thanks for the quick replies, especially about the 12mm pentax xf issues... interesting. (im 30 and wear contacts by the way)
I went to astrofest last week and got to look through a few scopes and eyepieces. (tuc 47 looked great through a 16" dob) For some reason most people there loved 2" eyepieces for everything from 30mm up to 14mm. Im not keen on having that much weight when using high magnification. For that reason i think i'd need a 1.25" barlow too (but which one?)
My scope came with standard 10mm and 20mm eyepieces and while i prefer the 20mm eye relief, i usually dont use it for too long before whacking the 10mm in for a closer look. (incidentally, is there any particular reason why you would use a 42mm to look at the Orion Nebula? Its been the main nebula that i have looked at so far but mainly use the 10mm to view it)
I think i'll look at getting the 30mm 2" superview for sweeps and big galaxies now.
I would expect the 8.5mm Pentax XF ($229)to have better FOV than my 10mm so i think it would be the eyepiece i use more than anything - unless anyone thinks that there are better eyepieces for under $200 for viewing planets in particular.
Unfortunately i cant stretch to a Nagler/Panoptic. Looked at the Baaders, (the zoom for $299 at Andrews sounds interesting) but reviews i have read suggest that the Pentax are better for an 8.5-12mm size.
Unfortunately trying before i buy is pretty much impossible. BTOW is all we really have in Perth, has a very small range of eyepieces and is out of stock often.
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