hey folks. just wanted to share a couple of things with you guys, related to the "knock offs" and good quality genuine scopes. i have been a member for a couple of years with no interaction till a few months ago. i am looking for a couple of items and wanted opinions and feed back from those of you with more experience. i was taken badly a few years ago on one of the first fake leupolds in my area. as a poor country bumpkin, i always used open or peep sights, which i was pretty good with, till a few years ago when my eyes began getting bad. i purchased a "leupold" 3.5-10 long range tactical IR from a buddy of a buddy, whom i casually knew. it looked good, had an embossed black band stamped on the front , tactical turrets felt firm, nice click when rotated, even had direction arrows on the scope body for windage and elevation the sightron s3 doesn't have. i had never seen one, so took him at his word. it looked good to me. gave him $600 for it, a lot for me at the time. of course soon after it became obvious i was duped, the ir dial came apart inside. he wouldn't take it back or refund my money. don't talk to him anymore. so, now a few years later i am looking for a good scope and am pouring through everything i can find on cgn and the internet. almost settled on a sightron S3 6-24 or 8-32. i'm not too lazy to research it, on the contrary, have been reading everything i can find on scopes in this price range for a few weeks now. that is why for new, inexperienced guys like me, it is nice to see honest, complete, unbiased reviews and opinions on firearms, scopes, etc, by you guys with lots of knowledge and experience to share. it might seem trivial to you, but invaluable to me. these forums, when used as meant to, are a wealth of information we can use to help make what we hope is a good decision for us. a new S3 is about a grand. i'm on a retired medical pension, that's pretty well my whole income for a month. it will be a huge purchase for me, not to mention a spat with the mrs. so. please guys, those of you who take the time to post an honest, in depth review, keep up the good work. it is really helpful to some of us. thanks for listening. Zoot.