Jake, I' m in the process of buying new binoculars. I read a book called Optics for the hunter. What the author said is you get slightly more light gathering from an 8x42 then a 10x42. With that you get more clarity for detail. I noticed that at a shoot last year when my 10x42' s fogged on me. The guy I was shooting with let me use his 8x42 Pentax. My classes where not the quality of the pentax he had but I saw a big difference in his classes. I think part of that was what I read in the book. I wish I could afford the swarovski' s but since I can' t I' m probably going with the 8x42 Pentax DCF' s. Just thought I' d pass that along. JERRY