LOL...…. I have a Meuller 8-32 I can put on it but that just seems so wrong. Like buying a Supermodel a cocktail dress at Walmart.
Sieg - You're probably right, but shoot what you've got until what you want becomes available. One of my good friends at the club where I shoot PR 22RF matches put a S&B Super Short scope on his jelrod-converted 40X repeater, so I don't feel at all over-equipped with the Athlon Cronus scopes on mine.
I read the email invoice from Athlon wrong - I was expecting a matte black scope, but when I got home and found the scope that UPS had left at the back door, ripped it open, and found a 'brown' one, I was a little surprised. I guess they didn't have as much demand for the 'brown' model as for the matte black. No problem as far as I'm concerned - it looks great, though I'll probably want to CeraKote a set of Seekins rings to as close a match as I can achieve before mounting it. At first glance, I thought it was air dry burnt bronze CeraKote, but after a look in better lighting, I'm fairly sure it's anodizing, in a tint that's similar to the Gen I Vortex Razor HD scopes. All the H-series burnt bronze I've applied has much more metallic in it than this coating does, though I've never bought any C-series air dry burnt bronze, so can't comment on its appearance.
The ETR's optical quality looks very good so far - I'm not seeing it get any darker at 30x than an original Cronus does at 29x. Comparing a newer Cronus BTR to the ETR, I'm not able to tell much difference from here inside the house, looking out through double-glazed windows. Will have to get outdoors with a bench & bags to do better comparisons. I'll want to get out one of my Bighorns that wears a Kahles K624i, along with both the original & BTR Cronus scopes on 22RF rifles to get a better idea where the ETR slots in between them optically.
The click detents on the elevation turret are very distinct - the clicks have a slightly louder sound than those of a K624i, and it takes a little bit more effort to get each click than it does with the Kahles. While this means it's unlikely the elevation knob is going to get turned accidentally, that extra effort makes it a little harder for me to avoid getting two clicks instead of one. This is obviously fresh out of the box, with no break-in of the turrets - I'd expect things to 'wear-in' a bit after more use - and even if it doesn't, I'm pretty sure that familiarity with these knobs will take care of any initial issue a shooter might have. Also, keep in mind that I'm comparing the new ETR to my all-time favorite turrets on the Kahles. The ETR's windage knob has click detents which are closer to the Kahles' in my opinion - they're very slightly softer, though still easily audible. It takes a short pull-out of about 3/16" to unlock the windage knob, nothing annoying in any way to me.
The ETR's power ring & parallax knob are each a little easier to turn than on both the original Cronus & the BTR version. I'd rate them as just about ideal. Physically speaking, the ETR is about an inch longer than the Cronus, and the turrets are about 3/8" farther to the rear than the Cronus' turrets. Speaking of the turrets - the ETR's turret caps are held in place with a coin-slotted screw, whereas the Cronus screws are socket ones for use with an allen wrench. I've always had a hard time avoiding marring coin slotted screws by slipping out of the slot, and though it does take a wrench (small & easily misplaced or lost) to loosen & re-tighten them, I still prefer the socket cap screw arrangement. This is probably as personal a preference as locking vs non-locking turrets, so form your own opinion.
That's about it for what I can say until I've had a chance to get all these scopes outdoors, and ideally, get the ETR mounted on the 40XB repeater & zeroed so I can do a tall target & box test with it. For those who might not have read it in any of my previous posts, I am an Athlon dealer - albeit a pretty small fish in a big pond. Just a one-man gunsmithing shop, situated in a sparsely populated area of western Kansas - my scope sales volume is pretty low, although what I do sell is almost entirely to competitive shooters who participate in PRS & 22RF PR matches, and all recent sales have been of the Ares BTR or Cronus models. Wishing these ETR scopes had been available a couple of years ago - pretty sure I could've sold quite a few of them by now. But, they do appear to represent quite a step up in features & quality, so once I've satisfied myself that they perform as expected, we'll see...