Well i can give you a bit of a hint here,
Look at your equipment you have now.! don't get a ccd/camera that isn't suited to what you are doing.
Recently i was talking to a friend of mine about this issue, and it isn't untill your doing it that you will figure out what you really want to do.
For this im going to give you one handy piece of information.
The LPI, in my honest opinion is $Ih7. ive used one here and they are really a kiddies toy. usefull for nothing more than the moon or maby jupiter (don't expect to capture the moons of jupiter... once you progress to DSO's (theres a lot more of them to image than the 3 planets that have anything worthy of imaging!) the LPI will go into the corner never to be used again...
DBK21, not a bad setup Unreal planetary imager super sensitive ect ect. though if you don't have a "Large" aperature scope youll fall down in the imaging, the more aperature, the more usefull magnification you can pull the more detail you see. The DBK does have a long exposure mode that will allow you to capture some alright images but that isn't its forte. Once your though with your planetary phase, this camer is useless for a guide camera as it isn't sensitive enough, another friend of mine recently brought a DSI to guide after seeing that i never had problems with getting a guide star no matter what, where as he was struggling even at 5 second iterations.
Another thing for planetary you will need to purchase a x5 Power mate this will do the same as dropping a high magnification eye piece for decent results. as i said maginification is king, when talking planetary.
Which brings me to the last piece of equipment you guys have asked about... the DSI II colour. As for DSO's and long exposure times aperature isn't king (well it is but meh
for beginners a 80mm ED refractor will be your best friend untill your sure of what you want to do) the DSI can capture shots of the moon/planets but it will not be good. But talking about taking photos of nebula/galaxy's this is a nice piece of kit (ditch envisage its $hI7 and grab something else to take your shots. Best of all when you finally get the dollars up to purchase a DSLR or a dedicated Astro CCD the DSI is a kick ass guider, slap it into a nice little guider (mine is only 16.95 dick smith special 114mm reflector) and your set to take 20min + exposures! happy days easy done!
So what would i do? well im bias but knowing what i know now and considering i have 10" reflector.
DBK21 + 5x powermate - Planetary Imgaging only.
DSI ccd - Long exsposure DSO (anything over 2 min and you need to guide...
DSLR (get one with digic III so you can control using the USB 2). Dedicated Astro photography for DSO's.
you both own Cassigrain style scopes so they are really planetary scopes but can double as some good Narrow Field scopes with the right equipment.!!!
Good luck
