New scope finally arrived. Orion XT12g

[Phaylon]

After a long wait, it finally has arrived. Can't wait to get it outside under the stars.

I purchased an Orion Skyquest XT12g. So its a 12" GoTo dob. This is a big jump in size from my 5inch SCT. Was blown away by how big the box for the ota was. Was worried it wouldn't fit in the SUV.

I had to get the GoTo. I am too used to it from my celestron, and tracking just seems crucial to me.

Anyone here have any experience with this particular scope?

Very excited to get this thing setup. Doesn't look like it will be clear tonight though....I should have expected that I guess...the curse of a new scope.

Will post some impressions as soon as I can get it out,

I also picked up the Orion Starseek wifi adapter. Ive been eager to get one of these since I first saw it. Looks like it will work with both opf my scopes too. Should be a lot of fun.

[Dude_with_the_tube]

wow,awesome scope mate.you are in for a serious treat when the skies clear up.Enjoy the views

[skir]

That sounds like it will be a lot of fun. Wish my budget could run to 12" with goto.

[moogoomonkey]

I would really like scope with GOTO when I get a bit more experiences. Just so I can sit back after a long day and just enjoy the views

[Zul]

Congrats with a fantastic scope!

[VigdisVZ]

A 12" should give you some nice views. The photons wont know what hit em.

[Phaylon]

That sounds like it will be a lot of fun. Wish my budget could run to 12" with goto.

To be quite honest I really couldn't afford this at all When I started looking, I intended to get an 8inch without goto. It didn't take much time at all in the telescope store to decide to go bigger. Its a very evil place. I really had no chance. So I'll probably be paying the credit card bill for a little longer than I intended.

FInally have it all put together and ready to go...just waiting for the clouds to go away, and it doesnt look like that will be happening for a few days at least. Until then, I will continue just playing with it in the dining room. I must say, moving it around with my ipad or iphone is loads of fun. I have a feeling this Orion StarSeek is going to end up being one of my alltime favourite purchases.

This scope is BIG. Much bigger than I realized at first. Im a fairly big guy at 6'3" around 250lbs....and I feel this is pretty much the biggest scope I would be able to handle on my own. If I had went for the 14" or larger I really don't think I would ever be able to use it, since I do most of my observing solo. And I would also probably need a big truck to move it around. So I believe that 16-24" monster reflector that I dream about owning will have to wait until I have my own backyard observatory.

[skir]

To be quite honest I really couldn't afford this at all When I started looking, I intended to get an 8inch without goto. It didn't take much time at all in the telescope store to decide to go bigger. Its a very evil place. I really had no chance. So I'll probably be paying the credit card bill for a little longer than I intended.

FInally have it all put together and ready to go...just waiting for the clouds to go away, and it doesnt look like that will be happening for a few days at least. Until then, I will continue just playing with it in the dining room. I must say, moving it around with my ipad or iphone is loads of fun. I have a feeling this Orion StarSeek is going to end up being one of my alltime favourite purchases.

This scope is BIG. Much bigger than I realized at first. Im a fairly big guy at 6'3" around 250lbs....and I feel this is pretty much the biggest scope I would be able to handle on my own. If I had went for the 14" or larger I really don't think I would ever be able to use it, since I do most of my observing solo. And I would also probably need a big truck to move it around. So I believe that 16-24" monster reflector that I dream about owning will have to wait until I have my own backyard observatory.

I know what you mean about spending too much! I think I'm going down that road at the moment. But I'll hopefully end up with something that I won't want to upgrade for a while (yeah right ) and if I do it will hopefully have some re-sale value. So you can control your goto with a computer? That sounds a cool feature, I'm even more jealous!

[Phaylon]

Yeah, I think you can control it with a computer right out of the box. The Starseek unit attaches to the scope and creates an temporary WiFi network around it. So I can connect with any device with wifi really. I used my ipad and installed Orion's astronomy app and had it all working within 2 minutes. super easy to do. Now I can just touch anywhere on the sky and the scope will slew there. Very convienient and kind of fun. I thin it will help me focus more on regions of the sky I don't know at all...since I now can see what objects are close by instead of just slewing to a random one off the list on the hand controller.

You can see some youtube videos of it in action. Thats pretty much what sold me on it. It also works on my Celestron, so I figured it will get a lot of use.

[skir]

Yeah, I think you can control it with a computer right out of the box. The Starseek unit attaches to the scope and creates an temporary WiFi network around it. So I can connect with any device with wifi really. I used my ipad and installed Orion's astronomy app and had it all working within 2 minutes. super easy to do. Now I can just touch anywhere on the sky and the scope will slew there. Very convienient and kind of fun. I thin it will help me focus more on regions of the sky I don't know at all...since I now can see what objects are close by instead of just slewing to a random one off the list on the hand controller.

You can see some youtube videos of it in action. Thats pretty much what sold me on it. It also works on my Celestron, so I figured it will get a lot of use.

Is the Orion and skywatcher software related at least at the synscan level? Would be interesting if a version of your software appeared for skywatcher mounts.

[Phaylon]

Im really not too sure. My Orion hand controller does say Synscan on the bottom of it, and the guy at the scope store mentioned to me many times that they are all made by the same people.

And as i typed that, I just looked it up really quick and the Orion website says the StarSeek unit is compatible with Skywatcher SynScan scopes. So it looks like it will work without any extra effort.

[Phaylon]

"SkyWatcher mounts with SynScan controllers"

That is the exact wording on the website in the section for compatibility.