Skyliner 200p purchase

[Steve Ovell]

Thinking about getting a skyliner 200p dobsonian, maybe even the 250p. Looking for advice on these scopes and if they are a good buy at all? Previous scope was only a small 70mm refractor. Looking for good general viewing capabilities, for planetary and deep sky objects. Been out of astronomy for few years, but am getting back into it now. Thanks 

[DRT]

The 200P is one of the most popular starter scopes for very good reasons. The quality of what you can see through it is hard to beat at its price and it is easy to store, use and move around.

I am sure the 250P is also excellent, but it will be considerably heavier.

[emadmoussa]

If you can manage the 250P, then bigger aperture is always better. Both scopes, in my opinion, are fairly manageable and both can fit in a car. 

[Sunshine]

Those are both sweet scopes, I am considering one actually, I’ve had a peek through the 200p, was impressed!

[Charic]

Welcome to the Stargazers Lounge.

Either scope will be just fine. I wanted the 12" 300P solid Skyliner to be my next upgrade, should one become/made available, thats close enough for inspection, and cheap enough to warrant the purchase. I would want to test it side-by-side first to see  if there's a clear difference, and  If there was visually, I would buy it.

The difference has to be  very clear, not marginal. I bought some expensive second hand eyepieces, expecting  to see far more from them than they actually provided, and those eyepieces were from the well known TeleVue brand.

On paper, the next size up in aperture for a Dobsonian ( for visual use only ) should always be better, and is the way to go, as more aperture collects more photons, more photons produce brighter and sharper images, maybe even producing a slightly larger image.
Jupiter  itself on the 8" 200P is small (don't think astronomy book detailing) but what you can see under almost perfect conditions, will still blow you away!

For now, there's no rush to sell my 5 Year scope, and for eyepieces, I would highly recommend some BST Starguiders ED eyepieces.

Edited August 19, 2018 by Charic

[niallk]

A 250px was my first scope: I wholeheartedly recommend it

It will show you so much - all sorts of targets solar system to DSOs.

I can only expect that a 200p will also deliver the goods in accordance with its aperture. 

I was about to purchase an Orion (US) 8", when Wolfi R. at TS pointed out that the SW 250px was about the same price.  I'm forever in his debt