, and I haven't heard anyone complain about it in theirs either. Personal experience, or something you read ? I don't know if your being a smart ass on not, but no I don't need any new binos.

Just double checked. Zens have more CA than FLs and SVs. Time for new binos?

 

[eitanaltman]

Just double checked. Zens have more CA than FLs and SVs. Time for new binos?

Maybe the FL but not the SVs. Allbinos, for all of their panning of the Zens, gave them a much better CA score than the SV (8.7 vs 7.2), slightly better than the EDG (8.5) and almost as good as the FL (9.2).

Time for new biases? The Zen EDs, in this specific area, are as good as the alphas. I feel sometimes like the cult of the SV is so great that people assume perfection in all areas. I found it quite easy to induce CA on the SV towards the edges just like any other bin I've ever tried (Zen ED included).

 

[eitanaltman]

To me it is. There is nothing wrong with returning stuff.

There is nothing wrong with returning stuff if you are legitimately using the return policy in good faith. There IS something wrong with exploiting the good graces of a company and using a return policy in bad faith as your personal rental service.

 

[Hermann]

I am testing their return policy. I am sure pretty soon they are going to Blacklist me from ordering anymore binoculars. HaHa!

I think that kind of behaviour is unethical.

Hermann

 

[Kammerdiner]

Mine have damn near none, and I haven't heard anyone complain about it in theirs either. Personal experience, or something you read ? I don't know if your being a smart ass on not, but no I don't need any new binos.

I have all three. Real-time comparison was between 8x43 Zen, Zeiss 8x32 FL, Swaro 8x32 SV (I have the 8.5 SV but I think it's at the office).

I'm not complaining about it either. All three are just fine by me. But let's not say others "aren't even close" when these days a whole bunch of them are really, really close.

And don't forget that if a binocular has fuzzy edges it's easy to hide the CA in the fuzz anyway. I sometimes think that's part of the FL plan. The CA is there, but who in heck wants to look at it?

As for Dennis, I've long since entirely stopped listening to his "reviews," since his opinions are always extremes, and he always flip-flops anyway.

Mark

 

[Kammerdiner]

Maybe the FL but not the SVs. Allbinos, for all of their panning of the Zens, gave them a much better CA score than the SV (8.7 vs 7.2), slightly better than the EDG (8.5) and almost as good as the FL (9.2).

Time for new biases? The Zen EDs, in this specific area, are as good as the alphas. I feel sometimes like the cult of the SV is so great that people assume perfection in all areas. I found it quite easy to induce CA on the SV towards the edges just like any other bin I've ever tried (Zen ED included).

Right you are: the Zens are plenty good in terms of CA, for me at least. That's one of the many reasons I've kept the 8x43 ED2 even though it sees almost no use at all. Another reason is center resolution, which is extremely good. Perhaps the main reason, however, is resale value, which is to say it has none.

I also agree that the 8x43 ED2 is maybe as good as the 8.5 SV in terms of CA (no direct comparison available at this time), but that's not the one I was comparing it with. The 8x32 SV has been improved in that regard. But if some think the 8.5 SV shows more CA than others, I really think they may be confusing it with edge sharpness. The SE has the same problem: the CA is so daggone sharp and bright it probably looks worse (in comparison) than it really is. The FL smears CA around better so it doesn't look as bad. The Zen 8x43 does the same, but to a lesser extent. The 7x36 ED2 would be the king of hiding CA I think.:king: That's probably why some have claimed they couldn't see any at all in it.

Mark

 

[Chosun Juan]

I still wonder why very few of the Alphas can equal the ZEN's in this area. Maybe they should emulate the Zen-Ray geometry. Is it also true that the Swift Audubon 8.5X44 ED are also able to repress CA effectively ?

This is what I wrote about CA in the Audubons in comparison to the Zen ED3's on the swift thread: http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?p=2573603#post2573603

post#80, "*Excellent CA control in the sweet spot - CA is virtually non-existent here (better than the Zen, which itself, is quite good).", and

post#84, "Yes, the ED model. I'm quite susceptible to CA, so the non-ED version was never a consideration. How people manage not to see CA is a bit beyond me, .....
I had them out today, under brightish yet overcast and diffuse conditions, and tried them out v's the Zen 8x43 ED3's on various targets. By and large they were slightly better than the Zens on woodswallows way up high, as far as I could crank my neck back, and also crows and magpies flying by. When it came to looking low at an old dead eucalypt stag (weathered light silver colour) against where the late afternoon sun would have been, the Swifts seemed to show more (thicker) yellow fringing than the Zens for the first time. When looking at the moon at the moment (last half), it's clearly advantage Swift - very, very good indeed."

Using both bins, CA is barely perceptible normally (caveat: I'm sure my eyeglasses introduce their own "flava" of CA at various axis, perhaps due to some visible bifringence in the "transitions" coatings due to mounting stresses in the frame .... an untimely run-in with a carelessly placed rake, means that this won't be a long term problem!) :eek!: |:$| :-O

There are of course many times under "trying" circumstances, when CA rears its ugly head - then I'm usually seeing 'ribena berry drink' purple, through to rarely 'staminade' red on the left or top sides, and mostly 'lemon' yellow, through to 'rainbow' green less often, on the right hand or bottom sides (remembering of course that this is in the southern hemisphere!) ||


Chosun :gh:

 

[[email protected]]

There is nothing wrong with returning stuff if you are legitimately using the return policy in good faith. There IS something wrong with exploiting the good graces of a company and using a return policy in bad faith as your personal rental service.

I am not using them as my rental service. If I keep one binocular out of six that I have tried they still have made more money than another company that has not sold a binocular to me. That is their return policy and if it causes them problems they can change it. It doesn't bother me about returning a binocular. I am not going to keep it if I don't like it. I am paying the shipping charges both ways so what are they out? I am incurring the charges of trying these different binoculars not them.

 

[[email protected]]

I think that kind of behaviour is unethical.

Hermann

Not in the US. Tell that to the CEO of Amazon and he will laugh in your face because his billions have been made by allowing people to easily return stuff. It is especially important with online businesses where you can't see and handle the item you are buying.

 

[[email protected]]

I think that kind of behaviour is unethical.

Hermann

Unethical and it raises the possibility that retailers might change their policy because of "serial" testers such as Dennis. The privilege to try a bino before you buy or in some instances even directly compare two binos is a customer service that shouldn't be taken advantage of. If one attains a binocular under the pretense of purchasing but has no intention of doing so he/she is simply being dishonest.

I can't imagine lying to someone about wanting to purchase a binocular if it suits me when in reality I just want to take a peek through it so I can comment on Bird Forum about it. These type of cursory reviews are interesting but of little value because they usually don't involve any field testing and the testing period is of such short duration. It's usually after months in the field that you truly learn the real worth of a binocular and things that might have seemed a mere inconvenience initially become full fledged problems.

Steve

 

[Chosun Juan]

I only notice bold purple off-axis fringing in some of the most extreme binocular examples - 56 mm roofs etc.. For me, what I see all the time in overcast conditions is orangy lateral colour on distant trees or other vertical objects. The orange smear can become quite thick towards the edge of the field and is noticeable enough to clutter the quality of the image.

I also see [in overcast conditions] this orange smear either above or behind dark flying birds, such as Crows and backlit raptors and waterfowl. This form of CA seems to only occur outside of the bins sweetspot and must have something to do with reduced resolution.

How curious. I have never seen an orange smear. What shade of orange? As per an orange? The purple I see is as per blueberries, or this emoticon: :-O. I have seen a photo taken through, if I recall correctly, a Nikon 8x32 HG which showed purple fringing.

Why do you call it lateral colour? Are you using the term in the loose sense, of to one side, or the technical sense of lateral (transverse) CA?

Which binoculars show this orange CA?

This is becoming a little bizarre. |8.|

Leif, James,

I have also seen, (when observing a light morph little eagle against bright diffuse sky), a whopping great 'tangerine smear' smack dab in the centre of the field, such that I thought I was being transported into some weird parrallel dimension, which just happened to lob bang in the middle of one of those old-style 'fanta' commercials !! :hippy:

This was through the deservedly little known Gerber 7x50 porro. Its 1kg mass providing reassuring comfort when confronted by cranky 6 foot buck kangaroos, but little in the way of comparative viewing pleasure ..... :cat:


Chosun :gh:

 

[Chosun Juan]

Unethical and it raises the possibility that retailers might change their policy because of "serial" testers such as Dennis. The privilege to try a bino before you buy or in some instances even directly compare two binos is a customer service that shouldn't be taken advantage of. If one attains a binocular under the pretense of purchasing but has no intention of doing so he/she is simply being dishonest.

I can't imagine lying to someone about wanting to purchase a binocular if it suits me when in reality I just want to take a peek through it so I can comment on Bird Forum about it. These type of cursory reviews are interesting but of little value because they usually don't involve any field testing and the testing period is of such short duration. It's usually after months in the field that you truly learn the real worth of a binocular and things that might have seemed a mere inconvenience initially become full fledged problems.

Steve

:t: Couldn't agree more (especially if it's to serve an alterior motive) ..... :C


Chosun :gh:

 

[etudiant]

Unethical and it raises the possibility that retailers might change their policy because of "serial" testers such as Dennis. The privilege to try a bino before you buy or in some instances even directly compare two binos is a customer service that shouldn't be taken advantage of. If one attains a binocular under the pretense of purchasing but has no intention of doing so he/she is simply being dishonest.

Steve

While Dennis may be an extreme case, 'unethical' is just a wrong characterization. If he were doing serial exchanges at his local store, there might be an issue, but Amazon is global and its business model has room for extremes, including perennially searching buyers. There are similar purchasers in other sectors as well, rifles, cameras and camping gear all are markets that have enthusiasts who are always on the quest for the holy grail.

 

[Chosun Juan]

Here is how Allbinos ranks and scores CA for several of the top 8x42's in their
current tests.
The scoring is 0-8 points for center performance, and -/+ 2 points for behavior at the
edge.

Leica UV HD 8x42 -------------------- 5.3/10 ----- "Slight in the centre"
Swaro. 8.5 EL SV ------ ------------- 7.2/10 ----- "Almost invisible in the centre"
Nikon 8x42 EDG --------------------- 8.5/10 ----- "Very low in the centre"
Zeiss FL 8x42 ------------------------ 9.3/10 ----- "Corrected splendidly in the centre"
Swift 820ED Audubon 8.5x44 ------ 8.3/10 ----- "Very low in the centre"
Zen-Ray ZEN ED2 8x43 ------------ 8.7/10 ----- "Low in the centre"
Kowa Genesis 8.5x44 -------------- 9/10 ------- "Very low in the middle"
Nikon SE 8x32 --------------------- 7/10 ------- "Negligible in the centre"

These results seem to be similar to many comments on this thread and others.

Jerry

Jerry; all,

- that's an interesting snippet about the allbino's CA scoring makeup - even if they don't fess up about the numerical result of each component! That's why I always place equal importance on their centrefield CA descriptors (although who really knows how consistent they are in that, since they don't list the order /magnitude /threshold for those).

I've added those in above to your original data (in red, bold font), along with a few more bins of recent query.

I think folk would be well served to keep these centrefield terms (and their relativity) in mind, during any comparison of allbino's data for CA, remembering that off axis, and edge performance is, for some, hard to /rarely access(ed) in practice due to complications by ER, spherical abberation of the EP traits, field curvature, distortions, blackouts, etc ......

(there seems to me to be something to what kammerdiner is saying about the 'ease' of seeing this edge CA in the SV, due to its excellent ER, and widely reported ease of eye placement and view, and edge clarity, in comparison to other bins)

There's a whole host of other intangibles thrown in there as well, such as, just exactly what is the "centrefield", its size as a % of view, and Tfov, testing conditions, etc, etc, etc ...... as everyone has already discussed on this thread. At least this is some sort of attempt to quantify it, along with henry's suggestion of a standardised test, and Leif (and others) pointing out that we all have our own little testing regimes /apertures - conditions /favourite targets /individual triggers.

In the end no matter how much we try and standardise the tests, it will be subject to individual variance. Nobody is saying this is what you MUST see (where have I heard that before!) or invalidating an individual's experience, but surely, the value for all of us in a forum like this, is in trying to sort the binocular 'wheat' from the eye 'chaff'. I'm sure if there is a difference of opinion, we'll soon know all about it! but eventually some sort of consensus is nutted out - I know, I know - no need to get all Zen like on me, and "a binocular without an eye behind it observes nothing" .....

Really, I've forgotten more about ordinary differential equations, fourier transforms, and maxwell equations etc than I ever learnt - so if somebody wants to come along and detail the mathematical premise behind longitudinal, or lateral CA - I'm all for it. I think in all of that above - there's room for everybody to be 'right' .......


Chosun :gh:

 

[JabaliHunter]

While Dennis may be an extreme case, 'unethical' is just a wrong characterization. If he were doing serial exchanges at his local store, there might be an issue, but Amazon is global and its business model has room for extremes, including perennially searching buyers. There are similar purchasers in other sectors as well, rifles, cameras and camping gear all are markets that have enthusiasts who are always on the quest for the holy grail.

Don't forget though that there are many small retailers and individuals who sell through the Amazon Marketplace

 

[bh46118]

Thanks

Sorry for the snarkiness. Is snarkiness a real word ?:scribe::-O

I have all three. Real-time comparison was between 8x43 Zen, Zeiss 8x32 FL, Swaro 8x32 SV (I have the 8.5 SV but I think it's at the office).

I'm not complaining about it either. All three are just fine by me. But let's not say others "aren't even close" when these days a whole bunch of them are really, really close.

And don't forget that if a binocular has fuzzy edges it's easy to hide the CA in the fuzz anyway. I sometimes think that's part of the FL plan. The CA is there, but who in heck wants to look at it?

As for Dennis, I've long since entirely stopped listening to his "reviews," since his opinions are always extremes, and he always flip-flops anyway.

Mark

 

[bh46118]

In your opinion do the Swift's have SE level resolution and illumination along with better CA control ?

Thanks Bruce

This is what I wrote about CA in the Audubons in comparison to the Zen ED3's on the swift thread: http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?p=2573603#post2573603

post#80, "*Excellent CA control in the sweet spot - CA is virtually non-existent here (better than the Zen, which itself, is quite good).", and

post#84, "Yes, the ED model. I'm quite susceptible to CA, so the non-ED version was never a consideration. How people manage not to see CA is a bit beyond me, .....
I had them out today, under brightish yet overcast and diffuse conditions, and tried them out v's the Zen 8x43 ED3's on various targets. By and large they were slightly better than the Zens on woodswallows way up high, as far as I could crank my neck back, and also crows and magpies flying by. When it came to looking low at an old dead eucalypt stag (weathered light silver colour) against where the late afternoon sun would have been, the Swifts seemed to show more (thicker) yellow fringing than the Zens for the first time. When looking at the moon at the moment (last half), it's clearly advantage Swift - very, very good indeed."

Using both bins, CA is barely perceptible normally (caveat: I'm sure my eyeglasses introduce their own "flava" of CA at various axis, perhaps due to some visible bifringence in the "transitions" coatings due to mounting stresses in the frame .... an untimely run-in with a carelessly placed rake, means that this won't be a long term problem!) :eek!: |:$| :-O

There are of course many times under "trying" circumstances, when CA rears its ugly head - then I'm usually seeing 'ribena berry drink' purple, through to rarely 'staminade' red on the left or top sides, and mostly 'lemon' yellow, through to 'rainbow' green less often, on the right hand or bottom sides (remembering of course that this is in the southern hemisphere!) ||


Chosun :gh:

 

[Chosun Juan]

In your opinion do the Swift's have SE level resolution and illumination along with better CA control ?

Thanks Bruce

Bruce, I've spent scant time with the SE, and never A/B'd the two directly (I certainly didn't grill the SE's CA, or get to test it on the moon etc, but in non-taxing daytime viewing it was fine - I couldn't call it one way or the other based on that).

I was more concerned with image size, the 4mm EP, and general colour representation. Without resolution testing them side by side, I can only say that they both had that wonderful porro image clarity (which I'm sure you already know about)

I much preferred the 5mm EP of the Swift, and it's colour neutrality (not a fan of the red shift). The Swift is bee-right, and in gloomy conditions out did the SE from memory - I couldn't say how they'd compare in bright daylight, though the Swift visibly bests the Zen ED3 in an A/B. (don't ask me why the pupils don't dilate further in daylight to equalise the brightness of the Zen to the Swift - all I can say is what I saw - visible victory Swift).

The SE had that well known colour pop, though I think a lot of any advantage over the Swift there is due to glare control.

Sorry, not much help, but as I said in the Swift thread, worth checking out in person for US folk, to see if you can dodge the documented bullets that killed it for me.


Chosun :gh:

 

[eitanaltman]

Right you are: the Zens are plenty good in terms of CA, for me at least. That's one of the many reasons I've kept the 8x43 ED2 even though it sees almost no use at all. Another reason is center resolution, which is extremely good. Perhaps the main reason, however, is resale value, which is to say it has none.

I also agree that the 8x43 ED2 is maybe as good as the 8.5 SV in terms of CA (no direct comparison available at this time), but that's not the one I was comparing it with. The 8x32 SV has been improved in that regard. But if some think the 8.5 SV shows more CA than others, I really think they may be confusing it with edge sharpness. The SE has the same problem: the CA is so daggone sharp and bright it probably looks worse (in comparison) than it really is. The FL smears CA around better so it doesn't look as bad. The Zen 8x43 does the same, but to a lesser extent. The 7x36 ED2 would be the king of hiding CA I think.:king: That's probably why some have claimed they couldn't see any at all in it.

Mark

Cool, I hear where you are coming from.

 

[eitanaltman]

I am not using them as my rental service. If I keep one binocular out of six that I have tried they still have made more money than another company that has not sold a binocular to me. That is their return policy and if it causes them problems they can change it. It doesn't bother me about returning a binocular. I am not going to keep it if I don't like it. I am paying the shipping charges both ways so what are they out? I am incurring the charges of trying these different binoculars not them.

One out of six? Are you serious?

Also, to your last point, doesn't Eagle Optics offer free shipping? So you are really only paying shipping one way to return them. They are still incurring the cost of the initial shipping as well as the lost revenue on not being able to sell the opened product as "new" after they are returned.

This is an example of abusing the letter of the law while violating the spirit of the law. The policy is there to provide users with peace of mind that they can order something online and be protected if they don't like it. Or if you want to order 2-3 pairs and decide which one you like the best, then return the other two. It is NOT there to serve the needs of some amateur binocular reviewer's whimsies as you churn through dozens of pairs of bins.

Saying " if it causes them problems they can change it" is incredibly callous and selfish. Basically, you are willing to abuse their good graces and if other honest buyers end up getting penalized for your bad behavior, you don't care. Kudos to you for lacking any shame.