Review on Celestron 52322 Landscout 12 36X60 Spotting by Greg Roberts

I bought this scope because it's small, light and fits in my daily backpack for hiking and birding trips. I have an Opticron 20-60x 80 scope that costs 10 times as much, but I rarely use it because of the added weight of the tripod. Overall I was very impressed with the Celestron 12-36xx60 scope. In the field it definitely helps to see details that I can't see with the binoculars. I did a direct comparison with the Opticron for reading newspaper prints at 50ft. The Opticron has the best picture quality you'd expect for the price tag, but the Celestron was pretty impressive. Other reviewers pointed out a number of limitations. The focus ring is a bit difficult to turn - the main problem is that even on a fairly stable tripod, the scope moves slightly when you turn the focus. At maximum magnification, you need to gradually rotate the ring and check the sharpness at each point. This adds a few seconds to the focusing process, which may or may not be crucial for wildlife viewing. The eye relief is fine for me, but can be a problem for people who wear glasses. The minimum focusing distance is slightly longer than other scopes, but in practice you will most likely have to switch to binoculars at this point. The included tripod doesn't make much sense for the telescope, as it requires a table at the right height. However, a tripod attached to the camera is handy for tabletop photography. In another comparison with the Opticron, I tried photographing the moon with a handheld digital camera attached to an eyepiece. I noticed that the Opticron gave 3x magnification when going from 20x to 60x, while the Celestron only gave about 2.1x magnification when going from 12x to 36x. Comparison with Opticron's image size showed that 12x was accurate, but 36x is closer to 26x (photos attached: don't judge the image quality as the exposure was hard to control on my camera and it's hand-held, but relative diameters make sense). I contacted Celestron's engineering department about this apparent discrepancy and they assured me that the zoom settings were correct, but they said they would not disclose their calibration procedure as per policy. Therefore, I leave it to the reader to interpret my results. For my purposes the magnification range is fine as anything over 30x is often limited by atmospheric conditions. A 26x scope in my everyday backpack is far more useful than a 60x scope left at home.