Is a 10" 12" OR 14 INCH Meade LX200R BEST TO BUY?

Question

I WAS GOING TO GET A 14 INCH BUT IVE NOT SEEN MANY PEOPLE WHO OWN ONE COMPARED TO THE OTHERS SO I WAS WONDERING IF THE SMALLER ONES WERE BETTER

Answer 1

For telescopes, bigger is better. But bigger is also more expensive and less portable. If you have plenty of money and a permanent observatory to put it in, go for the 14 inch. If you need it to be portable, go for the 10.

Answer 2

I'm pretty sure you know all that crap about aperture, so instead I will try to answer your question.

The main reasons why people buy the smaller ones are (a) price and (a) convenience. I made them both (a) because they are equally important!

Those 14 inch scopes are HUGE - have you used one or even seen one in the flesh? They really need to be set up permanently - they are just too big to regularly be moved. Plus, unless you have ready access to dark skies, then the advantages of the 14 inch may never really come into play.

A 10 inch scope that you use all the time will see much more than a 14 inch scope that is too much trouble to get out and set up.

You don't say much in your question, but I'm guessing you don't have years of experience of observing. A 14 inch catadioptric is no kind of a beginners instrument - unless you are very sure about your needs and your commitment to astronomy, then i think you would simply be much happier with the 10 inch scope.

Yeah I know it's what everybody else has, but there's a good reason for that - it's a great size!

This is just my opinion - there is lots of stuff on the net. I have included a couple of links that I found with LX-200 stuff that you might find interesting.

Happy gazing!

Answer 3

They are all fine instruments. From a physics perspective though, the quality of a telescope, including it's resolution (for binary stars etc.) and magnification ability all depend on how much light it can gather. Therefore, bigger is better. There is a reason why professional observatories are trying to build bigger and bigger mirrors. This is especially important in catadioptric telescopes which have a hole in the center of the primary mirror.

The main reason why you don't find too many people with the 14" instead of the 10" or 12" all comes down to affordability, the bigger the mirror, the more expensive it is to produce, pure and simple. I can guarantee that nobody who owns a 10" or 12" would not prefer a 14"!

The following website has an example of the effect of having a larger aperture size when viewing galaxy M51..

http://www.clarkvision.com/visastro/m51-apert/index.html

Answer 4

The smaller ones are more portable and transportable, but the larger ones have more light gathering power and increased magnification. If you're going to do deep space photography, the bigger the mirror the more light you get. If you intend to move this in and out of the house, the smaller the easier.