My very first red dot was a Leapers brand. I figured a red dot is a red dot, right? I didn't see the point in buying something expensive. Well, here's what I learned the hard way. A cheap china made, $40 sight will probably work for a .22. They're designed for airsoft guns with little to no recoil. Once you start getting the recoil going like on a .223 rifle, the electronics start getting shaken up and connections mess up, and the dot will start moving around-taking you off target. They also, generally aren't waterproof and quality control is lacking.
Now, Primary Arms...they're also made in China (as I understand), but there is much more put into the designing of the sights. They put better parts in them and design them differently so that you don't have to worry about your dot walking off target from shooting a standard rifle. They put better/more o-rings in them so that a little water won't hurt them. They give them better internal electronics that give you smaller MOA's and don't get messed up with a little bit of recoil. PA designs their optics to be able to handle your average shooter-someone who takes care of their things and mainly just shoots at the range or hunting on occasion.
I've seen several times where people talk about using their red dots for hard core applications, and every time, Primary Arms lets them know that these sights aren't designed to be relied upon in a heavy duty application. They basically went and made these sights as quality as they could, without making them heavy duty. From what I've seen, you can do everything with a PA Micro that you can with an Aimpoint Micro, except go diving and drop it out of a helicopter and expect it to keep going (I saw an Aimpoint do this and keep on going-it was amazing). So as long as you don't plan on doing any sort of special operations with your rifle, buying a PA optic should be good to go.
