Steve, what is the "prime" in relation to new vortex binos? Better ED glass?
Also while I have your attention, will they be upgrading the 82 ED2 spotter also in the near future? lastly have you compared the Zen ED2 82 spotter to the Vortex Razor HD and Theron mag 82-I am going to buy one of these three soon and am trying to decide on which.
Thanks
The Prime is just a name for the new binocular. They did not elect to use an ED 4 designation because it is a diferent design, based on a more traditional single hinge. As far as I know, the Prime is a significant attempt by Zen Ray to improve the edge performance and flatten the field of the ZEN series. The resolution specs will be improved some too. First samples are maybe a month away, best case, as I mentioned above. It will have improved glass and coating technology. It is a triplet ED, air spaced objective system and will have two HD (Lanthum crown) glass elements in the eye piece to serve as field flatteners. So it has both HD glass and ED glass. It is going to cost somewhere in the $600-650 range. It will have just about the same fov as the ZEN series.
I have had the ZEN ED 2 and Razor HD spotters side by side. If you put each in the stay on case, where you can't see the name labels, I would have to see for myself that either ZEN or Razor owners could tell which one was which. The ZEN has a dielectric coating on the pentaprism, and the Razor is silver, so the ZEN might ultimately show itself to be a little brighter, but I doubt the difference is significant. As to ZED 2 spotter upgrades, I don't have a clue there.
I did a fairly long review of the Kowa Prominar 884 20-60, the Theron Mag 82 and the ZEN ED 2. I think I posted it here as well as on Bird forum and Optics Talk, if I didn't I have no idea why I didn't. Short story is I think the Kowa is the best spotter going, period. The ZEN and Mag 82 stand up very well, and I have yet to be sorry, after having the ZEN for over a year, to regret the purchase. I got it over the Theron because the dual focus knob of the ZEN (Razor too) was easier to fine focus on high magnification than was the single helical collar of the Mag 82. Depth of field is pretty shallow over 50x, and the Theron went to 75x. But the Theron can now be had for $850 and has both a superb 30x WA and a 25-75x zoom. That was just about the hardest optics decision I have ever had to make. The Theron is the clear leader right now on value with the holiday price they have, with both eye pieces included.