Meopta S2 or Maven

kipper09

WKR
Joined
Dec 5, 2013
Messages
1,086
Location
West Virginia
Anybody use both? Obviously I think they are both very solid spotters. If I go meopta thinking 30-60 WA. Mavens warranty is the best there is. I have a pair of B2's. Have been pretty happy with them. If anybody has some input I'd love to hear. Thanks
 
I haven't seen the Maven, but Meopta has a much longer company history. I bought the Cabelas version when they were on sale this spring. A big difference between the Cabelas version and Meopta is the removable / interchangeable eyepiece. I decided I never removed my other one in years of use. The spotter has a great clear image and is clear all the way to 70x. Meopta also offers a lifetime transferable warranty. Last spotter I will ever need.

I did see a Maven on sale either on Rokslide or Archery Talk for $1500. Cabelas has the Meopta on sale for $1725.
 
I recently finished up a comparison of both. The Meopta was a straight model with a 20-70x eye piece. The Maven was the standard 20-50x angled model. Optically I could find NO NOTABLE difference. One was simply unable to distance itself from the other, the only caveat being the Meopta had a 20x advantage over the Maven. However I would place no particular advantage to the Meopta at that differing level of magnification. The depth of field is very shallow as you hit 50x and gets shallower fast as you go up from there. In most instances it was impossible to very difficult to get a greater than 60x image focused properly with the Meopta. This had little to do with optical quality. Both are outstanding and will be quite capable of standing toe to toe with ANYTHING.

There is one thing that I would clearly give the advantage to the Maven, and would be the deciding factor in my choosing the Maven. I've not bought one yet, but it is at the top of the short list. That feature is the variable rate focus. It essentially speeds the focus up at lower magnification and slows it down at higher magnification. In other words you loose the feeling of cranking to focus more then it seems necessary at the low end and makes it far easier to deal with fine focus at the high end. You will need to see that for yourself with the Maven side by side with something else. It is something that can be explained to no end but can't be grasped until you use it for yourself. If the Meopta had this feature, I would bet that it would be a lot more useful at very high magnification. The Maven was much easier to fine tune at 50x than the Meopta was at the same magnification. Again, it (in my opinion) has nothing to do with glass quality.

Now the Meopta has the advantage of having a removable eye piece, giving the user more options there. Both of these would be stellar with a fixed 30x wide angle eye piece. You can likely do that with the Meopta. The non removable Maven is ...well non removable. However most users would not miss much if anything with either one with a 20-50x WA assembly.

I never had a single instance of thinking I needed something better...at any distance. You will have to choose based on the variable rate focus or the ability to swap eye piece units.
 
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I own Maven 11x binos and I had one of their spotters. That being said I still have the binos and want a pair of 9s to go with them and I have a meopta meopro spotter now and it blows the Maven out of the water. I would say the S2 would destroy the Maven
 
Had both and would take the Maven. Just look at the opinions above.... You have to look for yourself, everyone's eyes are so different.
 
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