IMO, tools are meant to do a particular job well. A scope is a tool. Digital scopes do a fair job at working night and day, but they certainly lack as compares to Gen III or thermal quality. It is to swim upstream if the requirement is to have one rifle to do all things well and include a day optic in the scenario. I use my dedicated thermal night and day with no issues. Heck, I prefer and love it because I see stuff even during the day that I would otherwise miss. Hunting 2 - 3 times a week, I can't tell you the last time I used a dedicated day optic. I have a good many excellent day optics collecting dust. If you can bring yourself to go dedicated thermal, you may find yourself in the same boat. These are just my thoughts and experience. I hope it helps you to decide.

Best of luck!

Thanks. So you have no issues using your thermal in daylight? Never looked at it that way, but could be an end to the issue. I have been looking at the Armasight Zeus 3 336 60hz 42mm. Any thoughts on this unit?

I personally have no issues at all using thermal during the day. I was deer hunting one mid-morning and was seeing nothing. All seemed quiet. Across the pasture from me was a wooded area that skirted the pasture I was hunting. I held my thermal monocular up and boom, there was a line of deer walking just inside the wood line. I lowered the thermal and could not see them with my eye. I grabbed my regular binocs and only got a glimpse from time to time. I would not have known they were there had I not been using thermal.

From what I have heard, folks are pleased with the Armasight product. I have only used them a few times. They use software to "white out" the areas around a target and gain more detail of the target. I have heard that the scope can lock onto a hotter target than the one you are interested in and reduce the visibility of your target. DNS should be back through at some point and can correct me or elaborate more. Basically, I think overall it is said to be a good product.

I own multiple brands. The IR Defense was mentioned above. I own the IR Patrol, the MKII and just received the new REAP IR. I love the IR Defense software and functionality, but it hasn't come without issues. My IR Patrol has been flawless. The MKII displays whatever the last menu you had up was upon recoil on my 6.8. The core on my brand new REAP IR died on the second shot from another 6.8 I own. That was yesterday. They will get them fixed, but it does demonstrate there can be issues with any of them. No issues with my ATN 640, 5X, but it is a beast and the software is showing its age. My Pulsar XD50 has not had problems and I like the PiP feature....not crazy about the sight picture, but I am spoiled to 640 cores..

There are tons of nuances with with different scopes. Features, some important, some not. Lots to consider.

Are the pulsar units worth a look? I'd like to get the best I can for what I can afford, but the pockets don't go $5k+ or deeper on these.

Budget generally determines what most folks buy. Worth is subjective. I have been around this stuff for a while now. It tends to be a bit addictive and once you see something better you want it. Resources either allow you to go forward or you have accept and work with what you have. What has worth and value to one may not carry the same significance to another....and budget can play a part in a worth discussion.

Example: I had a guy out the other night that had a digital scope that I had given him. He was having a hard time adjusting it and asked me to take a look. It had been a while since I had looked into a digital scope. It was shockingly horrible. However, there was a time when I was thrilled to have that ability. It was the greatest thing I had experienced....well, that I considered affordable at that time....or maybe worth it. Anyway, I got it adjusted for him and handed it back. He was elated. This, for him, held value...it had worth. Because of my experiences going forward, I don't think I could hunt with it now....so it has little to no value to me.

Pulsar XD thermal scopes. Are they worth a look? Yes, when the budget is limited they are. Sellmark is the distributor here in the states and located in Mansfield, TX. It is owned by James and Dianna Sellers. They are good people and their company offers excellent customer service as compares to other companies in the business. The scopes carry a 3 year warranty and are generally reliable. They run 388 cores. Several cool features are offered such as Picture-in-Picture (PiP), the video out is always on and it is a good signal and you have the choice of manual, semi-auto and auto NUCing. The lowest cost is the XD 38. I would not consider it because the mag is 1.5 native optical making it hard to properly ID anything at a reasonable distance. I have the XD50A. It has a 2X native optical mag and is on the lower edge of what I see as minimal usable mag. Worth considering if budget is in the equation. If you can stretch another grand over your stated budget max, you could consider the XD75 which has a 3X native optical mag....but at that price you start to get into much better products with 640 cores.

So, if you limit your budget to 3 - 3.5K, the XD50A is worth considering. Beware however, once you peek into a 640 core product it will cause you to re-think worth and value. Nonetheless, it would be a reliable product backed by a good company and offer usable service.

At around 4K you can consider some scopes from Armasight and ATN with 3X native optical mag....and at 5K you get more mag. Most folks want to be under 4X so they have decent field of view on a running sounder. 3 - 3.5X seems ideal.

Sorry to get long winded. Worth and value are truly subjective. It is hard to tell another person how that is defined for them.

If you have never had a thermal scope and you really want to stay down around the 3-3.5K range, go with the Pulsar XD50A. But don't ever look down a 640 core product.

Much better resolution with 640 cores and when you digitally mag the first time you are still equal to the lesser cores, but with more mag. Try renting some from someone like www.ultimatenightvision.com to see what you like. Tyler will apply your rental cost to the purchase.

I also use handwarmers to sight in.