Meade DS-90ATE Telescope

Customer Review: Looks good on display, actual quality not so good.
The optics and overall look is ok with this one, but all platic mountings and foucusing/tracking gear mechanisms needs to be reconsidered by MEADE R&D team. The foucsing gear mechanism of the scope’s end (closer to the eye piece) is made of very fragile plastic teeth, which lost lots of teeth after only few nights of usage, now everytime i try to focus the scope, the focusing nob spun in vain, rendering this telescope practically broken. The scope mount is completely made out of ABS plastic, except bolts and nuts. Because of that, it gives an extra vibration noise everytime Autostar tracking works, not to mention manual focusing. If you are following a star, it might be ok, but if you follow a planet, or moon, you cannot see the stable image due to the extra shakings coming from insecure joints everywhere from the tripod to ring holder. However, considering the price, it might be ok for not-to-serious hobbist and anybody wants to see how Autostar works.
Customer Review: 90 mm Meade scopes good and hard-to-find
This is the most bang for the buck there is, a 90mm Meade refractor. The 80mm is typically available, but 90’s are generally hard to find. With an 80 being the smallest “serious” scope according to concensus, the 90 gives you additional observing opportunities. That is, you’ll see more objects than the usual 60mm “kiddie” scopes, and will have observing opportunies to see other objects beyond the moon, saturn, jupiter, moon, saturn, jupiter, moon….. Little scopes mean you see the same thing over and over. Get this 90mm if you can’t’ afford/don’t have room in the house for a bigger scope. It’s affordable, won’t take up too much room, and is portable (light) enough that you’ll actually take it outside and use it. Bigger scopes often sit because nobody wants to carry 70 pounds into the back yard.

Posted in Astronomy