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Chris, you seem to have a grasp of the equipment and terminology, but with those choices there are budget considerations that need to be addressed.
For sheer bang for your buck you can't go past a dob setup, particularly if your going to use it for visual.
Refractors are expensive for any reasonable aperture.
The GEM route is expensive, your budget for semi decent mount (Heq5 or EQ6 as a minimum) and OTA & related accesories is likely to run to over $3000.
If you can manage it, an 8 inch dob or an 8 inch SCT would give you reasonable portability. An 8 inch dob would cost less than 15% of the price of something like a Meade Lx90 SCT, but the Meade will have tracking and Go-to capabilities.
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