Binos at Lidl Monday 21st

[Paul Evans]

Anyone know anything good, bad or indifferent about these binos on sale at Lidl from Monday...?

www.lidl.ie/ie/home_ni.nsf/pages/c.o.20091221.p.Binoculars_1030_x_60

10-30x60, fully coated, BK-7 glass, these are not the usual 10x50s (which are very good indeed) but are zooms, which tend to be not so good though there are exceptions. At £16.99 I reckon they're worth a look-see at least.

I shall report back.....


Paul.

[brianb]

I reckon they're look-see-leave on shelf ... zoom bins are hardly ever any good (that's why you don't see them bearing makers names like Leica & Swarovski). Loads of comments in the last couple of years that the Lidl bins are going down in quality too, with collimation issues very common.

[pook]

Hi Paul,
I must say that I bought a pair of zoom binos from this outlet a couple of years ago to try them, as the value sounded great. However I had to return them. It was a case of one eye looking at the object and the other eye looking for it!
Pook

[Paul Evans]

Well I picked up a pair of these. Not perfect by any means, but not junk either. Here's the initial impressions:-

Field of view poor at 10x but expands with zooming and is respectable by 20x and maintains this field up to 30x.

Sharp across the frame at all settings, but it is varifocal - ie needs refocusing after adjusting the zoom. Contrast is pretty reasonable too.

Probably best in performance around 20x there is pincushion distortion near the edges at all settings but this is pretty normal with budget binos.

The worst feature is the field of view at 10x, made a bit worse by the fact that the edge looks to be blurred as if it is restricted by the objective lens rather than a field stop, though zooming in improves this no end.

So useful, but with limitations. No surprise at the price.

Paul.

[virgo]

Hello,
Looked through three pairs. Field of view too narrow, distortions quite bad even at that low price. Build quality quite good. Image rather dim at 30X considering 60mm coated objective. Not worth buying in MHO.
Virgo