There was never any doubt, was there Asi? Based on your imaging aspirations, I don't think the C8 was in the race!
Now that I've had a look at the photos on my home PC, at least I can see some scratches now ...
I think you're doing the right thing. If you are chasing perfection with your imaging, you wouldn't be happy with the results of
that C8. I don't know how bad the scratches would be, but light scattering and contrast would have to suffer at least a bit. It might be OK for a lot of stuff, but there's a good risk it'll fall short of what you want to achieve... thinking about it, scratches are optically different to dust and blemishes...
Enjoy the 9.25!
Al.