Purchasing my first telescope

[Cjg]

Chantelle,

As a proud Nexstar 5 SE owner - I can tell you how great this scope is, but my advice would be DON'T!

Go visit some astro societies first and see what you get through the eyepiece of the members scopes.

I love the ease of set up and use - it's a great back garden scope, but has taken me a year to reach this - my 10" Intelliscope dobsonian gave much better views of the faint objects - but it took over all my car space and weighed 55lbs.. the 5SE is a compromise - ultimately all scopes are. Have spent ages looking through it with an 8mm eyepiece at Saturn, but for the fainter deep space objects - not so good, for astro photography, even though it has the capability to align the mount - maybe for planets, but deep space objects, no good.

Mine though lives in a backpack and with power pack and mount is just about "hike' able" and that's important to me.

If you have your heart set on one, bear in mind that for just a few more £££'s you'd get a 6SE and that takes you to a different level with in what you can see!

Best of luck, though cannot stress enough the test drive if you can...

Chris

[smudgeball]

Hi

The 6SE is a great scope.

Great for planetary and punches above its weight for a lot of deep space targets.

Agree with the points everyone has made.

You've got to weigh up budget, aperture, storage, amount of available time to view, expectations, future upgrades, photography yes/no, the list goes on and on.

For me I got the 6SE because I wanted a compact scope with quick setup and goto so that I could see as many things as possible in a limited viewing window.

So that was my purchase criteria.

I was looking at the 4SE and 5SE and even the Advanced Series GOTO from Celestron but this didn't tick the storage box on my list so I dismissed it.

When I finally decided on a 5SE, the aperture bug flew by and I ended up with the 6SE.

My point being that you just can't tick every box, you'll just end up spending more money than you want to and feel more annoyed on a cloudy night when you can't use all that ££££s worth of kit !

It's not easy but one thing is for sure, you'll enjoy whatever you purchase.

Just don't let those expectations get the better of you.

Regards

Neil

[earth titan]

There is a condition known as choice paralysis. I think you are heading that way

Buy a second hand scope.

Try it.

If you love it, cool.

If not sell it and try a different one. You'll probably get your money back!

Sent from my X10i using Tapatalk 2

[boabsta]

I agree with Tom. I went the second hand route and got to try a few scopes and mounts with and without goto and actualy eneded up making money out of it as well.

When you read through a lot of posts on here you will find that the majority of people tend to buy the wrong setup to begin with and then a lot of them end up with 200p's either as a dob or on eq mounts. Myself included now, but that doesnt mean thats what will happen with you. I also have a sw127 mak and after owning 4 scopes previousley it blew me away. As such for the moment I have both but unfortuneatley the boss woman is not too pleased with the bedroom being overtaken by astro gear and has ordered it gone which I am trying to do by selling it at price no one wants to pay .

The astro society is a good idea but be warned, a lot of the boys and girls in these groups have very big toys and it can be a bit overwhelming first time. They will make you feel welcome and a lot will want to show you what you can see through theyr scopes but you wont get the same views from your smaller scope so can lead to dissapointment.

Everyones experiance, expectations and desires are as different as the scopes on offer so I will echo others basic advice, take your time, things can get expensive quick when you are undecided.

Good luck

[jamespels]

+1 for the second-hand route. Had tio shop around a bit but my TAL 2M is an excellent scope and only cost £150.

Another good option for you is to wait a couple of months (skies are a bit too light to see much over summer anyway) and visit a couple of star parties in autumn (apprantly there is a half decent one in Norfolk!) - you should be able to try out all sort of scopes and possibly pick up a good 2nd hand bargain as Tom suggests.

In the meantime, maybe buy some nice bins like the Revelation 15x70s and a light tripod to practice star-hopping and look at the brighter objects.

If you really cannot wait, the best advice above is to join a local astro group and try out their gear - if the members are reluctant to do this, run away and find a better group!

J.

[Alastair Rae]

There is a condition known as choice paralysis. I think you are heading that way

Excellent term. I guess you can be happy any one of the 57 varieties of scope.