Celestron Advanced Series C8-NGT Reflector Telescope

Comments about Celestron Advanced Series C8-NGT Reflector Telescope:

This was my first telescope in years, so I was a little nervous after reading some of the reviews. However, it is a fantastic telescope and is not that difficult to use.

I have been using this scope primarily in my yard in the middle of Denver, with horrid light pollution. The Orion Nebula, Andromeda, planets and moons are all easy to see and clear, despite the ambient conditions. I think it needs collimating, but I guess that's fairly common. The spotting scope is great power and easy to align. Unfortunately the one time I've been able to bring it up to the mountains away from the city it was windy (those from the area know how bad Nederland can be...), so I haven't been able to really use it to its full potential.

I do have to almost completely disassemble the tripod to move because it's heavy and unwieldy, but I can get the whole thing set up and broken down in about 20 minutes. This does mean I need to re-balance it every time, but I keep getting faster and faster.

Right now I am not using it for photography, so the 2 star align is almost completely adequate. I don't bother polar aligning it most times, so the tracking drifts off slowly. However, even with a quick alignment, it is extremely fast and easy to locate objects. For 'causal' viewing, I would align it with a planet (Jupiter in my case now), which gets you close enough. Then as you pan through the sky, you can add in reference points as you wish.

The only other negatives are that you have to buy the A/C adapter separately. In addition, the motors are rather noisy. However, the DC cord is fairly long (maybe 15 feet or so), so that's good.

My plans are to use computer control rather than the hand set in the future, as well as astrophotography. I will add in any comments about that later as I try them out. The instructions DO include information on how to write your own tracking software (as in what signals to send to do what).

Service and delivery comments:

Delivery was on time, and the packaging was excellent. My only complaint is that every big box had another box immediately inside, which was a bit wasteful I suppose.

Comments about Celestron Advanced Series C8-NGT Reflector Telescope:

This telescope sits in a closet in our house. We've had it for two years, and had it out a total of three times. My dad bought this as our first telescope. THIS IS NOT FOR BEGGINERS. If you are just starting out you're better off with an astromaster. Which is the telescope Iv'e just ordered. This telescope takes at least three people to set up; you can't just put it in the back seat of a car and travel with it.

With that said the good thing about it is that it's a great telescope for someone who is an expert with telescopes. Someone with lots of experience could find this a top notch machine. So if you're looking for something small/lightweight and compact this is not the way to go. If you're looking or something straightforward and easy to handle get something else.

Comments about Celestron Advanced Series C8-NGT Reflector Telescope:

The telescope was very acurate. It took me several days to learn how to use properly. The instructions are lacking.

Comments about Celestron Advanced Series C8-NGT Reflector Telescope:

Ive had a 4" Newtonian for several years and felt it was time for an upgrade.I have no complaints about the C8 other than it needed to be collimated right out of the box, but this was expected.It is very easy to set up and break down, which is very important to me because I must travel to use this.It delivers good crisp images and is extremely accurate.The whole key though is spending time with the setup(polar aligning and such),and tweaking the backlash.It has a built in program for polar aligning the mount, but I recommend spending the extra money and getting the alignment scope otherwise it must be aligned 3x.(two star align, polar align, & 2 star align again.) I would also recommend a diagonal, and either a star pointer or a red dot scope.I find the spotting scope difficult at times.

Comments about Celestron Advanced Series C8-NGT Reflector Telescope:

I have had this telescope for about a month and it has worked great. Took a little time to get the starts in properly for the GOTO but this is my first telescope. It has good optics and its not to hard to set up and take down.