Marty,
Jerry mentioned weight. There was a considerable difference in weight between the full sized LXs and the LXL (with "L" standing for "lightweight"). At almost 36 oz., the original Venturers were quite heavy for their configurations. My shoulders were sore after a day in the field.
However, in the 8x and 10x32 versions, there's just under an ounce difference. So in that regard, you won't notice a difference, and ergonomically they are identical, regardless which one you receive.
Three things that are different between the original Venturers and the LXL (now called "Premier" in the US, HGL everywhere else) are:
1. The armor on the "L" is softer. Nice to the touch, but it more easily scuffs.
2. As Jerry mentioned, the "L" contains lead-free glass vs. lead glass in the Venturer. I thought this was a big deal, but it's probably less important than the coatings....
3. The anti-reflection coatings are different. To my eyes, the Venturers show colors that are more true to life whereas the "L" skews the colors warmer. Reds appear a bit orangy and blues a bit purplish.
In this configuration, I like the originals better. In the full sized, I could live with the colors being warmer for the benefit of significantly less weight. But alas, the full sized units have very little pincushion distortion so the image "rolls" for me ("rolling ball"). There's a touch of this with the 8x32, too, but not enough to be bothersome. Only one member reported "rolling ball" being a bother to him with the 8x32 model. Made him nauseous.
It's probably not the "Premier" if it's that old, which has a black box with stripes on it. The LX had a gold box with the letters HG on it (High Grade, as Bob mentioned) and the LXLs had a blue slip case that the box fit into just to be extra classy and justify the higher price (though some of the later production LX's also had the blue slip case).
I didn't find the ergonomics of the mid-sized model comfortable for my large hands, but that's a personal thing, you might find it fits your hands perfectly. The twist-up eyecups are soft and tend to show wear after a while, but they have a metal frame underneath the rubber, something not found even in some binoculars costing much more (although my Vixen 7x50 Foresta has that set-up also, and it's not an expensive bin like the LX/LXL).
There is one feature that you will either really like or really hate, and that's the turning speed of the focuser, which goes from close focus to infinity in less than HALF A TURN! That's faaaaaaast! Twice as fast as the full sized models, and 1 turn, they are already fast, or at least they were when they first came out, now a lot of companies make fast focusers, which are not to my liking. I found it difficult not to overshoot my targets even though the focuser on my second sample had sufficient dampening and turned smoothly unlike my first sample, which had a loose focuser and some backlash.
The colors and contrast are among the best I've seen in binoculars, particularly in the original series.
In both samples, I found some astigmatism at the top of the field but the horizontal axis was sharp edge to edge. The full sized models don't have this astigmatism.
So like most roofs, it has its quirks, and I've named the ones I found, however, image-wise, it's hard to beat. You'd have to move up to the much more expensive EDG to beat it in a roof.
Let us know how you like the LX/LXL?
Brock
