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Hey Guys I recently went down the same track as you are and astro photography is also something I looked at.
I searched and searched looking for refractors, cassigran etc etc. only wanting to spend $1,000 the more I looked the more confused I got. Then I came here... One of the best questions that set me on the right track was "what do you want to see?" I thought hang on " everything".. Then I really thought about it Deep sky object mainly, difficult as I'm only 11 klm from Melbourne.
The budget went up to$1,500 on the basis that I would rather buy something that will out perform my expectations. Goto functionality was a big one especially if I wish to take pix. After comparing scope against scope I settled on a Orion Goto 10" dobsonian, from bintel they were really helpful. The light gathering power of the 10 inch is amazing you can punch through Cloud's which staggered me. The 10" dob has an "f" ratio of 4.7 so for taking pix it's great. Dob's are the best value for money in terms of image capture. The first real scope I looked through was a Refractor that was about $10k with my dob I can see everything it see's may be not with the same clarity but still spectacular. The other issue that pushed me to a dob. Is the simplicity of design, alt az mounts are simple from what I read on equatorial mounts can take some additional set up time so first up the only set up you have is level base colmination and alignment using the Goto. Last night that took all of 5 minutes and mainly because I' fussy. People say you can't use a dob for pix, I'm still new at this but here is a pix from from last night.
Just also be aware that this interest can get expensive, I've already spent an extra $1000 so choose wisely
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