Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I am pretty experienced with many scopes for astronomy and wildlife; I have expensive and cheap ones, and usually know what to expect when I buy optics. I bought this because I needed a relatively inexpensive scope to take camping and in situations where it could be damaged or stolen. Overall, I am unhappy with the optical quality. The large objective makes a very bright image this is great and why I picked it. It seems fairly rugged for the price. However, I find that it is only useful at the very lowest 20X magnification. At that magnification, the images are pretty good. However, the decrease in quality with increased magnification is very rapid. It is not unusual for sharpness to degrade with magnification, but on this scope the degradation is dramatic. It also suffers from significant color fringing (chromatic aberration) that also, rapidly degrades with increased magnification. The focus control is quite coarse, so it is difficult to get a perfect focus. Another disappointment is the "eye relief". This is the distance the eye must be from the eyepiece. On this scope, it is hard to see the whole field of view with glasses. So, I recommend if you need need a bright image, but only at low magnifications. It is a very poor performer for looking at the moon or planets, also. I haven't checked it out on the shooting range, it might work out a little better there.