I had the 500. The first thing I thought of was no panning motor when I bought my first 825c.
Marcum was trying to keep the retail price down because they felt add somewhere around $200 to an already high price point would put their camera out of the range of the average Joe.
They came out with the Marcum Camera Compass. After using this the last couple years I actually like it better than a mechanical rotating device. With the 500, I dropped countless “plastic thingies” down the hole or buried them in the snow.
A quick turn with the compass and I’m set up. To look around another slow turn. I will admit I needed to plan out where my holes were to make the compass easy to get at.
I guess I wouldn’t let the fact that they don’t have the battery draining motor feature stop me from the low light features of the Marcum line.