Talk me out of D-300 night vision

[Luckyorwhat]

I'm ordering a D-300, but they couldn't process my credit-card today and have to wait until tomorrow. So there's 24 hours to change my mind, and I'd be willing to listen if anyone can talk me out of it.


Right now all I've got is a Russian 'Cyclops' big heavy Gen1 monocular with 3.4x magnification. I took it camping once but it's not useful. I tried to gather firewood with it, but you can't walk well while using it, or carry firewood! There's an IR flashlight that mounts on top and helps some at close range. And there's a button you have to press to make the scope work, you hold it down and the scope makes a clicking noise, then you release the button and the scope amplifies light for a couple minutes. Best I figured was you could look ahead for any obvious stumps or cliffs, then find your way along with a flashlight. So my advice is to stay away from magnified gen1 monoculars. I personally didn't mind it's performance though, it's finicky to focus on close objects but if you don't mind a little blurriness you can get a pretty good idea what things are. And if you have a minute to focus you can get a pretty clear picture.

But now I'm getting a D-300 in Gen2, it's half the weight, superior performance, and multi-use. I'm getting the hands-free kit to go with it, but they also sell gizmos (That don't break the bank) to mount the scope on a rail behind your sight, or to turn it into a weapon sight itself, or even to clamp it onto the back of your favorite rifle scope and turn that into a night-vision scope (though it will be degraded brightness, by whatever magnification you use).

After I receive the new one I'll do a proper thread with comparison pictures. But right now the D-300 is a smoking deal.

 

[CyaN1de]

Ummmm....yeah....welllllll....... Dun Do It.

 

[HeVGunner]

How much and where at?

 

[eltorro]

In time, by season starting, you'll see that the price will drop.

Gen II is not worth it. the technology has moved on and it's a waste of money.

If you don't get the head-mount binocular NV you might as well use a camera that has NV.

a headmounted LED flashlight is better than any NV for gathering wood in camp.

I heard zombies got IR detectors to get those gizmo lovers...

 

[esquif]

unless you pay a couple of grand for a 3 or 4 gen dont. Gen 1 and 2 are basiclly useless in my experience

 

[Luckyorwhat]

Too late.

HevGunner Got it from the Vic the NV guy at AR15. Arriving Monday or early this week. Cost $980 for the plain gen2, but you can't get that so you have to spend $1250 for the milspec gen2, which I guess looks a little better anyway. The reason you can't buy the plain gen2 is because they need a tube data sheet, which is like 'provenance', this ensures that you are ACTUALLY getting a gen2, not someone smuggling controlled technology to North Korea inside a pair of binoculars. So milspec ones are hand-picked and examinied and certified, I think that's why they cost more.


ElTorro that's what I thought, but that was based on Gen1 impressions. But what do you mean by season starting? I also learned there is a lot of things that go into these, lots of little things that can be good or bad, and that's why not to buy ATN products. Basically it's like car engines, you or I look at the scope and see a sports car, but someone who knows will see the engine inside, the headers, this one has a dry-sump, etc. Basically I just watched what informed people ridiculed and praised, and accepted it.

Plus a head-mount LED isn't very modular, where a monocular you can use with guns

Esquif the way I see it the USA is head and shoulders above the competition in the world for night vision. And they are very serious about preserving that. I mean sure France and who else is still sneaking units out and going to copy them, but there's no big group orders going to Afghanistan and such. So the point is that while Gen3 or Gen4 might be nice, albeit prohibitively expensive, there's no way for you or I to buy them. They simply will not ship them to you, a company called ITT just got busted and fined $100,000,000 for breaking the rules. No seller in their right mind would sell you anything above Gen2, and I was specifically told that the billing address and shipping address MUST match. Plus Gen3 costs 3 times as much!

Aiui the Gen3 is better when passive, but I'm not really going room-clearing on a moonlit night And Gen2 is still good without illumination, it's just going to see about 60% of the distance of a Gen3 in the same low light conditions, aiui.

Plus there's all sorts of improvement in infra-red flashlights: check this out, for $150:

The built-in illuminator on a D300 is supposed to be good for a few yards, maybe 30 or 50, but these flashlights are called Da Torch, come with rail mounts built-in, and look at that light! Gen2 and one of those and you'll be doing just fine farther than a rifle could shoot.

And that's another bonus, because the D300 can be worn on the head, or you can buy a rifle mount, it works with all PVS14 mounts, or you can buy their special mount and stick it on the back of your normal rifle scope! The problem with magnification is that normal scopes will lose light, and the more you zoom in the less brightness the picture will have, so that's where an IR flashlight (or a laser that does the same thing) would, if you pardon the pun, 'shine'.

 

[eltorro]

Season starting means that most of them go on sale by the end of the year.
It's a good buy, specially if you attach it to a nice 4-6x scope. On a very dark night that is. On a regular night, a x56 of good quality would be better.