Meade ETX90-AT - good starting point

[Goffas1964]

Hello team,

Newbie joining the forum from Adelaide. Keen to 'start the journey' in astronomy and have a chance to grab a (new) second hand Meade ETX90-AT. Would this be a good starting point for planetary obs and such?

Any thoughts (good/bad) appreciated.

[alval]

As a starting point for visual astronomy of planets, moon, and clusters optically it would be fine, for the faint fuzzies not so much unless you can get to a nice dark site. It is small enough and portable so with practice easy to set up and align. However it is an older etx, but at the right price and as long as you make sure the mount is functional and the controller works, as they can have issues. Weasner.com is a good source of info for them. The newer observer series made from around 2015 has a stronger reworked mount.
Once you get hooked and aperture fever takes over then look into bigger and better.
Al