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Old 29-01-2011, 01:04 AM
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floyd_2 (Dean)
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Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Cecil Hills (Sydney)
Posts: 557
Just thought I'd throw another contender into the mix. Have you considered an Orion XX14i or XX12i? I have the XX14i and love it. I would call it just manageable for one person if you were going to take it to dark sky sites. The XX12i would be very manageable. Both have a push-to computer which makes finding anything in the sky a breeze. As some of the others have already noted - buy a scope that is easy for you to set up / put away etc. It's no good if you have to think whether it's worth the hassle of setting up each night.

With my XX14i, I roll it out of the shed, put it up on leveling blocks, tweak collimation (2-3 minutes so far) and then walk away for an hour while the mirror reaches thermal equilibrium. It's dead easy.

If you're only going to observe from home, then there might be things that you could consider to make set up / putting away easier, like a dedicated shed and observing area, a cart / wheels for your scope etc. Certainly the XX14i and XX12i have good mounts that pull down to quite a small size if you intend to drive to dark sky sites.

I remember almost buying a 16" Meade (full tube) many years ago when they were new on the market. I will always be glad that I reconsidered, as the scope would have just been too big for me and would have led to decreased observing due to the increased hassle of man handling it everywhere. Certainly truss tube scopes have made larger apertures a lot easier to handle. I still think 14"-15" is about the maximum that I could ever comfortably handle on my own.

Best of luck with your decision.

Dean
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