Telescope Buying Guide: Low Cost Options

Video Transcript

"Okay, so we've talked a lot about telescopes here and hopefully we're better educated, but how about some choices--some varieties--to help you choose telescopes, and what you might consider when you're ready to buy a telescope. Everything that I see here is under seven hundred dollars. Cost effective and standouts at their price points, and I just want to kind of show you a little bit of the differences here. What you can expect to realistically spend to get started, what you're going to see and if you'll be happy or not. This little guy right here at 4.5 inch reflector on a Dobsonian mount is under two hundred dollars, and at that price point, probably don't have a better telescope to offer you. It does need to be up on a pedestal a little bit, maybe a picnic table or something, and as a Dobsonian it is manual operation. More than enough to show you the rings of Saturn, more than Messier or Galileo had, a great introduction for getting started. At the price point, it is a real telescope. The little guy I got back here is just a little bit more money and again, enough to see the rings of Saturn, enough to get started. It is a little ED refractor, so it'll have good color correction and it won't give you much false color as you push the magnification. Remember when light is bounced off a mirror, there's no lens or prism to come through, so you won't experience that false color. This is a GoTo telescope. When we start out with GoTo telescopes, you can get an outstanding scope for under five hundred dollars. This is 130 millimeter, just over five inches, and it is a GoTo telescope. Once properly aligned, it'll find objects, it'll track objects for you. It's like having a little tutor with you as you use the GoTo setup. Under five hundred dollars. Now, here's something interesting. This little guy is six ninety-nine, and this ten inch model here is six ninety-nine as well. Ten inches of aperture, ninety millimeters of aperture. What is the difference? Why the same price point? Well the ten inch guy here is a Dobsonian I said is the best cost effective way to get lots of aperture. It's a manual operation. You find objects on your own, you track them on your own. With the little 90 millimeter here, this is a GoTo telescope, so it has more bells and whistles. It tracks for you, it finds objects for you... it's almost as simple as going... Saturn, and have your telescope go there for you. So, the first thing people usually consider other than price when they're coming in looking for a telescope is portability. Where they're going to use their telescope, will they travel with it, and whether or not you want to find objects on your own or if you'd like to have a computer hand controller to assist you. I have talked to people when I tell them about GoTo telescopes that you've got to know at least two or three bright stars in the sky to set up your telescope. Don't be intimidated by that. They'll be the same two stars tonight, tomorrow night, and the next night as you go out to align your telescope. One gentleman said "I don't think I can find a couple stars to align to. I think that'd be difficult... maybe I should get a telescope like this." Well, if you can't find two stars you got to find everything with a Dobsonian telescope. So if you love star hopping, if you love the thrill of the hunt, perhaps a manual operation telescope is for you. If you've got an hour's worth of time, if you've got kids, if you've got people they want to see a GoTo setup can certainly be a quick and easier setup. Because you'll track down objects... you can see forty, fifty objects in an hour if you wanted to with something like this, rather than having to track them down manually. So keep in mind price point, portability, where you're going to be viewing from, and whether or not, like I said, you like the thrill of the hunt or you want to be able to go... Saturn."