Don't get me wrong; I'm not advocating a compact binocular for astronomy, though many people are surprised at just how much a little 8x20 compact can see from a dark site. As it happens, I was testing a few binos on stars last night, and was getting a little annoyed at some of the flare I was getting with a couple of mid-priced models, so to be sure it wasn't some wired atmospheric phenomenon, I grabbed my baby Leica Ultravid 8x20 and turned it on Mars. I am here to report that the atmosphere was just fine (though a bit turbulent). So was the Ultravid. Mars was a beautiful round little disc without any flare or coma. Now if I could only get all my binos to do that, I would be very happy.