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Old 03-01-2011, 05:18 PM
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pgc hunter
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Join Date: Feb 2009
Location: Renmark, SA
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Like everyone else, I suggest get the binoculars. Those tiny 76mm newts are of limited usefullness for observing. Not only is the aperture very small, the light/contrast loss caused by the secondary mirror will render effective resolution and light grasp to that of an even smaller instrument and being a "table top" scope, you also must find a stable suface to put it on or engineer one yourself, which IMO would not be worth the effort for something that is otherwise more limited in capability than a typical 70mm refractor. At F/4, images in a plossl eyepiece will be loaded with coma and likely other abberations. The thing won't handle much power either, so planetary views will be fairly limited.

The Orion ST80 is a good alternative, but for visual it is best suited to widefield, low power views (under 100x). Not ideal for planetary due to it's F/5 focal ratio as chromatic abberation is a problem and essentially blurs the image at higher powers. It's construction and optical quality/light grasp is superior to those tiny SW "heritage" things. If you're after something for low -power wide field deepsky viewing, the ST80 is a nice bit of kit, and is very portable which will resolve deep sky objects better than the binoculars. But... Bintel have the ota only at $219, so when you add on things like the tripod, eyepieces, diagnal etc, you are looking at a good $350+ that money will buy you the binos plus be well on your way toward your larger scope......

If it was me, I'd get the binos for 150, then save up for the 10 incher. In the meantime there is stacks and stacks of things to see in the 15x70's.
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