hello all, need advice on a gift

[matty1104]

hello all,

i will be buying a telescope as a gift for a 30 somthing woman and need a little advice, the budget is £250 not a lot but thats all i have so i have two in mind.

http://www.telescope...info_20140.html which is the meade starnavigator 114m for £249

or

http://www.telescope...pe-autostar/622 which is the meade ETX80

i would really like it to have goto tech as i would like to make it easy for her.

all advice is welcome good or bad.

Thank you

ps she prolly would used it for looking at ground tragets also.

[sologuitarist61]

Both look OK to me, though the added aperture on the Starnavigator would be useful for astronomy. GoTo is a must is she doe not have too much experience. However if for primarily ground targets I would probably go for the ETX80 (which is also OK for astro). Sorry, I guess that doesn't help too much.

[Ganymede12]

How serious is she about astronomy?

I love my Sky-Watcher Mercury707! It has given me lots of spectacular views and It is easy to store and set up and best of all - it only costs £80!

Of course there's no reason that those two other scopes won't do the job (in fact they will probably do it better) but they don't seem as portable (and certainly not as cheap!).

My version has an Altazimuth 2 mount so It's manual but you can get a GOTO version.

Anyway, It's your choice I guess.

[Kevdan]

Hi,

It all depends on what she wants to see, if its objects in our solar system then they will find planets however image size and quality may be dissapointing due to small apertures, I may be corrected but deep sky objects such as nebulas etc will be out of reach for these scopes, except of course the orion nebula. Personally, I'd go for a bigger aperture non goto firts and if she does get into it upgrade later, the goto's like synscan will point at thousands of objects in the sky but with smaller aperture scopes you may not see anything.

Sorry to put a damper on things.

Kev.

[Ganymede12]

You make it sound as if small aperture scopes are rubbish!

This is not the case. My scope is small (80mm in aperture) and I get brilliant views of planets.

You may also want to get here the holy book of Astronomy. I am speaking, of course, about Turn Left at Orion!

[Kevdan]

You make it sound as if small aperture scopes are rubbish!

No, not im not knocking small appertures at all, small scopes have their place, I was just implying that if she is a newbie and she, like so many expected postcard quality then she would be dissapointed. Both of these scopes are of decent quality and made by well known manufacturers.

Kev.

[CFC]

Mmmm you could dump her and marry me instead if you give such thoughtful pressies

(only joking husband didn't mean it!)

£250 is enough to buy a very nice telescope - and both of those scopes are nice.

Go for the SkyNavigator - it has a bigger aperture so will give better views, and if she is a novice I think she might find the commentary interesting. If storage space is in very short supply, then go for the smaller ETX 80.

[Capricorn]

I would go for the ETX-80, they are basically maintenance free. Smaller aperture but easy to use and get on with.

The setup is simple and should be no problem, no knowledge is required, having a reasonable view of the sky is needed as the scope decides which stars to use for alignment. You can select/change the alignments but that is more involved. Perhaps showing her how to locate Polaris will be useful, assuming that she doesn't already know.

80mm will allow most things to be seen within reason, maximum magnification will be around 100x (4mm eyepiece) although do not use a plossl, she will have to consider something like the TMB/s from Sky's the Limit. That should just enable Saturn's Rings to be seen (just).

Double stars and clusters will be good in it.

I know that Astro-Eng (Scopes and Skies) did a solar filter for the ETX-70 and 90 that screwed on and made solar viewing easy. Not sure if they do one for the ETX-80. MAke sure she is aware of the hazards.

Drawback is that the scope may be a bit noise, you really need a mains converter (possibly a small homemade connection converter if the connection is still a pp3 thing), Maplins.

I have the ETX-70 and with a BST eyepiece, think 12mm , I could see Jupiter very clearly, small but very clear, bands were easily seen. Since have bought the other BST's but never tried them on much. The BST's work well in them but cost is £47 a piece.

Potentail accessories: Solar filter if SnS make one, short focal length EP, Bubble level/compass thing from SnS, Flexi-adjuster for the focus knob again SnS.

[brantuk]

Allways a difficult one at the budget end of the market. Bear in mind that the inclusion of "goto" in the spec puts a significant proportion of the money on electronics and limits the provision for the all important optics. Without "goto" the majority of the spend can go on aperture which is allways preferable purely because the larger the mirrors the more you can see. Refractors are out of the question cos they are at least 3-4x the amount, per aperture, of mirrors. Also equatorial mounts (even manual) tend to cost a bit more than dobsonian mounts. Whatever spec you choose - make sure it's pink. lol

[andrew63]

of the two i think the etx 80 could be better - as stated, low maintenance, compact nice wide views and if wanted for terrestrial use - at least the view would be the correct way up!

andrew

[dav1d]

Neither. Stop a second and have a look at this in the SGL classifieds. I've been drooling after this since it appeared, but don't have £250 & am nowhere near Essex.

You, on the other hand, have £250 and are in Essex anyway. It's a proper 10" cannon at a bargain price - grab it!

No goto, but goto is overrated anyway.

[kor84]

Personally I'd drop the goto and go for bigger aperture (if space allows), I find star hopping and hunting around a big part of the fun, it's fantastic finally finding something that has been eluding me!

[knobby]

Neither. Stop a second and have a look at this in the SGL classifieds. I've been drooling after this since it appeared, but don't have £250 & am nowhere near Essex.

You, on the other hand, have £250 and are in Essex anyway. It's a proper 10" cannon at a bargain price - grab it!

No goto, but goto is overrated anyway.

Unfortunately you need 50 posts to view the classifieds

[x6gas]

Mmmm you could dump her and marry me instead if you give such thoughtful pressies

(only joking husband didn't mean it!)

£250 is enough to buy a very nice telescope - and both of those scopes are nice.

Go for the SkyNavigator - it has a bigger aperture so will give better views, and if she is a novice I think she might find the commentary interesting. If storage space is in very short supply, then go for the smaller ETX 80.

Hell I'll marry you too. Okay I am a married 40 something bloke, but I'm tidy and cook a mean chilli!

[x6gas]

No goto, but goto is overrated anyway.

Opinion is divided over GoTo; it has it's supporters and detractors. It's not overrated, it's just that some people value it and others don't.

[CFC]

Hell I'll marry you too. Okay I am a married 40 something bloke, but I'm tidy and cook a mean chilli!

Prenup - I get all the scopes if we get divorced....that's a nice looking set in your sig by the way....

Gold digger? Moi?