Which first telescope to buy?

Well, ..., neither! They're both trash. For $30 more you can get a great scope. Read the writeup below for tips on how to buy a first telescope.

Buying Your First Telescope

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When considering a first scope I suggest that you watch the following video on Astronomy: http://video.nbc17.com/v/41781944/raleigh-astronom...

You should, also, read the following article. It will give you some information on how telescopes work, as well as, additional buying tips: http://www.raleighastro.org/observing/general-arti...

For more advice I would suggest that you contact your local astronomy club. You don't have to own a telescope to join! Joining your local astronomy club is the best way to nurture your passion for astronomy. Plus, you'll find that they'll be able to provide you lots of great advice and support for acquiring and operating a telescope.

Now the best pricing for a decent first scope that I can suggest is a Dobsonian scope with a 6" or 8" mirror from Orion (e.g. Orion XT6 - $310 or XT8 - $360).

The two dobsonians I suggested are great visual beginner scopes and are super for just taking out to the backyard for casual observing but will definitely hold their own at any amateur astronomy gathering. They are also easy for young people to use and operate. You can do short exposure astrophotography with them but not long exposure astrophotography (for that you need a lot more money - See "Astrophotograpphy for Web Cams - Robert Reeves").

The Dobsonian scope will be much more durable, of higher quality, and you'll be able to see all of the Messier deep sky objects (DSO's) plus many of the brighter NCG DSO's, many many stars plus: Mercury, Venus, Earth's Moon, Mars, Jupiter and it's moons, Saturn, its rings and moons, Uranus, Neptune and the dwarf planet Pluto, as well as, many of the minor planets, comets, and asteroids. Additionally, it's easy to transport, setup, and use (under 60 seconds from car to ground ... no kidding).

Bottom Line: any scope with less than a 6" mirror with a 1200mm focal length, IMHO, would be a waste of money. See the links below for low priced dobsonian scopes with 6" and 8" mirrors. However, the larger the aperture (size of primary objective ... like an 6", 8", 10", 12" mirror or larger) the better. Also, there are many brands of dobsonian scopes made by many different companies that you can choose from. I only offered these as examples because they are popular with our club members.

Look at the links to the www.telescope.com site that I've provided below and you'll find that they do have quite a selection of standard, push-to, goto dobsonian scopes that could fit your needs.

I took the snapshot of Saturn in the first source with a 6 inch telescope and a webcam. There are a lot of good telescopes that measurement on your fee range. See the last 2 sources. By the way, utilizing a telescope is not as easy as many persons think. Simply getting the article within the field of view and retaining it there's a primary difficulty for most inexperienced persons. They spend a bunch on a telescope and do not know the constellations and so can't point it and get annoyed and promote it on eBay for half of what they paid for it. So that you might wish to small and easy. Even the smallest telescope will show Saturn's rings, so you don't have got to spend $1,500 to begin. There are excellent beginner telescopes for $300 and even less. Of path they will not be computer managed, because of this it will be even more most important so that you can get a star atlas and be trained the constellations. No all of them, however the vibrant ones that you'll discover in that ridiculously vivid city sky you could have there.

I wouldn't recommend either of these telescopes because both have too small an aperture (diameter of main mirror) to satisfy you for long. Of the two, the 130mm will be much better because of its larger aperture, although its mount is overly complicated and hard to use.

Instead of Celestron, try looking for SkyWatcher telescopes. These are made in the same factory as Celestron, but are usually imported directly from China, whereas with Celestron you are paying for shipping California, US duty, and then shipping to India. SkyWatcher comes directly from China to India. I know of at least one dealer in India who carries SkyWatcher, but there are probably others.

First of all do not buy telescope with motors and navigation. It is waste of money! 95% of those thousands of objects in the database are invisible in telescopes like these.

Second of all. You don't want EQ mount. They are horrible to use especially by beginner, they are also expensive, complex, heavy, need polar alignment every time before use.

My advice is. Go for aperture. Bigger the primary mirror better! That is a holy rule of astronomy. Aperture enables you to see those dim objects, bigger it is, more light it gathers and brighter those objects are gonna be in the eyepiece. Telescopes with best aperture / price ratio are the ones called Dobsonians. They are Newtonian telescopes on Dobsonian mount. Very simple to use, setup time is about 5 minutes, easy to move, relatively light weight and simple to manufacture therefor are not expensive (as complex EQ mount are) but most importantly they are stable and move smoothly.

As a complete beginner you will be fine with 6" Dobsonian such as Orion XT6. Really a great telescope.

http://www.telescope.com/Telescopes/Dobsonian-Tele...

Or alternative from Skywatcher

http://www.firstlightoptics.com/dobsonians/skywatc...

Price may seem high but it is not. Telescope like this will never lost its value but small 3" telescopes are not good for anything.

If you don't have a money for it then wait until you do or think about buying a good pair of binoculars like these:

http://www.telescope.com/Binoculars/Astronomy-Bino...

If you buy low price telescope it will definitely end up locked in the closet forever. If you start like the astronomy then you will want to buy a bigger telescope. Or you will get tired of astronomy and you will not find any use for a telescope like this, and nobody will buy it because it is useless. But telescope like XT6 can be sold because it is a good telescope even for experienced astronomer who has super telescope at home but is looking for something smaller and easier to setup.

A 76mm reflector is a toy and a 130mm reflector is still too small. You are wasting money on EQ and computerized mounts and failing to put it into where you need it-----> large diameter optics. Look at 150mm newtonians at least. For the same money you can buy a dobsonian mount 150mm newtonian..... far better.

Refractor because it is easy to point for a first telescope. After you master that, move up to a reflector.