Id like to buy a spotting scope for birds. What brands should I look for for quality and magnification?
There’s a very comprehensive review at the source link, though it’s a couple of years old. According to them, the Zeiss Diascope 85mm is probably the best one out there. Note this review: The new Zeiss Diascope 85T FL trumped all when it came to sheer optics. Of all the dedicated birding scopes with around 80mm apertures, the Zeiss Diascope got the best scores on the resolution tests. The image is remarkably bright. At a magnification of 60, the Diascope 85 resolved finer detail than any other dedicated birding scope we tested, with absolutely no color fringing. The Zeiss Diascope became the instrument we used as the reference scope, to which we compared all the others. Not only is it sharp, but it’s also well designed, to make focusing the most precise experience we have ever found in any scope. There are two focus knobs, with different gear ratios, one for fast focusing, and the other for fine focusing. The fine focus helps you get the image absolutely sharp without introducing extra
