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I'll try to address as many of your queries as I feel I can add constructive info to. I want to point out I have owned a scope for a whole 6 months now (well, almost!) so I'm a newbie too. I'll answer from my own experiences - these answers may not necessarily be right or wrong, but accurate from my point of view. I have a GSO 10" dob basically the same as yours, except wider mirror and f5 ratio.
Lifting the dob on a box, etc, is great for when you are viewing at a low elevation (I've made up my own special "height booster") but I found that when viewing standing up all the time I get sore feet very quickly, especially on cold nights. I'm probably going to re-make my "box" to about half it's current height (which is presenty a total of 350mm). However a good height adjustable viewing chair is even more worthwhile I think. I lashed out and bought one of those excellent viewing chairs as carried by Bintel, etc, for a bit under $200. Expensive yes, but in my opinion a great accessory. I have also used it to sit on while talking, eating and drinking at a barbecue, camping, etc, as well. Very comfortable!
My scope came with 25, 15, 9 and 4.5 mm eyepieces. The 4.5 I have never successfully used, I don't use the 9mm much, I love both the others - HOWEVER like you I felt I needed a wide field ep, as my stellar navigating skills are poor I needed it as much to actually find particular objects as anything. I think a wide angle 9mm ep is still going to be a little like looking through a keyhole, if you know what I mean, just a bigger keyhole. Depends on what you want to achieve. If you want increased magnification but with trying to keep the desired object in your field of view (dob = non-tracking = moving target) then the ep you mention sounds interesting. I have an Orion Strates 68 degree ep in 8mm for the same kind of thing, I quite enjoy using it.
I definitely recommend a truly wide angle eyepiece of some kind. About 3-4 months ago I purchased the Andrews Ultra Wide Angle 30mm 80 degree 2" barrel ep, normal price around $149 though mine was on special at the time. This ep provides approx 1.98 true degrees of sky in my scope. My enjoyment in observing in general, and my success in finding particular targets, immediately doubled! There is a review of this ep on this forum, I'll try to find it to paste the link in.
Some say save your money as ultimately you'll want to upgrade this to a better brand anyway. perhaps. I tend to disagree - again, I'm a newbie. Money is precious, and I could afford to buy this NOW, and be using it NOW to enjoy so many aspects of my observing so much more! Some objects simply demand a wider viewing angle to appreciate then in their full glory, or to view them properly in context with their surrounds. If you can afford other more expensive brands then please do purchase one.
Barlows .... a bit of a contentious issue for me actually. I have now purchased 2 - a Meade #140 2x bought brand new, and a Televue 2x (not the Powermate version) purchased 2nd hand on this forum. I bought them to assist with planetary viewing, specifically Saturn and Jupiter, and I find I do not use either of them. Yes, I effectively get a 2x magnified view, but I strongly dislike the "light scattering" that seems to take place, ie the image quality just falls apart. Perhaps I have never tried them under truly fabulous seeing conditions, but I've used them on pretty good skies, and I still don't like them. Many (most?) others on this forum however use barlow lenses frequently, and love them, so I am at a loss to explain my dislike of the results.
One last thing I will add ..... fairly good collimation in a reflector will give fairly good viewing, excellent collimation will result in excellent viewing. Details just appear in familiar objects that you would not have imagined were there, fainter objects that were previously invisible will appear, etc.
Buy yourself the Combination Sighting & Cheshire tube from Bintel, etc, and read lots about how to collimate your scope accurately. I also bought the Laser collimation tool (if you buy one get the "return beam" version, not the "standard") and I use it to check / fine tune as well.
Sorry to have taken up so much space - I wanted to point out a few things that as a newbie were important to me, but perhaps someone with greater experience / knowledge may not have highlighted these points.
Cheers!
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