I would prefer a rangfinder and an el-cheapo pair of binocs if you could only afford one, but get better bino's down the road IF you feel you are missing something by not having a quality pair. See how much you use the cheapos and decide if you need to buy a little more brightness during the last few minutes of daylight... I love my Nikon 440 rangefinder (sold my bushnell for the more compact Nikons) and I just bought Monarch binos, only used them in the field once though so far (only been hunting twice since I bought them, and only one of those 2 places did I really need binos.)