What telescope should I buy?

[200pman]

Fwtw.i bought a 200p love it.easy to set up.use in my garden.i will never change or upgrade to a larger dob.im 65 and still enjoy this dob .enjoy whatever you choose. 

[Starfazed]

Just been through this myself so can share a few thoughts. You said your budget was 1000 and you are in Europe - is that 1000 Euros? And specific UK brands mentioned here like Stella Lyra may well not be available where you are (but similar scopes come from the same factory under brands like Zhumell). Having the strength, space and budget for a 10 inch Dob is a nice problem to have.

Question 1. How much can you afford to spend (including the cost of extra eyepiece, Barlow, sack trolley and foam padding, carry straps, laser collimator etc)

Question 2. What's the biggest size you can confidently and safely carry AND store - where's it going to live when not being used?

Question 3. Do you prioritise aperture or clever tech?

By clever tech, I'm thinking of the balance between a "pure" visual experience with no batteries to go flat (optical rather than red dot finder, manual movement only) scope versus a push to solution like the Starsense, through to fully motorised Goto that can find and track objects (the only Dobsonian I found that does this is the Skywatcher Flextube range, which has the added bonus of being collapsible so is easier to store). But that comes at a cost. Around £1000 will buy you a collapsible Goto 8 inch, a pushto Starsense 10 inch, or a top of the range but no electronic no frills 12 inch Stella Lyra. It will also buy you a 5 inch Celeston 5SE Nexstar Schmidt-Cassegrain, which goes to show the added aperture you get from a Dob for the same price.

One final thought - your budget also allows you the possibility of splitting the money on two decent but contrasting scopes if you think you might want to travel with something more compact.  For example you could just about squeeze a no-frills 10 inch Skywatcher Classic Dobsonian plus a 127 Skymax Matukov  into £1000.

[iapa]

On 05/05/2023 at 20:55, nikooo said:

Hi, this is the first time I'm actually buying a telescope, so I'm an amateur. 

I was looking to buy a Dobsonian telescope, but I don't really know which of these should I buy... a 200/1200 or the 250/1200. I mean I saved some money and right now I don't know If I should pay more money for 250p because I don't know How big is difference between 200p and 250p.

 

Let's say that I want to save money so which one do you guys recommend?

 

 

 

There is a web page that will let you get an idea of different targets with a wide range of OTAs and lenses.

http://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/

You can then get an idea of the differences.

 

[iapa]

On 05/05/2023 at 20:55, nikooo said:

Hi, this is the first time I'm actually buying a telescope, so I'm an amateur. 

I was looking to buy a Dobsonian telescope, but I don't really know which of these should I buy... a 200/1200 or the 250/1200. I mean I saved some money and right now I don't know If I should pay more money for 250p because I don't know How big is difference between 200p and 250p.

 

Let's say that I want to save money so which one do you guys recommend?

 

 

 

There is a web page that will let you get an idea of different targets with a wide range of OTAs and lenses.

http://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/

You can then get an idea of the differences.

 

[iapa]

On 05/05/2023 at 20:55, nikooo said:

Hi, this is the first time I'm actually buying a telescope, so I'm an amateur. 

I was looking to buy a Dobsonian telescope, but I don't really know which of these should I buy... a 200/1200 or the 250/1200. I mean I saved some money and right now I don't know If I should pay more money for 250p because I don't know How big is difference between 200p and 250p.

 

Let's say that I want to save money so which one do you guys recommend?

 

 

 

There is a web page that will let you get an idea of different targets with a wide range of OTAs and lenses.

http://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/

You can then get an idea of the differences.