Morty from United States, MI Public Profile

This is an excellent scope for the price, especially with the included tripod. The included zoom eyepiece is usable and gives perfectly adequate views up to about 40x, where it starts to suffer from some image quality issues. However, if you own or don't mind investing a little extra in a decent quality wide angle astronomy eyepiece or two (this scope takes standard 1.25 inch eyepieces), you will improve your experience drastically. I use a 24mm super wide angle Meade eyepiece most of the time, which gives a huge, bright, crisp field of view and comes out to 20x power on this scope. Its perfect for birding. The included tripod (from the Optics Planet package) is decent, perfectly usable, and certainly a nice addition at this price. Same with the stay-on, view through case. I'd recommend this scope at its price point even with the stock eyepiece, but with the addition of a nicer eyepiece, it becomes what is consider one of the best sub $500 scopes out there for birding.