Upgrade time - Dob to ?

[NickontheCoast]

Seems my astronomy habit is influenced by those significant birthdays! 2008 was the 8" Skywatcher Dob which has seen great service, albeit too many nights inside.

For 2018 I have been looking at adding a goto, which is an expensive proposition - cheaper to buy a new goto dob (kinda).

Now I am looking at the Celestron NexStar 8SE Telescope for portability and of course goto etc. Without access to a range of these my real query is, is it worthwhile to go to the 8" (pricey) or will the 5/6" (maybe not so pricey) be ok and not a disappointment after the aperture of the current dob?

Viewing is usually (I get a fairly good western sky) planets, nebulae and other DSOs. While I try and plan a night viewing, sometimes the seeing is great and I'd like to just pick up and go.

Open to any advice and thoughts.

[mental4astro]

Why a totally new scope that has the same or even smaller aperture?

Have you looked into adding a set of digital setting circles such as the Nexus line from Astro Devices (www.astrodevices.com)?

For less than half the cost of a new SCT, you can pimp your existing scope with a database of 2.5 million objects from 65 separate catalogue and a pointing system with a resolution of sub-second of arc. With this degree of resolution you can identify ALL individual objects within the LMC. This is actually something no goto system or other set of digital setting circles can do.

You can also use whichever existing planetarium app you have on your phone, tablet or computer with wifi connection.

Alex.

[Wavytone]

Nick, after having 8" you will find a 5" or 6 disappointing especially on DSO's.

Assuming you stick to something compact, for a quick setup IMHO a push-to-setup is hard to beat. This consists of an altaz mount (I used an Losmandy AZ8) equipped with encoders and a Nexus II which provides a Wii connection to Sky Safari on a smartphone

[Rkonrad]

I agree the go to on the relatively cheap Alt Az mount is so so plus they are not the the most stable mounts the 8 SE is under mounted in my opinion for a nice portable set up I use a C5 on a SLT mount nice and stable but its small and nothing like a 8 inch dobs

[NickontheCoast]

The purse strings were set aside....

[floyd_2]

Out of interest Nick, what sort of budget are you playing with mate?

[Chapstick]

I have a 6SE and long term borrwing a 8" Dob and personally find the views of both comparable. I actually much rather the smaller STC with GOTO over the manual dob, that said I am selling the Nexstar 6SE to get something a fair bit bigger...