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The 127 arrived yesterday and I managed to get a look through it last night in poor conditions. The optics look decent with no glaring faults (checked for astigmatism, decentering, zones, spherical aberration). The test certificate supplied with the scope claims a smooth 1/4 wave peak to valley and that fits with what I see (ie. uniform, concentric, well defined out of focus rings with some difference in brightness between inside and outside focus).
Jupiter showed about the detail I'd expect at 100x with no visible chromatic aberration. A bright star had to be carefully focused to avoid a blue fringe which fits with what others have reported with these scopes (ie. blue doesn't come to quite the same focus as the other wavelengths).
The case is of good quality and makes a handy bench to sit the scope on, but there was a lot of black dust from the foam on the optical tube and the tube was not in a plastic bag. The metal lens cap was not screwed onto the objective and there are finger prints on the lens. The rings were not square to the handle/dovetail and there are several scratches through the paint. Some packing foam between the tube and dew shield was doubled over making the shield very difficult to remove initially. The 10:1 focuser was not properly attached to the focuser body.
After fixing all of the little niggles I'm left with a reasonable quality scope with some scratches in the paint. I'm curious to hear what condition other 127's have arrived in if others have ordered. I'll do another optical check at higher mag when conditions allow.
On another note my new backyard is a lot darker after shifting house this week - no streetlights shining into the yard and no neighbours lights even though we're in town and no heavy industry in the area.
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