GSO RC images 21 May 2009

[wysiwyg (Mark)]

Very nice images Paul,

It looks like this scope is going to be the next bang for your buck type of scope. RCOS are already reducing their scopes by 20%, thats nearly $10K off the price of the 16".
Maybe they saw your photos

[desler]

I know it;s all a learning curve, but boy, these images are just so nice, it makes me feel pretty low down the food chain.

I'm so happy that your finally getting the results you hoped for Paul, well done!


Darren

[Peter Ward]

Originally Posted by gregbradley

Looks to me like some Chinese Telescope makers are going to be the new Takahashi in the not too distant future and will shake up the lucrative Ritchey Chretien world.

Greg.

Yes, it's amazing what you can do with a $A12,000 Taka mount and $3K OTA these days

[TrevorW]

Pete is that a touch of sarcasm I hear or are my eyes deceiving me

[Peter Ward]

Originally Posted by TrevorW

Pete is that a touch of sarcasm I hear or are my eyes deceiving me

Nah...(and taking nothing away from Paul's images) just stating the 'bleedin obvious...

[AlexN]

bleeding obvious being that the mount is the most important part of medium to long focal length astrophotography? (or great images in general?) Not to mention knowing your gear and how to get the most out of it?

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Originally Posted by Peter Ward

Yes, it's amazing what you can do with a $A12,000 Taka mount and $3K OTA these days

hahaha! Seriously, the 12" variant of the GSO RC is within reach for a lot of people (from memory, it'll be priced around US $4700) - if it performs like the 8" is doing, but with more light gathering ability, it'll hold serious potential. As long as optical quality stays good (and mechanical quality now that I thinik about it), they're going to start killing RCOS sales. And that's great - RCOS gear is way over priced. Those guys probably have a 500% markup.

Dave

[TrevorW]

Dave they haven't made a 12" yet you are quoting the 10" prices

[Hagar (Doug)]

Looks pretty good Paul, You have to be happy with results like this. The scope looks like with a little effort it will be one of the new class of scopes set to change the overall costing of astronomy equipment for the future.

The apparent reflection you have on the bright stars is evident on my VC200L as well but was improved with collimation but may be something you just have to put up with. Looks like I had better buy a copy of CCD inspector. It worked OK during the trial period. So might be a required bit of kit with the RC or the Vixen to keep them in check.

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Originally Posted by TrevorW

Dave they haven't made a 12" yet you are quoting the 10" prices

Not according to Astronomics. They've been advertising it heavily for the past 2 months in various magazines. US Pricing be noted.

6" - 795
8" - 1995
10" - 2795
12" - 4495

Page 23 of May's Astronomy

:-)

Oh, and there's talk of a 16" for around 9 grand US or so.

Dave

[marki]

Dave is correct, its all there in black and white with a comment about being able to buy a compact car with the change you save buying the astrotech 12" instead of buying a RCOS. Interesting in that the 10" and above includes cooling fans in the price. Do you think they might be getting serious about this?

Mark

[Peter Ward]

Originally Posted by AlexN

bleeding obvious being that the mount is the most important part of medium to long focal length astrophotography? (or great images in general?) Not to mention knowing your gear and how to get the most out of it?

All of the above. A poor mount will ham-string even the best optics on the planet.

[leinad (Dan)]

Originally Posted by marki

Dave is correct, its all there in black and white with a comment about being able to buy a compact car with the change you save buying the astrotech 12" instead of buying a RCOS. Interesting in that the 10" and above includes cooling fans in the price. Do you think they might be getting serious about this?
Mark

http://www.astronomics.com/main/docu...20may%2009.pdf

[Peter Ward]

Originally Posted by marki

Dave is correct, its all there in black and white with a comment about being able to buy a compact car with the change you save buying the astrotech 12" instead of buying a RCOS. Interesting in that the 10" and above includes cooling fans in the price. Do you think they might be getting serious about this?

Mark

Of course, all the hyperbole must be true....the same ad also reads:

"And Meade’s 6” f/10 Advanced Coma-
Free (ACF) catadioptric optics deliver the
same sharp coma-free view as a professional
Ritchey-Chrétien telescope, but
without an R-C’s high price tag"

[TrevorW]

Dave that must be old advertising as Astronomics home page makes no reference to the 10" or bigger and they are selling the 8" for around $1400 USD currently , I've seen the 10" advertised on a Sth African site for around $4700 USD, I suggest we don't speculate to much on content and price in OZ until someone here ie: Andrews actually advertise it

http://www.astronomics.com/main/cate...F9DX9A0/Page/1

[kinetic (Steve)]

Originally Posted by Peter Ward

Of course, all the hyperbola must be true....the same ad also reads:

"And Meade’s 6” f/10 Advanced Coma-
Free (ACF) catadioptric optics deliver the
same sharp coma-free view as a professional
Ritchey-Chrétien telescope, but
without an R-C’s high price tag"

that's hyperbole Peter

[Peter Ward]

Originally Posted by kinetic

that's hyperbole Peter

Freudian slip...I was thinking of the shape of the optics

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Originally Posted by TrevorW

Dave that must be old advertising as Astronomics home page makes no reference to the 10" or bigger and they are selling the 8" for around $1400 USD currently , I've seen the 10" advertised on a Sth African site for around $4700 USD, I suggest we don't speculate to much on content and price in OZ until someone here ie: Andrews actually advertise it

http://www.astronomics.com/main/cate...F9DX9A0/Page/1

Trevor - check CN - there's *lots* of reports from NEAF about 10", 12" and 16" all coming in the near future. Astronomics, not GSO. GSO is an OEM, as well as their own named brand. Andrews is buying the GSO RC's. Astromonics has commissioned GSO to make 10", 12" & 16" RCs along the same lines as the 6" & 8" that they natively manufacturer as OEM/branded name. Yes, the hardware is made by the same company, but that doesn't mean that GSO will provide 10" and above RCs. I presume they will, it makes sense to, at least R&D wise and economics wise.

Dave

[dpastern (Dave Pastern)]

Originally Posted by Peter Ward

Of course, all the hyperbole must be true....the same ad also reads:

"And Meade’s 6” f/10 Advanced Coma-
Free (ACF) catadioptric optics deliver the
same sharp coma-free view as a professional
Ritchey-Chrétien telescope, but
without an R-C’s high price tag"

I doubt that many people are going to honestly be able to tell the difference between an image taken with a 12" GSO RC and a 12.5" RCOS RC. At least, when both units are properly collimated, decent mounts are used, good tracking, good exposures and the same CCD imaging gear.

I've seen the same disdain in the photography field, where those using pro cameras treat those using non pro cameras with utter disdain and contempt.

This can only be good for the industry - like the Dinosaurs, these overly priced brands will *have* to adjust or die. The days of massive markups are over I suspect, and as a consumer, I'm quite happy with that. I don't particularly care if RCOS cries poor, or stops making such a large profit, that's not my problem. Maybe if they didn't sell their products with such massive markups, they'll retain some market share. I guess it'll depend on how greedy they are. They'll certainly play on their "name", much like Nike & Reebok play on their names in the shoe industry. A name is name, it's no guarantee of quality, or a reasonable price for that matter.

I can understand some RCOS owners becoming upset if a 12" GSO RC performs with 95% of a RCOS RC at 15-20% of the price, they'll find it hard to justify their expenditure I suspect ;-) And they'll be mightily jealous of those that are getting near performance at a fraction of the price.

I do suspect that the RCOS RC's are definitely better optically, and mechanically, and probably feature wise, but the question is, by *how* much, and is the huge price difference justified? I suspect not!

As to Meade, despite my dislike for the company and it's average products (imho), the LX200 ACF units have a reasonable reputation for optical quality, leading to reasonable imaging with the units. Sure, Meade did a major stuff up when it announced the ACFs as being Ritchey Chretiens, and it didn't win them any friends in the industry I suspect.

Dave

[AlexN]

good post dave. All these comments carry an overwhelming element of truth, but the fact is that consumers are generally the same in every field. There will always be bargain hunters wearing clothes bought from target, and there will always be people paying 80% more for nike, despite the quality of the products being similar. Name brands will always carry weight in the market. People will still buy rcos scopes even though they can get similar quality images from a gso at a fraction of the cost.. I know if i had the money i would own am rcos on an astrophysics 3600 gto mount regardless of if i could get similar images from a gso rc and a celestron cge pro mount. Why? Because they are the best. If you can afford the best, you buy the best. If not, you make do with what you can afford. Luckily for ur, gso have just made what we can afford a whole lot better.