New Bino coparison

Hey guys, I finally decided to pick up some new binos and spent a few minutes going through pretty much everything they had under $300, even a couple over. My price range was ~$100, but I wanted to compare.

Nikon and Luepold were the main brands, along with a couple bushy and a few off brands including Alpine. I won't discuss all of them, just hit a few. I must say that the Leupolds, all though very clear and crisp were by far very dark compared to ALL the other brands. I even looked through some 8x42 Olympics that were also quite dark.

Alpines were a tad brighter than Leupolds, but not as clear, they are low buck bino's though so no big worry.

They had a couple small compact Bushnell's also, not too bad, decent priced but dark due to the small objectives. BUT, they were still brighter than the Leupolds. The only larger Bushnell's were the perma Focus model. I like the idea, and they have a nice price, but although they are very bright and clear, they have almost a partial 3D effect that was hard on my eyes due to having to make slight focus changes in your eye with varying distances. It does make images really stand out though.

What I settled on was a pair of Nikon Action 8x42's. They were about $80 and comparitively very crisp and clear compared to all the others I tested. Now don't get me wrong on the Leupold comments. I had actually wanted to get one of one sort or another but I really got dissapointed by the lack of light gathering they had. I suppose there is a chance that even though they were very dark when tested maybe they'd actually be brighter in dark situations but I didn't feel like chancing it. It was a dark gloomy day when I took them out, the guy was really nice about it and of course was trying to talk me into something high dollar for the effort. It comes with a very wide and comfy neck strap. I wore them for several hours with no fatigue. Ok now, I will also add that I do have one thing about them that I don't really like. The right eye focus adjustment gets moved a lot and messes with my eyes. Its not that its the binos fault, it doesn't turn overly easy, but with gloves on I always wind up moving it a little if I don't think about it.