Has anyone had hands on this new scope yet?
http://www.saxon.com.au/new.html#m20325
If yes care to comment? If no do you have opinions on the smaller Saxon MAKs ?
While on the subject opinions and experiances with MAK vs SCT designs at the 8" size would be appreciated. AFAIK the MAK has better contrast (smaller central obstruction) and longer focal length (thus higher magnification for any given ep) so is better for planetary/moon observing but is heavier (hence can give cool down problems) than equiv SCT.
To me this means an 8" MAK is close to a 9" SCT in light gathering, but what about for use with DSOs and astrophotography? I understand MAK's longer focal length is an issue (f12!) that means using a flattener/reducer is more often (always?) required but does this degrade image quality with DSOs a little or a lot, how much is a good reducer etc etc?