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Matt, I have a pair of quite cheap Tasco 8x40 binos. I've had them for about 20 years and they're great for looking around the night sky. They saw 'first light' on Halley's Comet! My wife also has a good quality German pair of 7x42 which she never thought of using for looking at the stars until I showed her what can be seen. The first night we were using them she 'discovered' Omega Centauri and was really excited. She'd never seen anything like it.
I think there are two important things with binoculars. 1. Don't go for high power unless you're also going to use a tripod or some sort of bino table. 2. Go for the largest aperture reasonable.
For me the 7x or 8x is a good magnification because I can hand hold them and still see Jupiter's moons. Also this gives a good wide field and isn't that what we want with binos? My 8x FOV is just enough to see the whole Southern Cross. There are a lot of binos around at 10x but I rekon that is getting too high for hand held viewing at night. If I were buying a new pair today I would go for something like 7x50.
Just my 2bob's worth.
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