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Yeah Paul - look, having been as 'old school' as I am, seeing a ~5" triplet APO for less than $2400 with a reportedly brilliant 3.5" focuser and a dedilcated flattener for only $300 extra, to say I was feeling a little dubious about it would be an understatement (and having owned WO FLT110 (TMB/LZOS optics), TMB 80/480 and an AP Starfire 130) I will say I had my expectations well under control - and had reserved myself to the fact that I was 'settling' for whatever quality I the scope provided, based on the very low price...
Does the 120APO compare to the Starfire 130? I think if you put them on a test bench together, the starfire would destroy it, however, when you're imaging under ~2" seeing conditions on average, I doubt you'd ever notice the differences between them... and I think it would optically hold its own against the WO FLT110 I had... Build quality wise, it's certainly at or above the WO and the TMB scope - again, the AP... I dunno, maybe its rose coloured glasses, but the Starfire seemed like it was just more lovely than anything else...
A lot of reviews will say that the scope is amazing 'for the price'
I would say its amazing, in spite of its price. It is FAR better than it has any right to be at this price bracket.
For me, there was a LOT of deliberation... Based on what I knew I was happy to spend I was looking at:
the Askar 107 and 130 PHQ scopes, and 120 and 140 APO's.
There are next to no concrete reviews on the 107PHQ, and despite my 65PHQ being exceptional, with no reviews, spending 3k on a scope was less than ideal... and the 120 is bigger, and has more reach, for nearly $600 less (after adding the flattener) and has numerous AMAZING reviews.
the 130PHQ has amazing reviews, more aperture and reach, but its slower at nearly f/8, and you're looking at a different size of scope going to a 130 f/7.7 quadruplet over a 120 triplet... Oh, and nearly $1k more expensive.
Then the 140APO... well... fully extended for imaging its nearly 1.3m long but 140mm f/7 for just over 3k with the flattener was tempting... But again, no reviews, and the spot diagrams compared to the other 3 were quite average...
All I knew was that I wanted a LONG focal length, a dead flat field (over my small sensor) a decent wack of aperture to resolve a bit more detail, but retain the portability of my rig... So after a lot of umming and ahhing, I pulled the trigger on what turned out to be the cheapest scope in the comparison, and I'm 100% glad I did...
It's brilliant... each sub that rolls in, I litterally look at the screen and think "HOW?".. Then when you first hit STF after integration... wow...
I wouldn't hesitate to recommend the scope at a moments notice, however, if you have the budget for the AP SF130, TEC110/140 or Tak TOA130 - Do it.... I bet they will outperform it when your seeing is sublime...
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