My new Viper 6.5-20x44 arrived today. I went outside and put the crosshairs (target dot actually) on something at about 200 yards and was immediately pleased with the clarity. I looked the scope over and noticed it was only set to 6.5x power so cranked it up midrange to 14x and re-sighted on the same object. Right away I noticed it was less clear and harder to maintain eye relief without a dark halo appearing around the outer edge. I have heard such rave reviews about this scope line that I was a little surprised to see this happen. It reminded me of the cheaper Tasco I have of the same size. I have not cranked it up further to the full 20x yet but can only assume it will exhibit the same and worse.

I am curious if anybody else has experienced this? I am 100% sure the Vortex folks will offer to look at it and swap it out but not sure if this is simply to be expected for this scope.