Asking for suggestions for a budget-priced night vison binoculars, please.

[Workingzombie]

I've seen these two, Nightfox swift, and Creative XP going for $2-300 bucks. Anyone have experience with them? Are they worth the cost?
My thanks in advance.

[Hodgie]

I don’t have any experience with any of them, however I recommend checking out this channel and his budget night vision options. This guy is king of the budget optic reviews and torture tests. I’ve bought many things based on his reviews and most of them I’ve had excellent success with.

https://m.youtube.com/c/704TACTICAL/search?query=Night%20vision

[Lafayettegregory]

I've seen these two, Nightfox swift, and Creative XP going for $2-300 bucks. Anyone have experience with them? Are they worth the cost?
My thanks in advance.

I have a first gen monocular. Its about 9 years old. Works good. Not great. I have seen little difference with other more expensive units that some friends have.  A lot depends on how you plan to use the unit. Do you need a helmet mounted unit, rifle mount or handheld?
 Ir will always be visible by others And remember, its good out to about 75 yards for a clear image.
BUT, I use mine for nighttime sky viewing and it works very good.  IR is good for up close. But for 75 yards out its no good. I can see movement and a silhouette out to about 250 yards.  Movement can be easily seen but detail is minimum.

[Toad]

1. Do they have to be binoculars? Do you really need magnification?
2. The jump in performance from Gen1 to Gen2 is considerable for $500 more.
3. What are your expectations and needs. Skipping tube and going to digital may give you more bang for the buck.

[JimmyJamesKY]

Do Gen 1 night vision optics degrade over time?  I have a Russian made Redfield monocular, and it worked pretty well for what I paid for it ($100).  I could watch nocturnal creatures with the IR off, and see in a pitch black room with the IR illuminator turned on.  It's been put up for a few years. I dragged it out of the closet the other day, put a battery in it, and it's barely usable.  You can't make out what you are looking at at all.  It's never been exposed to bright light, and was stored with protective cap in place.

I never had serious use planned for it, it was just a neat gadget.  It's basically useless now though.

I'll never do it, but my dream setup for my Yugo SKS would be a suppressor and quality night vision scope. 

[Onepoint]

Yes, it does. I also have a 20 year old Russian made handheld that is mostly useless now.  By far head mount night vision devices is better than handheld or weapon mount, but most of us don't have the DOD footing the bill for the nice gen 3+ dual head mount systems.

All of the low end ones are gen1 which is the lowest resolution and shortest lived, but now just about all come with white phosphor and give black and white images, which helps perceived resolution over the old green images.  Also note most of the newer type "binoculars", are not really binos or even 'scopes', but a digital monocular projected to a screen, it fools the brain, but you are looking at processed image not a light enhanced direct image, and don't use light gathering tubes at all.   That screen emits light as well, but they are usable in day time, like low power binos, the down side is they use 8 AA batteries, or some use a larger 18650 battery.  Creative brags they don't chew up battery life, but I suspect a good back up battery supply and rotation is going to be needed to keep these all ready to rock. One that had a head mount mentioned a whopping 3 hour rechargeable battery life. 

[Toad]

Either choice isn't bad. It's digital stuff and not tube stuff. It's not going to degrade like tubes.

Digital and Tube functions differently. Tube will enhance ambient light. Digital does little to enhance ambient light and requires an illuminator. However, digital is full light spectrum and handles illuminators better....and it's cheap.

At the $250-300 range, you're paying for the case/housing the electronics gear is placed in. The gear is relatively cheap, and you may wish to make your own. You can get a really good imaging sensor and lens set for under $100. The next component is the screen. Near-eye screens suck. There hasn't been a demand for them since Cam-corders were popular, so the technology advancements died decades ago. Both units you have listed have screens of less performance than a cellphone. A full field cam, lens set, wifi dongle, batteries/wire, and a smart phone is really all that is needed to give you better performance.

NV head gear straps suck. Don't expect comfort.

[Toad]

Here's a video of snap on NV for a gun scope I built back in 2014. Tech has gotten better and cheaper since then.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtROJ81HIa4

That was a 710res cam, being recorded on a 600res DVR...so performance is degraded a bit.

Build Thread

http://www.sksboards.com/smf/index.php?topic=130264.0

[Toad]

The other thing you can try, as it is a very low cost alternative, and you can test the "Toy Attribute" of a digital headset...with surprisingly good performance...

If you have a relatively new smartphone (iPhone 12 or better, Google 5 or better, Samsung 20 or better) with the fancy aperture, ultra low lux low light camera, look for a product called Google Cardboard. Google CB was Google's giggle at their own flop of Google glass, and a laughably toy'ish stab and VR headset moguls like Oculus. Google CB is nothing more than a card board head set, with stereoscopic lenses, that you stick a smartphone into, and you have a VR headset....for about $10. Download the app to set the screen up for 3d viewing. For $10, with an existing smartphone, you have color/3D NV goggles...with recording, zoom, videogames, and SKSboards.com...in 3-flipping-D.  Just add an IR only flashlight from AliBaba...$20...and you have fun toy that will out perform most, if not all sub$500 digital NV on the market.

For less than $40 investment, with the purchase of batteries, you got a cool gadget to play with and you can test the budget side of Digital NV tech.