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Rifle Scopes Help Me Decide: ATACR vs. PMII vs. Razor

Which Scope?

  • Nightforce ATACR 7-35

    Votes: 104 46.4%
  • Schmidt and Bender PMII 5-25

    Votes: 92 41.1%
  • Vortex Razor Gen II 4.5-27

    Votes: 28 12.5%

  • Total voters
    224
Don't own a S&B but have the other two. For the 6.5 creedmoor go with the razor you will love it, I have one on my Sawtooth custom ruger persision.Save the atacr for a long distance gun. I mean a Big Bore gun . I have that on my 338-378 weatherby accumark in a bell&carlson tactical medalist stock . The Atacr is flat out Badass
 
I can only compare NF and vortex. Only have minimal exposure to SB (used, but don't own).

Vortex turrets are nicer. NF parallax is better. Picture (clarity, CA, etc, yadda yadda) are basically identical. The NF reticles suck at higher mag, vortex reticles are better in every aspect. Vortex wins, plus is cheaper, and has better warranty. (I've never had to use warranty on a gen2 as yet), and have warr'd my old NSX.
 
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ZCO 527 5-27x56 w. MPCT2 or MPCT3
Tangent Theta TT525P 5-25x56 w. Gen 2XR or Gen 3XR
S&B PMII 5-25x56, 3-27x56 High Power, or 5-45x56 High Power
 
It's always tough, but extremely rewarding in the end when we're presented with hard decisions to make, which I refer to as "good headaches." However, being fortunate enough to have a "good headache" can be daunting and at times drive us crazy. Too many choices in life, I guess, but that's a good thing. We also tend to "think it" too much and soon become frustrated. It happens to all of us, I suppose. I myself had a hard time not too long ago trying to decide on a scope for my new AR-308 DMR which I use strictly for targets out to a max of 300 yds. (my age has gotten the best of me). My choices at the time were narrowed down to the 5-25 ATACR and the Vortex Razor Gen II. The S&B was at a price point more than I cared to spend for what I was using it for. I finally convinced myself a decision had to be made and to stick with it. Both are excellent scopes in my opinion, but the Razor 4.5-27 won 1st prize for price point, features and the determining factor for me was the large sight picture. To me, the image looking through the ocular lens was larger than the NF. Not saying it's better than NF, just saying it seemed larger to me. With regard to glass quality, I couldn't tell the difference so it played no part in my decision. Both seemed excellent. So, after having the Razor for a year now, I am extremely happy with it, have no regrets, and would recommend it to anyone.

Hope this helps and wish you good luck with whichever scope you choose. All three are excellent choices. Just my thoughts.
 
Nightforce 7 - 35, at least you didn't put a ZCO in your little research project. I resent the fact that they want to so badly control the market value of their optic. They continue to loose ground to NF so much that they would rather give you a Spuhr mount rather than lower the price of their scopes. Dealers should be able to work with dealers at whatever price they work out privately. I respect free markets and that company is stepping out of bounds trying to support the price of their optics like they do. Anyway, enough of that.

NF is my new goto brand. Just ordered two 7-35s for my vudoo and my partners 6.5CM. Tracking, warranty and resell value is my reasoning.

If resale mattered to you so much you’d appreciate zco. You’ll be selling your 7-35 for $2500 and the zco for 3200+.

Rest of post is speculation about “losing ground.”
 
Thanks for all the responses! I was able to handle an ATACR and a Razor II indoors today. Even just holding it the eyebox on the Razor seemed much easier to get behind.

One weird thing I encountered with the Razor was when I turned on the illumination the illuminated portion seemed to move around. Instead of being “locked” to the floating dot in the middle the illuminated dot was moving around the reticle’s center dot. I’m guessing this is due to my astigmatism.
(Side note: I also compared an NX8 1-8 and Vortex G3 1-10 and the same thing happened with my eye and illumination - G3 illumination was “moving around”. In both cases NF illuminated reticles stayed where they were supposed to. Maybe NF and Vortex handle illumination differently where the NF doesn’t affect me and the Vortex does?)

Haven’t had a chance to handle S&B yet, and a lot have recommended ZCO so I’ll look into that, too.
 
I vote for the S&B. I recently upgraded to a S&B, and I went through the same struggle of figuring out which scope to go with. I was able to compare all three scopes you are interested in side by side, and I enjoyed the S&B the most. It had the best fit and finish of all of them, the fact that they machine engrave all of the markings on the scope instead of laser engraving it's awesome. I also felt that the image quality to my eyes was the best with the S&B. Overall, the quality and precision that the S&B had was above the others and every time I use the scope it impresses me.
 
After talking with multiple manufactures at Shot Show the glass in the top tier scopes is all about the same It comes down to the grind and the coating that are applied to the glass. I prefer S&B and Kahlas over NF and Vortex. Like Vortex better the NF. If you plan on spending for a top tier scope look through as many as you can and what looks best to your eyes. I shoot with prescription glasses and that will also make a difference how a scope looks. It just come down to what looks best to you. Good luck with your search.
 
After talking with multiple manufactures at Shot Show the glass in the top tier scopes is all about the same It comes down to the grind and the coating that are applied to the glass. I prefer S&B and Kahlas over NF and Vortex. Like Vortex better the NF. If you plan on spending for a top tier scope look through as many as you can and what looks best to your eyes. I shoot with prescription glasses and that will also make a difference how a scope looks. It just come down to what looks best to you. Good luck with your search.
I didn't talk to booth operators at SHOT show, but I have owned/do own many examples of all of them, and while I do not believe the glass composition/forming/etc to be the exact same, even if the "only" differences in ZCO/TT/S&B/Kahles/NF/March are coatings and grind (and in reality, optical design), that makes an enormous difference.

I've yet to have a single person, even non-shooters, who've looked through my TT/ZCO glass vs. NF or Kahlas, for example, and not immediately point out the ZCO/TT is better. These are people who have no idea of cost or brands. Glass, grind, coatings, optical design, you name it - it doesn't really matter at the end of the day the technical reasons for it, there are definitely "tiers", and NF/Kahles aren't in the same as ZCO/TT, for example.

I do agree with the summation that you should try and look through them all, but I've yet to find any local places carrying the so-called "alpha" tier glass. It's a leap of faith on those, generally - but there are online stores which deal with returns fairly well for unmarked/unmounted scopes, and fortunately they have pretty great resale value even if that doesn't work out.
 
The point I was making is Shott glass is used in many different scopes and it does very with grind coating and designed.TT's are and older design while the ZCO make good use of advances in design. TT is Japanese glass and you could tell me ZCO is Shott glass not sure?? I have looked through ZCO and its a great looking scope to MY eyes were as the TT I looked though was on par with my S&B be to me. Others like the TT better. From all of the scopes I have looked though at ELR matches with target out to 3080 yards the best bang for the buck is 4.5x27 Vortex where as the 2 best to me were S&B and ZCO. I wanted to like the NF 7-35 but it just didn't have the same as the ZCO or S&B. I know guy who shoot with the TT and swear by it. I guess that best thing there are multiple TOP TIER scopes choose from.
 
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The point I was making is Shott glass is used in many different scopes and it does very with grind coating and designed.TT's are and older design while the ZCO make good use of advances in design. TT is Japanese glass and you could tell me ZCO is Shott glass not sure?? I have looked through ZCO and its a great looking scope to MY eyes were as the TT I looked though was on par with my S&B be to me. Others like the TT better. From all of the scopes I have looked though at ELR matches with target out to 3080 yards the best bang for the buck is 4.5x27 Vortex where as the 2 best to me were S&B and ZCO. I wanted to like the NF 7-35 but it just didn't have the same as the ZCO or S&B. I know guy who shoot with the TT and swear by it. I guess that best thing there are multiple TOP TIER scopes choose from.

Oh boy @Perceptiv ain't gonna like that
 
This fucking butthurt virgin searched through snipershide to find one person saying nightforce beat Schmidt when thousands of other people on side by side comparisons and charts say the complete opposite😂😂😂😂
This fucking guy also said TT was only as good as Schmidt glass🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡🤡 TT has better glass an is better optically than ZComp and e wet side by side extensive review on this site says the same thing😂😂😂
Go back to your corner I put you in earlier
 
Oh boy @Perceptiv ain't gonna like that
Like what soy boy, that he said absolutely nothing that discredits what I said😂😂 TT wins in glass/optical performance all day against Z comp and every extensive review comparing the two on this site says the same thing LOL, one guy says he liked Z comp better lol so what, guys say vortex glass is as good as Schmidt 😂
You were looking for an “eye got you” but failed worse than Joe Biden in a reading contest
 
Like what soy boy, that he said absolutely nothing that discredits what I said😂😂 TT wins in glass/optical performance all day against Z comp and every extensive review comparing the two on this site says the same thing LOL, one guy says he liked Z comp better lol so what, guys say vortex glass is as good as Schmidt 😂
You were looking for an “eye got you” but failed worse than Joe Biden in a reading contest

That's not what I was looking for but you are doing great keep going 👍🤣.
 
^ this is what happens when 15 year old call of duty idiots find the hide
Pretty embarrassing a 15 year old is embarrassing you and roasted you so hard and embarrassed you on another thread that you had to leave and search the depths of snipershide to find people say NF glass is better when 80% say Schmidt😂😂 you really are a virgin
 
Yep... out
You dont know shit, this fucking walking cocksucker @deersniper was talking shit in another thread about nf and Schmidt and starting spouting off “Schmidt glass is trash” when nobody else was saying anything like that about NF, and the little girl ran away to this thread. So again you don’t know shit about wtf this walking virgin was saying in another post before running away