how and where to buy telescopes for amateurs?

Answer 1

"Where" is a topic for eBay or any Internet search once you decide on what you want to get. Deciding on what you want to get is a difficult question. As the capability of a telescope goes up the price goes up even faster.

You have to decide on what you want to do with the scope.
Astronomical bodies will still look like points of light when using all the 'beginner's scopes on the market. If you wish to look at the moon, the beginner scopes will be fine.

These are the things that you can see with a beginner scope or 7x50 binoculars: lunar craters, star clusters, major comets, major planets or nebulae. You probably won't see the moons of the planets nor the rings of Saturn, until you use a larger power.

As the light collecting power of the scope increases, the usable magnification will also increase. As the usable magnification increases, the need for a clock driven mount becomes necessary, otherwise the object quickly passes out of the pictures.

If you want to take photos of what you see, then a scope with the ability to mount a camera is necessary, along with a proper camera. Such a setup should probably be computer driven so you can find the object in the first place.

You get the idea? So, I recommend that you think seriously about what you want to do and then get the best (probably expensive) system that you can afford.

;-D Astronomy is a blast!

Reference:
stardate.org

Dealers/Manufacturers
Meade Instruments Corp.
Orion Telescope and Binocular Center
Celestron International
Edmund Scientific

Answer 2

There are a lot of good places to buy a telescope. Like somebody said earlier the first thing is to decide on what type and how big. Both Orion.com and astronomics.com have excellent guides on picking the right scope for you. Remember that more aperture is what makes it possible to see the dimmer items such as galaxies and nebula not magnification.Study which scope and you will have found locations at the same time.
I personally use both astronomics and orion. I am very happy with the service from both.

Answer 3

First of all you need to decide what type of telescope you want. There are astronomical telescopes used mainly for viewing the stars and spotting telescopes used for terrestrial viewing such as bird watching.

If you are interested in a telescope for astronocmical viewing, this site has a large selection:

www.telescopes.com

If you are interested in a spotting scope for terrestrial viewing this site has a large selection:

http://www.opticsplanet.net/spotscopbysize.html

In general you want to purchase the scope with the largest objective lense that you can afford in both spotting scopes and astronomical scopes (up to about 8 inches for astronomical scopes). Beyond that size they become rather bulky. For terrestrial scopes 80 mm is considered a good size. Some years ago 60mm was the standard size.

Here is a link to spotting scopes. This site also sells astronomical scopes

http://www.opticsplanet.net/spotscopbysize.html

Answer 4

The best telescopes for the money can be found at Orion Telescopes, Inc. Try your computer. search engine. BEWARE of the Walmart and other department store stuff. They are total JUNK, with wobbly mounts and garbage eyepieces. For the same money as this Walmart junk, you can get a respectable telescope from Orion or some other telescope specialty companies.

Answer 5

www.meade.com
www.celestron.com
www.astronomics.com
www.oriontelescopes.com

These are just a few of the places to buy telescopes from my Sky and Telescope Magazine. I would recomend buying yourself a copy of this magazine and looking at the ads ( www.skypub.com )

Answer 6

I have one telescope with me.I use it to view into the bathroom of my neighbour.Gosh..now he's married.I dont want to get involves with married men.So i will sell it to you second-hand for 50% discount.
My address:
preethi sharma
Door no.390
near everst high school
moti nagar
ludhiana-45

Answer 7

If your school organises an astronomy club, then can easily avail telscopes by joining the club.

Answer 8

dont let them screw you by telling you that magnification is the most important...its the resolving power that you need to look for
if they try to sell you one by claiming something about its magnification, run
enjoy

Answer 9

Go to e-bay

Answer 10

http://www.shopzilla.com/8B--Learning_Toys_-_cat_id--14011000__keyword--telescopes%20kids


http://www.shopzilla.com/7S--Binoculars_Telescopes_-_cat_id--12180000__keyword--telescopes