Manual or GoTo

[trogre]

Manual or GoTo. Not an opinion on what is best as I have no experience but I can understand the camp of “manual, learn the sky”.

Years ago my cousin had a Kodak instamatic camera, those long in the tooth will remember it. Basically as film camera and just point, press button and wind on, that was it. I had a pair of canon slr`s, think they were A1`s and later A1 + T90 , that is how long ago it was!!

I also had a Bronco medium format camera which had changeable backs so, 35mm, 120mm and Polaroid. My cousin said to me he wanted to buy a top notch camera like my canon and ditch his automatic. Now he only basically used his instamatic once a year, on holiday. I wanted to show him it is not just a matter of setting camera to Auto and expect a good result. I set up the Bronica with Polaroid back and set camera on auto.

I got him to take a photo of me and the sun was behind me and facing the camera. Result I was almost pitch black and the sky was exposed perfectly. I said to him before he spends hundreds of £`s on a camera, 1st buy a cheap slr and learn about how light, focus, aperture etc effects the result of picture. Learn the basics and he will have a great base to work on when he upgrades. Realising it is not quite so easy he kept his Instamatic.

Long story but to me no different than astronomy, learn the constellations as much as you can. Orion for example may be at a certatain point in the sky at say 7pm but 6 hours later will have moved. This was my 1^st lesson as I got used to looking at Orion at a certain time. I came out a lot later and was confused as to where it was.

I think you all know what I am getting at, manual or goto you do need that basic knowledge which can to be honest can be learnt with just your eyes even before you buy the scope. Let’s face it you will certainly need to pick out 2-3 starts to align (if goto or pushto) so why not get familiar with them before you start.

Mind you trying to learn sky visualy in this awful weather is so frustrating.

[laudropb]

I think the reasons for choosing your system can go a little deeper than that. For me I prefer manual because it is the search for faint objects which I enjoy most. I like to plan a star hop and put it into action. When I succeed I get a real buzz. When I fail it's back to the drawing board and start again. Also I find that when I take time in locating an object I then spend more time observing it. It is amazing the more detail that you see if you spend time looking. Having said that I do think go to has its place and I am going to buy a Mak on a go to mount. It is all a matter of personal choice.

[Charic]

Mind you trying to learn sky visualy in this awful weather is so frustrating.

There's always Stellarium?  ( http://www.stellarium.org/en_GB/) 

[Tinker1947]

I favour a GoTO, not because it will find DSO's and save me the bother, it will track object once there found manually, there is also the AP side of things try finding a DSO that your scope can't see and take  a image, a GoTo once set-up will slew to it and the image will be in the centre of the sensor, this alone will save hours of trial and error....

[Scooot]

I use push-to, similar to goto but you push the scope to its target rather than use motors. Although it has no tracking. Light pollution makes star hopping much harder where I usually view, at my house. It was even difficult picking out the main stars via a telrad so I've got rid of that now. The push-to helps me find things quickly so I can spend more time observing, but I've been doing it a while so I'm now very familiar with the sky. When you're knew, it's sometimes difficult to know what something looks like in a scope. So you can be in the right area, but never be sure if you can't detect it because it's not visible in your scope that night, or whether you're looking in the wrong place. Push-to or goto helps to eliminate that problem. You will learn the sky more quickly without goto etc, but you will learn it eventually with it.

[NGC 1502]

I'm very much a manual starhopper. But I'd never try to persuade someone else to do astronomy my way, it may not suit them.

I've seen clubmates totally hacked off with their go-to, and others getting on fine.

I've seen clubmates struggling big time to find stuff manually, and others, like me having great fun.

Same with visual and imaging, what suits one may not be good for another.

Find out what suits you. Whatever gets you out under the stars....

Regards, Ed.

[Knighty2112]

Had a GoTo scope about 6 years ago. Never really liked it much so sold it. Much prefer to hunt around manually with the scope, but depends on your patience level I guess if you want quick instant views appearing in your EP.

[Gazabone]

I have to say I use both systems; I put up a GoTo when there's not much time but I do enjoy finding stuff manually.  When I bought an NEQ6 Pro mount earlier this year, I opted for the syntrek version rather than the synscan.  On a couple of occasions, I've had to cut observing short because a GoTo has developed a error (on one occasion, I did a round trip of about 50 miles and did no observing because my AVX mount wouldn't power up at all and has no slow mo controls to make it really usable with my C8 on it.

I'm pretty rubbish at star hopping; I haven't got the hand yet of translating what I see on a star chart to what I see through the eyepiece however I really enjoy using setting circles, either on one of my EQ mounts with RA and Dec or on my 10" Dob using Alt.Az coordinates.

Bottom line is that you'll find advocates (and detractors) of any system and I think it simply a case of trying them all out and seeing what you enjoy most.

Whatever you do, Happy viewing.

[RT65CB-SWL]

Never used a goto... for me manual alt-az or equatorial and no restriction. 

If the power failed/batteries discharged... I know I can still use my mount & 'scope! 

[ronin]

You learn the sky with a goto as fast as you do without.

No-one actually goes outside and says goto X and does not know where X is, what X is and not know where the scope should go to the show X.

Oddly if you find something unknown with a goto you can ask the scope what it is and the scope will give you an indication of whatever based on the RA/Dec. You cannot do that with a manual scope so you could argue that with a goto you could learn more. :eek:

I recall it was asked a long time back how many had a goto and how many did not, the expectation being that goto was in the minority. Result was that over 2/3 of us had a goto. Maybe they are more useful then you think. I recall paying a first visit a club once and 80% of the scopes were 5 and 6 inch Mak/SCT goto's. I know it was 80% as there were 10 scopes there (makes it easy) - 8 goto's, one 80mm refractor on a Vixen Porta mount and one 6" newtonian on an EQ mount.

[trogre]

I suppose it is horses for courses and choice is purely personal. Like some members have said they started with goto and reverted to manual and vice versa. Both ways will give pleasure.

I have to say if I am leaning one way it will be at the moment goto/push to. The main reason at the moment is nothing to do with which one brings more pleasure but 3 pesky street lights. On a few occasions I have gone out and said to my wifey there is no point in getting a scope as I have trouble seeing many stars because of  light pollution + the orange glow of town to the west.

Having said that I am surprised how just holding the palm of my hand up to block out just one street light improves my night vision of stars by almost 100% .Block out all 3 and it would be a different story. I keep on telling myself I must build 3 light blockers which are easy & cheap to do.A few people have made them out of pvc pipes & tarps to good effect. Even now it would vastly improve my bino viewing let alone trying to manually find stars.

Whatever method we l prefer you can bet say in 10 years the way technology is advancing we will be discussing something new to astronomy which today none of us even dream about. I just wonder what else they can come up with?? Will most scopes in 10-15 years be almost totally controlled?? With manual being a minority? I certainly hope not but just what is around the corner perhaps only the developers can tell us and they will not.

Perhaps there may even be a thread somewhere where members have said what they think future development of astronomy will bring technology wise?? If there is I would be interested in what they think. My wife is still waiting for the car you can buy that has no wheels!!!! Not in our lifetime, but there are some out there who are getting there with their prototypes!

[Dave Lloyd]

Had a GoTo scope about 6 years ago. Never really liked it much so sold it. Much prefer to hunt around manually with the scope, but depends on your patience level I guess if you want quick instant views appearing in your EP.

Hunting round the sky using the excellent field of view you get with the likes of your ST120 is not too onerous. I think perhaps with the likes of a mak or similar goto might be a big help for someone who is learning.

[Drop Of Sun]

I use both. I have a manual 10 inch dob and a goto 16 inch dob.

Manual I lke for its simplicity of setup, no power to worry about or cables to connect. I tend to pick on the brighter or easier to find objects.

With the goto dob, things I love include:

-  I can fit in many targets in a short space of time or on nights with patchy cloud. With our weather of late this has been a major advantage to me. I have only observed once in November for a couple of hours, but saw plenty thanks to the goto, givne my iffy manual finding skills!

- When looking at some objects I am not so familiar with, they are often less in your face than the ones I know better. If it wasn't for knowing the goto had put me in the right place, I wouldn't always be sure if I really was looking at the right object.

I think just use what you prefer. There are advantages both ways. Manual definitely encourages me to know the sky a little better, but I could still do some of that with goto as I like to know where things are roughly so I can tell if it's worth sending the goto there.