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Originally Posted by norm
The LXD75 10inch Meade with autostar would be very nice. In the right budget as well.  |
The Meade LXD75 mount is the equivalent of an EQ5 and is really inadequte for a 10" telescope. An overloaded equatorial mount becomes nothing more than an excercise in frustration IMO. In addition to that, if planetary/lunar viewing/imaging is your main objective (Dave lives in light polluted Sydney so I assume it would be) the Schmidt Newtonians are not a great choice IMO. The Schmidt Newtonians are inferior to a standard newtonian at high power for lunar/planetary viewing IMO. They are much better suited to widefield low power views of DSO's at which they excel. If you were to go the Schmidt Newt route I would limit myself to the 8" model, because of the mount, I would be avoiding the 10" version. That having been said I know several people who are happy with their 10" Schmidt Newts, they obviously have different standards and expectations than I do.
My recommendation within your budget and the options you have listed would be the 10" F5 Guan Sheng OTA on a Synta EQ6 mount. Andrews can do this combo for you and so can Bintel I believe.
Geoff's recommendation of the 10" dob for visual and a smaller Equatorially mounted scope for imaging is another excellent option and is possibly a better choice than a 10" Equatorially mounted Newt IMO.
CS-John B