can't suggest any meads myself, I found I had too spend too much money to get what I wanted there. I wanted a large aperture sct and a reliable and above all quiet equatorial mount, with goto.
I settled on a second hand C11 OTA and a new EQ6 pro mount. That left me a lot of spare cash for quality EP's etc. Now all I have to do is construct a reliable dew shield and figure out the polar alignment system
Here is what I put together for au $5000
http://img.villagephotos.com/p/2006-...1/Myscope2.jpg
A lot of scope for the money this way. In a meade, $5000 would have only gotten me an 8" including the add on eq wedge, and with the C11 OTA I got the williams crayford focuser and the dialectric diagonal included. So shop around is my advice.