So it may not be good at imaging but...

[Manok101]

Ive heard of setups where telescopes were hooked up to computers (usually laptops) and I was wondering if observing could be done that way with a dobsonian telescope?

[FrankieValley]

I'm guessing (and not at all sure) that the Skywatcher GOTO Dobs can be connected to a pc via the Synscan controller in the same way as their EQ mounts can and be controlled by a sky chart software i.e. Cartes du Ciel. Like I say, a guess. Anyone know better?

[umadog]

The GoTo will lead to field rotation which precludes long exposures unless you use a field de-rotator. You will get nice bright images more quickly and easily with a short focal length refractor on an Eq mount than with a Dob. A driven GoTo Dob will produce good results when used for video astronomy. You can take nice astrophotos with a Dob, but it's harder than with other approaches.

In photography, the brightness of the image is influenced more by the focal ratio than the objective diameter. Properly, it's the angle subtended by the objective as viewed from the image plane. With the objective size constant, it's easy to envisage how the subtended angle increases as focal ratio decreases. This effect is equivalent to increasing exit pupil size in visual observing.

[Catanonia]

Ive heard of setups where telescopes were hooked up to computers (usually laptops) and I was wondering if observing could be done that way with a dobsonian telescope?

Yes, put a web cam in place of the eyepiece and use the software to show on screen what it sees. But you won't have the EP magnification.

You have the benefit of upping the exposure length etc to show even more detail, say exposure 10 times a second will show more than the eye.

Nice and simple.

If you are clever with bodging, you could find a way of attaching it to you EP's and get that benefit too.

All you have to do is find the focus point and mess with the web cam settings to get a nice image.

[GeorgeH]

In photography, the brightness of the image is influenced more by the focal ratio than the objective diameter. Properly, it's the angle subtended by the objective as viewed from the image plane. With the objective size constant, it's easy to envisage how the subtended angle increases as focal ratio decreases. This effect is equivalent to increasing exit pupil size in visual observing.

My ears are too tight... :)