Customer Reviews

Olympus WideView 10x25 Porro Compact Binocular

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Very nice portable/compact binoculars. Very high quality given the necessary tradeoffs between price of the lens/prism system and the size of the overall unit. I have had very bad experiences with other "compact" binoculars in the past. Either they seem to have bad optics, a narrow field of view, a high price tag, or all of the above. But this Olympus has really made a believer out of me.

The most important things I appreciate about these binocs are:

1. that they have a wide field of view (72 deg), which is useful in framing your subject and in compensating for the minor hand jitter attendant in a 10x mag binoc;

2. that they are reasonably small, portable and durable (they were effortless to carry with me when I went India earlier in the year, and very useful for spotting and identifying the birds wheeling over the city, and I didn't feel like the binocs were too fragile/expensive to carry around with me);

3. the field of view is flat and well-focused from edge to edge.

Additionally, it is worth mentioning that the tradeoff made in these binocs for optic quality versus total size (i.e. they are not among the smallest of the 'compact' binocs out there) was a good one. The bottom line is that you want the binocs to be small, but not to the extent that the image is poor. The porro prism design of this Olympus model adds a little bit of size to the binocs, but in return you get better optics. I have experienced many problems with other "compact" binocs in the inexpensive (<$) price range because of the common use of cheap roof prism systems. Convergence problems sometimes manifest themselves in roof prism binocs; recognizable as vertical misalignment of the left and right eye images. This causes eyestrain. This Olympus model gives me a very clear image across the entire field of view with no convergence problems whatsoever.

Binoculars are great for concerts and the outdoors.

Binoculars are great for concerts and outdoors