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Skywatcher GPS mouse...


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I have one for my EQ6, and it sets location, time, and date. That's it. Given that the mount's permanently in an observatory, it's a very expensive clock!

There is a slight, but noticeable, improvement in GOTO accuracy with the GPS (for completely accurate time/location) and reticle eyepiece (for spot-on 3-star alignment), but not enough to really justify the outlay.

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I'd second the reticle eyepiece - if you want to improve your goto accuracy this makes a huge difference. I picked up a cheap (non-illuminated) reticle eyepiece from ScopesnSkies and it's proved incredibly useful. It makes a big difference to goto setup, helps with drift alignment, centring webcams, and a whole range of other tasks.

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I'd agree about the cheap, non-illuminated - I have the illuminated Skywatcher one, but find the illumination a bit bright, using it with the light turned off and stars slightly defocussed works much better. Not really worth the extra cost.

EQ6 goto is a mystery to me. Sometimes it is extremely good, but occasionally fairly awful, and i've yet to figure out what the difference is.

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Yeh...I plan on a reticle piece once I get first light and check errors also.

I've already tuned the EQ6 and replaced the awful cheap and notchy worm bearings.

But I'm prepared for errors. Gonna be fun playing to be honest.

I never planned on the GPS mouse...just curious to why it's seen as worth £99 lol Takes a few seconds to enter the data manually and like mentioned about...a decent phone will have GPS :)

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Just out of curiosity I checked the Bay for GPS devices and they're super cheap (admittedly they don't instantly update your handset). But it reminded me I've had a TomTom sitting in my glovebox unused for nearly 2 years.

Got it out and it had full power! lol Instant GPS details too. Google was bang on though. Good to know :)

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I got the skywatcher GPS mouse with the 2nd hand scope I bought yesterday, so are they any good? Guy told me it tells the scope all it needs to work all I have to do is point the scope north and the GPS does the rest, so I guess that's not entirely true?

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If you got it with a scope then it's got to be a good thing as you didn't pay top whack for it :D

With the handset you usually have to enter the longitude and Latitude (only once if you're in the same area) and then the date and time each time.

So if you have yours it will populate all of that for you. Saves you 1-2 mins max but if it's included with your purchase...then all is well :) But definately not worth £99 new in my very humble opinion.

It won't polar align your scope though :p

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YOu dont need a reticule eyepiece for accurate alignment - you already have one - its your finderscope. JUst make sure the finder is well aligned to the main optics and use the finders crosshairs for star alignment. Its what I do and it works fine with very accurate GoTo alignment.

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  • 5 months later...

StarGPS produces on for the Skywatcher also, much cheaper. I am getting one fropm StarGPS for my Skywatcher goto Dob. I am to lazy to input the info each time, and it's as pain to always have to, so feel it's better to use the GPS to input the data, and much improved data.

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