OK, finally got the new Meopro HD in. I ended up with a 8x42 instead of a 10x42 like I orginally posted. This is my first pair of roof prism binoculars. The other reference points I have as far as quality goes are Docter 8X56's and Docter 15x60's. I regard both as very high quality, particularly the 15x60's. At some point I will sit down and do a more detailed comparison between the Docter 8x56's and these new Meopro HD's. Until then, here are my initial impressions: - Nothing really negative to report. - The case is OK and has a magnetic closure that I like. For this price point it could stand to be a little higher quality in terms of padding, but it's no big deal. Docter didn't even bother with a case on my poro's - Objective caps and rain guard fit fine. Strap is nice. - Overall build quality feels nice. You can tell they are intended to be somewhat lightweight, and they do not have an "overbuilt" feel to them. - Focusing wheel is nice and smooth. It reacts fairly quicker than I'm used to, but it's not a bother. Diopter is nice and stiff like it should be. The focus wheel takes less effort than I'm accustomed to, but I sort of like it. This combined with the quick ratio helps you make field adjustments pretty rapidly - My general assessment of optical quality is positive. No obvious deficiencies - The general feeling is an easy-on-the-eyes expereince - Weather so far has been cloudy, but looking at a distant treeline I did not detect obvious CA in this high contrast scene - Resolution is high, although I don't own any peer brand rood prisms to compare with. - Color seems very neutral. The view has a little "crisp-pop" to it that I like. - They have a bright appearance, but I have not used in very low light yet. - Eye cups fit me fine, and they have plenty of eye relief for me. I don't wear glasses, so I would fall in the camp of wishing to trade less eye relief for more field of view in binos. That's all for now. Like I said, where these binos might fall in ranking relative to peers, I don't really know. But there's nothing that stands out as being deficient. They do have enough optical quality to give you that ooohhh-check-that-out feel when you look through them. Maybe someone else who owns other high-end roof prims can chime in with a more meaningful comparison. David
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