I was as the GAOS This weekend. I looked at Steiner, Zeiss, Vortex, Meopta, Tract and the Maven.
I was most disappointed that the 2016 Diamondbacks were not there for testing. I Looked at the Viper HD, and CrossfireII.
I think the crossfire were junk, alot of distortion away from center, the Viper HD were nice clear but the rep didn't have alot of knowledge and the Votex scopes were selling like hotcakes which made it hard to not be crowded at the booth..
I feel the Meopta Meostar and Meopro were good glass but seemed like they were tinted a bit. The show prices were higher than what Cameraland lists on their website, but I was close to purchasing Meostars.
The Zeiss Terra were not impressive at all. Conquest were very solid. I liked them.
The Steiners Predator didn't impress, they ranked between the Crossfire and the Vipers to me.
The Tract seemed light and fragile, again an unknowledgeable booth attendant. Overall not impressed with them.
I found the Maven to be on par with the Zeiss Conquest and slightly ahead of the Meopta and Viper.
I really wish the optics booths would have been closer together, all in the same room. This show is huge and we covered alot of ground going back and forth. With the rooms having different lighting it was hard to compare apples to apples, especially indoors.
At the end, I almost left without new glass. But I kept thinking about the Maven.. I bought a set of demos in the B1 Grey body in 8x42 and 700$ I toyed with them in the vehicle on the way home and feel I made a great decision. I plan to get them out this eveing and glass some fields and put them through some real paces.
I am not an optics expert, so don't kick me in the balls for my statements made here. I do realize that testing glass indoors is not a good representative of their true performance. I have owned 4 sets of Leupolds in the 120$ - 400$ range and they just haven't held up to my abuses. It was time for me to try another brand.
