Meade ETX-80AT-TC or Celestron C6-N

knm

I looking to buy my first scope.

After much Googling I decided that the Meade ETX-80AT-TC was the one for me. I can get this for €432 approx including delivery from North Down Telescopes. It comes with a nice selection of eyepieces and I like the built-in Autostar software and Barlow lens. It seems a good all in starter package.

Then on this site I came across the Celestron C6-N. I need to check, but I think this is a similar price. It has a bigger aperture which I think means it gathers more light making it better for deep space. Although I suspect most of my initial viewing may be lunar and planetary. It has an equatorial mount needed for photography, although I suspect that taking pics may be a little beyond a beginners scope. It only has one eyepiece.

After just reading thru this post, it seems I should go for the Meade. But any last minute advise would be very much appreciated.
Thank you - John

Redshift

You seem to have done your homework in any case both are nice scopes and I think it's boils down to what you want to do with it.
If you can live without the autostar then i'd be inclined to go with the celestron as it will give you more bang for your buck.
Not to say that the ETX isn't any good on the contrary they're excellent I own an EXT 70 AT and an ETX 125PE and I love both of them.

knm

I'm still really torn between the Meade and now, the Sky-Watcher Explorer 150.

The Meade has the Autostar automated thing, which seems really handy for finding stuff quickly - especially handy in the west of Ireland weather. I can view terrestrial with this as well, can't I? Can it be used manually?

With the Sky-Watcher I have Focal Length 750 as against 400 for the Meade. This is better - isn't it. There is a bigger learning curve, as regards finding your way around the sky. I don't mind a learning curve. Can I view terrestrial with this?

And of course there is still the Celestron NexStar SLT 114. Can I view terrestrial with this?
I really need some help here. I know they are all good scopes. Maybe there is something not so good about one or two of them.

I would like some people to express a preference.
Apologies for the persistence.

Thanks again guys.

Redshift

There's no denying that the autostar is a great tool but it's attached to a fairly small scope in the case of the ETX 80 you are looking at.
It would be helpfull if you could state what your maximum budget is then we could make some better recomendations to you.
As for viewing terrestrial objects be aware that most astronomical telescopes will yield an upside down and or mirror image and so an erecting prism will be required to correct for this.
If you maximum budget is around the 400 euro then I would be inclined to forget about autostar and spend all the money on the optics.
As I mentioned tell us how much you want to spend.
Good to see someone putting the effort into learning about the different scopes available and doing the research before buying.

knm

My Budget is around €400.
I can live with the upside down image/space only thing, as I can factor in other lens/etc later on.

The option to view the right way up would be acceptable if I could buy a erecting prism later on that is compatible with my scope. But this is nice, not essential.
I don't mind the learning curve. But, yes the autostar does seem really handy for seeing all of the really nice stuff.

I want to see the moon, Stars and all of the planets and maybe some deep sky objects.
I want a good starter scope that I can build on and add to later on.
An investment in the future.
Thanks

slade_x

knm wrote:

My Budget is around €400.
I can live with the upside down image/space only thing, as I can factor in other lens/etc later on.

The option to view the right way up would be acceptable if I could buy a erecting prism later on that is compatible with my scope. But this is nice, not essential.
I don't mind the learning curve. But, yes the autostar does seem really handy for seeing all of the really nice stuff.

I want to see the moon, Stars and all of the planets and maybe some deep sky objects.
I want a good starter scope that I can build on and add to later on.
An investment in the future.
Thanks

I thought i posted in this already, looks like i missed it somehow

The smaller ETX ranges all come shipped with an erecting prism as far as i am aware, the 70 definitely does anyway.

Concerning what you are interested in seeing. Saturn, jupiter and a tiny view of Mars are in the range of smaller scopes (they wont be detailed, for eg. saturn you will see a sphere with a halo around it. Saturn actually has rings, thanks to cassini nasa has recently found another ring; a faint ring at the edge of saturns previously though last ring). Stars on their own will appear as nothing more than specs in any scope really. but some people i suppose like to look at colour variations

Star Clusters i suppose are nice in smaller telescopes (pleiades for example), but even better with bigger apertures while using the same low magnifications

Deep sky objects really arent strong points of smaller scopes. the majority of deepsky objects will be hard to see properly or even find. In a really dark area with very little to no light pollution you do have a much better chance of resolving some Deep sky objects with a small scope. But DSO's are really the domain of larger scopes.

The most important thing to know is the more light that manages to get to your eye the more detail you will see. a telescope is merely an extension of the focal length of your eye and a platform for much more light to be gathered and focused to a point before your eye (aka relief) so that your eye can then focus on what its seeing at the eyepiece. Magnification is the function of the eyepiece you use (it basically further extends the focal length of your scope; also like a barlow lense.) but this is less important as if your telescope cant gather enough light and/or cant focus that light then you just wont have the detail in an object that you want to see to merit a higher magnification

Its not uncommon for a budding stargazer to have 2 or 3 scopes; 1 small portable or as i call them grab and go scopes (70/80/90mm or ETX's 70 to 125 range), a medium (6" to below 10") for moderate use and a large practical (10/12++) for when your in the mood to go all out on a session.

The ETX80 would be a lovely little portable scope for you though. Particularly with beginners its common for their expectations to be very high (maybe hubble has spoiled a lot of people or maybe its the detailed, coloured images plastered across nearly every telescopes packaging that are no way in their achievable range. such images are usually sampled from our beloved Hubble Space Telescope). and its not unreasonable for them to want to see a lot of whats freely available to view in the night sky, but for some sadly their budgets dont allow such flexibility.

The telescopes that will give you the best "bang for your buck" as they say are a type of reflector known as Dobsonians. These types of telescopes have the best cost per aperture ratio. Meaning you'll get bundles of light gathering ability cheap. they are cheaper because, well the most obvious they are reflectors, but they also have very simple alt azimuth mounts. (some people might find the EQ mount somewhat confusing when they see a point in the sky they want to manually move to and the axes just wont move simply in the direction they want to go). Although sadly the ideal large ones are somwhat over your budget

Redshift

As slade mentioend your are somewhat limited by your budget, and you probably wont do much better than the ETX or the Celetron for that price,
but something else you might considder and that is to save another 200 euro which will give you enough for an 8" Truss Lightbridge.
This is a substantially bigger telescope and while it doesn't have goto capabilities I doubt you would be dissapointed with it.

http://www.telescopehouse.co.uk/page.aspx?theLang=001lngdef&pointerid=CD358BCF63584ACFA7E11025C65D565E&action=lnk

knm

I don't really want to go over budget.

It's still down to the Meade ETX80 AT or the Sky-Watcher Explorer 150. The Meade has Goto and as you say is very portable.

If I went for the Sky-Watcher, what sort of set up time would be involved?
I'm assuming that its not as "grab and go" as the Meade.
Thanks for all your replies.

slade_x

knm wrote:

I don't really want to go over budget.

It's still down to the Meade ETX80 AT or the Sky-Watcher Explorer 150. The Meade has Goto and as you say is very portable.

If I went for the Sky-Watcher, what sort of set up time would be involved?
I'm assuming that its not as "grab and go" as the Meade.
Thanks for all your replies.

It all depends on how you transport it. the ideal way to transport it would be to initially set it up (balance the scope with the weights and polar align if that what you want to do) before you go to your observing site

Practically, you'll probably have to dismantle it for transport; taking the optical tube assembly out of its housing. removing the weight and removing the extension bar. if your observing site is really dark bring a large lamp to allow you to setup the telescope properly. once the telescope is setup never turn a normal lamp on again. if you need to see something use a red led (you can usually buy these to attach to your keychain to be able to find the key hole on your car)

Either way setting it up goes pretty quick, all you do is place the optical tube assembly in its housing and balance it on its declination axis. then add the bar and the weight and use the weight to balance the tube on its right ascension axis. all in its a less than 5 minutes job.

The only other thing is, the mount will not allow you to move in such directions as easily as an alt-azimuth. With an EQ mount your dealing with 2 axes (Declination and Right Ascension) that you will freely move and then the polar alignment angle, that you set before observing as normally it can get way too awkward to alter it with the full weight of the telescope and weight on top of it. It would be important to familiarize yourself with how the mount actually moves the telescope in the daylight before you take it on an observing session

knm

Hi, it's me again. I'm pretty close to getting a scope now.
It's between the Skywatcher Explorer 150 and the Skywatcher Skyliner 200. The Skyliner has a bigger aperture, bigger finderscope and with the Dob mount, may be easier to set up.
I don't really mind the learning curve with the equatorial mount, but the Dob might be easier here in the west of Ireland where cloud can often interrupt your viewing.
Any opinions on these?
Thanks again.

slade_x

For the same price bracket and considering its your first i would be inclined to pay for the 8" Dob over the 6" with an expensive mount (although from the illustration it doesnt look like a sturdy mount)

Also for the difference in price you could also get a dew shield (or make one)/ solar filter and/ or another eyepiece

knm

Thanks slade_x. I had pretty much decided on the 8" dob. Actually ordered it last night.
Thanks for all the replies.

Tea drinker

Did it arrive yet?
Hope it all works out for ya, have an 8" orion optics meself, and you were right to go for the bigger scope. Goto is ok but can be more trouble than it's worth.

lettuce know how ya get on.

knm

Yea, I've had it a few weeks now. The first weekend I got it, the nights were very clear so I had some good times. Out again tonight - Feb, 17. Again the views are good, although I think I saw more of Orion two weeks ago.

Any ideas on what I should buy next - a Barlow or another ep? At present I have a 25mm and a 10mm. It's also got a dual-Fit 1.25"/2" Focuser.

Tea drinker

'tis hard to say, but I can tell you a good barlow never gets thrown away. I think celestron Ultima are good barlow for the money, but there is another good one... can't remember.

I really like wide field, have a meade series 4000 40mm 2", nice. Also previously got an 1.25" celestron ultima 42mm, and the 2" way is better.

There are some "starter" eyepiece kits out there which might just save you money, some european some US.

Check out this site, you could read it for hours.....
http://www.astromart.com/Default.asp?

knm

Cheers Tea drinker. Just a few simple questions.

Can I assume that you need 2" ep's for a 2" ep adapter and a 2" Barlow? Also, what is the significance of the different size Barlow's? 40mm/42mm? Is it not a case of one size Barlow(1.25") fits all ep's(1.25")?

In the meantime, I have just bought Baader Sky Glow filter to help with lunar observing and lp.
Now I'm on the lookout for a cloud busting machine.

Tea drinker

Hey, sorry I didn't get back to you sooner, actually started typing a reply twice but got distracted by flies .. or work, or something.

Anyway, Yeah, you're right, 1.25 barlow should work with any 1.25 eyepiece, any you had a question on another thread about 1.25 filters, yep, they will work on any 1.25 eyepiece that are threaded for filters - and 99% are.

when I was talking about 40mm (this is the 2" meade 4000) and 42mm (1.25" Celestron ultima) I was talking about my long focal length eyepieces, not barlow's. Don't bother with 2" Barlow, they are kinda exotic.

Actually, this is getting embarrassing, I just discovered a celestron 40mm omni in my collection... I'm really going to have to look at where i spend my non-tax dollars.

knm

Thanks, gotcha.