A little more than a month ago I ordered a Pulsar XQ23V with the thought of keeping my HD19A as spare or if someone who didn't have a thermal scanner was going with us.
Here is what I found. My HD19A had a sharper focus than the XQ23. The 19A has objective focus, ocular focus, contrast, and brightness along with three modes which is like the XQ23V and most of the other Pulsar thermal producs. I mostly keep mine on the ID mode.
At the time I purchased the XQ23 it was selling for $1,650 which was $350 less than what I paid for the 19A two years ago. It has some very good features including 2 sec. startup, display off, 7 color modes, OLED screen, 1.8 native, and 2 and 4x digital zoom as well as statiametric range finder plus almost double the detection range. Those are all great features at a much lower price than I paid, but I was just not satisfied with the sharpness of the image. I thought the 17 micron core, OLED screen and slightly larger objective would keep the sharpness of the xq23 comparable to the 19 with it's 1x native, but it did not.
I believe the cause may have been that on this newer model with all those great features they went to a flat faced objective lens rather than the convex lens of the 19A which would help sharpen the focus. The XQ23 and 19A are pretty much identical in size and weight.
If I had not already had the 19A and was looking for a thermal scanner I'm sure I would have been satisfied with the XQ because it would do everything a scanner needs to do which is to locate targets. However I had the 19A and just couldn't see keeping the XQ23 with a less focused image than what I already had in the 19A, so I returned it to the dealer. He checked it against one of the identical XQ23's and said the image was the same. Therefore I knew it wasn't just that I got a bad unit.
I have since gone to a Crye Precision NightCap and one of the brackets made by P-mack to use the 19A as a head mounted scanning unit. Although I haven't had much chance to hunt with the head mount, I think that it is going to work very well this way. The 19A with the 1x native actually made me glad that I am using that unit on the head mount because it works much better for up close walking with the thermal. I just look a few yards ahead with it and make out very well.
I am including a video here of a comparison I made between the two units. My observations are totally mine and in no way represent what anyone else may have found, so make your own decision knowing that I'm not a representative for anyone.