Tff caribou head the nail on the head.

And if fixed power scopes are so much better why do so many high level shooters use variables? Technology and glass quality has drastically improved in the last ten years.

Another thread derailment brought to us by Charles.

Ok ChuckieB here is why you are wrong. And my facts are facts. I work for Leica and have also worked for Swarovski and Bushnell I the past 20 years. I have been through both the Leica and Swarovski plants on several occasions and have been giving factual clinics on optics since 1996.
Today's scopes from about 200.00 up are far superior to the old classics you speak of. Fixed or variable power.
Light transmission has very little to do with the glass in optics. Light transmission is determined by the amount of light allowed through the lens and not rejected. The coating on lenses determines this factor. The better the coating the better the light transmissions. The scopes you speak of have only a single coating on one side and have the worst light transmission capability. In the 1970s Luepold started using a process called multi coating on the outside lens only. Multi coating was far superior to simple coating and allowed approximately 15% more light transmission. Thus multi coated scopes allowed at max 85% light transmission. Many companies of course followed this process. In the mid 80s Bushnell/Bausch and Lomb invented fully multi coated lenses. A very expensive process where all lenses were coated with multiple coats of anti reflective and on both sides. This was the best there was. The Bausch and Lomb Elite scopes got everyone else on the stick. All of the premium optics companies followed. Fully multi coat was allowing up to 95% light transmission. Since then chemical coatings have been improved to the point that a scope isn't even considered good if it doesn't allow at least 98%. Perfection 100% can never be fully achieved due to glass resistance but 99% is the standard in high end optics.
Glass is very important to quality glass but with today's processes even cheap glass is better than old scopes glass. Up until the 80s plain silica glass was used in 99% of hunting optics. That is the same quality as window panes. The companies like Bausch and Lomb and Ziess who made eyewear and high end research microscopes started using optical quality glass. Since then improvements are vast in glass. But glass is built on manufacturers specs. No matter how clear the glass is it reflects light so the coatings are as or more important than the actual glass.
As far as edge clarity. Until Swarovski started grinding their lenses from edge to edge in the early 90s no company ground to the edge of their lenses and therefore your edge clarity claim is out the door. Grinding machines and process did not allow for the percision to grind to the edge with out and over abundance of damage and waste. Lenses were erected using an aluminum ring that locked around the edge of the lens and therefor you simply saw black at the edge. Today all high end scopes are ground to the edge and are erected using an epoxy and prong method. Basically look at how a diamond is mounted. Using this method you get a wider less distorted field of view.
The one point you are semi correct on is fixed power. A non variable scope with all things being equal in manufacturing will allow you a little more light transmission on the exact power it is. For example a 10x fixed will allow a very little more than a 6-24x if the the variable is set at 11 of above. But on the other hand the variable will allow more light if it is on 6x.
The one factor that will never change is the trade off between magnification and light transmission. The higher the magnification the less light transmission you have.
I won't get into the comment on variables and point of impact. Today's second focal plane scopes are so precisely made that it is minute and you can get a first focal plane reticle and totally eliminate it.
Sorry to everyone for this being so long but I get tired of hearing this guy spout about stuff he has no idea about. It scares me that someone might believe him.

BOOM!

Put that in ur pipe and smoke it!

Awesome post. If you don't mind I'm going to plagiarize the crap out of it.

No problem. It is all stuff that can be researched.

Yadda yadda yadda.

Can't read or spell either, apparently. There is a built-in spell-checker here that is really easy to use, you know.

Each individual reader here must judge whether other people's posts have been informative or not. - You do not get to make that call for everyone else.

Well, you've thrown your little hissy fit, and hopefully now you will now untwist your little girl panties and take a stab at behaving like a civilized adult.

Good luck with that.

[/quote]

Your grammar is bad

It should read; and hopefully now you will untwist

I'm with tffCaribou. You are constantly rude and needlessly insulting and of no measurable benefit to this forum. Go back to the 24HourCampfire, where your style and manners are more common (yes, a play on words).

I thought this post was related to "One rifle 257 Wby vs. 300 WM", boy that sure went to S#%% in a hurry!

He got tons of information and great answers in the first 2 pages.