Swarovski spotting scope

So I had my mind set on buying a Swarovski ATS 20-60X65 based on everyone's feedback on various threads. I finally got a chance to look at one at Cabela's today and was shocked to find that with it and the Vortex side by side, I felt the razor outperformed the Swarovski. Specifically the eye relief was awful on the Swarovski. I practically had to put my eye ball on the glass to get any type of picture and anything past 20 zoom and the picture shrunk to a pin hole. This is the opposite of everything I read so what am I missing?

I was comparing the 65mm objective in both but as soon as I looked through the Vortex even at 60 zoom the picture was still full size for the objective. I was actually really disappointed and shocked. I know everyone says Swarovski is better in low light but I cant imagine this getting better with less light.

If you want a great scope go look at a kowa. They blow swaro out of the water and it's not even close.

Go buy the 85 razor and come with me on the mtn at dusk. You can't be in a well-lit building to see the difference.

I've heard good things about the Kowa.

If Vortex could charge more for their optics.... they would.

You get what you pay for in this world.

Carnage2011 said:

If you want a great scope go look at a kowa. They blow swaro out of the water and it's not even close.

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This is certainly the case with the Swaro 80 and 65. I can't speak for the 85 or 95

We put a swaro 95 and a kowa 88 side by side last year in Colorado and kowa was significantly better at higher power in low light. My uncle owned the swaro and has since sold it to get a kowa.

From what I hear the Kowa is better in low light.

There is no comparison between a vortex and a swaro. None. Stare through one for 6-8 hours a day on a 10 day sheep hunt. By day 2 you'll think you took sand paper to your eyes with the vortex.

Would take a kowa over a swaro any day of the week.

For everyone saying you get what you pay for, that doesn't answer the question. Why is the eye relief so poor on the Swarovski compared to the Vortex? Again, I wanted the Swarovski to be the winner and expected it to be and it's not a money problem. I physically could not see nearly anything in the Swarovski past 30 zoom. For everyone recommending Kowa, I haven't found a dealer nearby so I can look through it to compare. Also I took both scopes outside and compared them glassing cell towers about a mile away.

I couldn't really compare the quality since I couldn't see through the Swarovski. I'm wondering if the Swarovski was defective or what else it could be.

nhn2a

PM sent

There is a Kowa 664 Prominar on the Rokslide classifieds for a great price. Buy it before I sell my POS Vortex and get it myself. mtmuley

Were you testing in a retail shop? I've owned both and there is no comparison. Swaro Hans down.

Which model kowa are you referring to that beats the Swarovski?

To the OP......you cannot judge two spotters in a store for anything but weight and size.

Well I ended up buying the Vortex Razor 20-60x80. The associates at Cabelas let me take the scopes outside to compare them. I did the first comparison at around 2pm between the Swarovski ATS 65 with 20-60 eyepiece and the Vortex Razor 20-60x80. I spent about an hour going between both scopes. I really liked the size of the Swarovski but as I described above I was highly disappointed with its performance. After that I started this thread on the way to the mall with the wife as I was completely dumbfounded by the results.

Well we were driving back by Cabelas on the way home at 8pm tonight and I couldn't resist the urge to try it again but at sunset so we stopped again only this time I asked them to bring out the Swarovski 80mm ATS thinking maybe it was just a problem with that particular scope or that size. Once again the eye-relief on the Swarovski was still problematic. I had to get much closer to the eyepiece on the Swarovski which made it much more uncomfortable for me to look through. The 80mm was a significant improvement over the 65mm model when it came to sight picture and the eye-relief issue I described in my original post but still not nearly as good as the Vortex. I will say that with my eye up against the glass and finally able to see a full sight picture, the Swarovski did have a crisper picture than the Vortex although not as much of an improvement as I expected. However the Vortex performed very well at low light and much better than I expected. In the end, I was able to get the Vortex Razor for $980. It was the last one they had so since I've got 90 days to return it I figured it was worth buying and testing out since the Swarovski is 2.5 times more expensive.

Again before everyone says buy once cry once, this decision was not about money. I own the Swarovski EL Ranges binos and a Swarovski Z5 5-25x52mm Rifle scope and on those I felt like they were indeed top of the line and worth every penny. It may just be me but I did not get that impression from the spotting scopes. I'm gonna look around and see if I can find a Kowa to look at but so far none of the big chains around here in NC carry them.

Stubaby said:

Which model kowa are you referring to that beats the Swarovski?

To the OP......you cannot judge two spotters in a store for anything but weight and size.

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The 773 & 883 with the 25-60 Wide Angle Eyepiece. It is worth noting the 664 is a lower level glass.

Not even Vortex thinks they're as good as a Swarovski... that's great if your eyes like them more though. It's your money and your eyes, so go for it.

P.S. The Kowa Prominar are often considered the best glass available, but their bodies are considered not as robust and well- built as the Swarovski line, which some people worry about for hunting verses something like birding. Take a look at birding websites for really solid optics reviews, they often know more than the hunting websites.

Schaaf said:

The 773 & 883 with the 25-60 Wide Angle Eyepiece. It is worth noting the 664 is a lower level glass.

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Where did you see that the 663 and 664 are lower level glass? Far as I know, objective size is the only difference from the 77 and 88 series. mtmuley

Schaaf said:

The 773 & 883 with the 25-60 Wide Angle Eyepiece. It is worth noting the 664 is a lower level glass.

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mtmuley said:

Where did you see that the 663 and 664 are lower level glass? Far as I know, objective size is the only difference from the 77 and 88 series. mtmuley

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No fluorite in the 660 series.

http://sportingoptics.kowa-usa.com/scopes/

Also no fluorite in the 770 series. The 880 has the fluorite lenses. The nice thing about the 770 is it allows you to use the TE-11WZ Eyepiece with 2 XD Lenses. Other than that it sounds like the 770 and 669 has the same glass.

Missed that. The two bigger scopes are a bit much for packing around I'm thinking. mtmuley