( 3 reviews )
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Posted: 06-18-2009
This was my first telescope. Let me just say that I'm very impressed with what I see. On my first night out with it I was able to see Jupiter and some of its moons. I was able to make out the red and white bands of clouds too!! It wasn't huge in the eyepiece, but hey, we're not using the Hubble Telescope here. I even got a good look at Saturn as well. Saturn was literally this big -0- and that was with a 9mm eye piece. Now, I bought the accessory kit and I highly recommend getting it with this scope. I love the 32mm eyepiece for great eye relief and the 2x barlow even better. Don't plan on using the 4mm for anything but the moon and even then it's a little too much for this telescope. The spotting scope on the top of this thing is a joke. I took mine off. I just start with the 32mm lens "aim" at what i want to look at, and then start stepping the lenses down. All in all, I would recommend this as a good starter scope. Just point and enjoy. Who needs motor driven gps mounts that take forever to set up.
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Posted: 09-20-2008
The optical quality is quite good, with a good field of view and very limited spider effect. The star pointer is fair to poor however if used with a low power lens (25mm or larger) it will suffice. Barlow usage is excellent and I'm amazed at lunar observation. Only other gripe is when slewing at a low polar angle you can run into the knobs. Mount seems solid however I don't care for the dec. setup. The focuser could stand a little more travel but is adequate for this scopes capability. Overall I give it 5 stars for lunar and terrestrial use, four and a half for planetary (excellent on Jupiter and Venus, struggles with Neptune and Uranus) but with some filters I hope to improve that. Deep sky is fair. The star finder I give a one.
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Posted: 07-03-2008
I'm very pleased with this telescope. I've always looked up at the stars in wonder, now I can see more then I thought were out there. This is a great starter scope, from what I've been told by people who love this hobby. The telescope lets you view the sky to see stars you can't see with your eyes. I'm disappointed in the eye piece you receive with it though. The field of view is very narrow, hard to find the stars you want to see. I was given a wide angle eye piece, to use from a friend, which made my viewing pleasure wonderful. I went from looking at a 13" color tv to a 36" color tv. That's the best way to describe it. I'm glad I got my telescope and will enjoy it for years to come. Kevin
