ctsmith,

In a limited number of tests, with my night-time optics chart test I have no been able to find any difference between the SHV and NSX scopes.

In this test, a cope is set on 6x and then aimed at a chart 25 yards away, illuminated with a 100-watt incandescent bulb, also 25 yards from the chart. (I bought a batch of the same bulbs several years ago, so keep the test consistent.) The with black-and-white lines that vary from 1" to 1/16" inch thick, and scopes are rated by the thinnest line that can be seen. If the line can be very clearly seen, the rating's given a + sign.

Average modern multi-coated scopes rate a 6, the 1/4" line . Above average is 7 (3/16"), and I've yet to test any scope yet that rates higher than 8 (1/8"). So far, both SHV's and NSX's have rated 7+.

As other examples, several Swarovski Z3's and the original Zeiss Conquests rated 7's, while more expensive Swarovski and Zeiss scopes rate 8's.

In the past few years, far more scopes rate 7-8 than they did when I first started using the chart-test over a decade ago. In fact, the scope has to be pretty inexpensive to rate a 6, and even some scope retailing for less than $300 rate 7's.

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John Steinbeck