There’s no “best” telescope for everyone. The one that’s right for you will depend on your lifestyle and your astronomy goals. Here is a guideline to help you with your buying decision.
Firstly, the magnifying power is NOT the most important consideration when choosing a telescope. It is the telescope’s aperture (light-gathering capability) that determines how much you will be able to see.
There are three types of telescopes: Refractors; Reflectors; Schmidt-Cassegrains.
Refractors
A refractor is the scope of choice if you will be stargazing from cities or suburbs, where the night skies are moderately light-polluted. Great for viewing the moon and major planets. If you wish to view nebulas and galaxies, then a Newtonian reflector or Schmidt-Cassegrain would suit you best.
- A 60mm to 80mm aperture refractor makes a fine starter scope. These telescopes are inexpensive, portable, and maintenance-free. A great choice for beginners.
- A 90mm or 100mm aperture refractor will capture more objects and provide better performance, for a higher price.
Reflectors
Newtonian reflectors are great all-around scopes, offering generous apertures at affordable prices. They excel for both planetary and deep-sky viewing. The larger the aperture, the more you’ll see.
- 3" and 4.5" equatorially mounted Newtonians will provide a nice “survey” of celestial luminaries, and they’re plenty portable.
- 6" and 8" Newts have enough aperture to deliver captivating images of fainter fare-clusters, galaxies, and nebulas-especially in a reasonably dark sky. The tradeoff is their bulk and weight. A 6" Newtonian on a Dobsonian mount is easily manageable by one person, and makes a wonderful beginner scope.
Schmidt-Cassegrains
If portability is important, consider a “catadioptric” scope such as a Schmidt-Cassegrain or Maksutov-Cassegrain.
- Provides excellent views of the Moon, planets, and deep-sky objects, and is well suited for astrophotography.
- Costs over $1000 for the most basic 8" models plus hundreds more if you wish to outfit it for astrophotography.
- It might not be so compact after all when you consider the inclusion of a hefty tripod and mount.
Telescope Mounts
Telescopes come on three basic mount types: altazimuth, Dobsonian, or equatorial.
The altazimuth is the simplest and is recommended for casual stargazing and terrestrial observing.
The Dobsonian mount is a boxy altaz-type mount designed for easy maneuvering of large Newtonian tubes of 6" aperture or greater.
The Equatorial mounts are a bit more complicated (and more expensive) than altazimuth mounts, but allow the user to follow the motion of celestial objects with a single manual hand control, or even automatically with a motor drive — a great convenience.
In a nutshell:
Get as much aperture as you can reasonably handle, but not more. Big aperture is desirable, sure, but you don’t want to end up with a scope that is too big or complicated to conveniently set up, haul around-and use!
Start out with a basic refractor of 90mm aperture or smaller, or a Newtonian reflector of 6" aperture or less. After you’ve learned the basics of observing and developed an appreciation for the hobby of stargazing, then you can move up to a bigger, fancier scope.
The above information was obtained from http://www.actonastro.com/. |
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