This Meade telescope would suit the amateur astronomer interested in a moderately priced, large aperture, easy-to-operate telescope. It’s an 8″ with a lot of punch and will give you some spectacular views. I’ve spent several weeks with this Meade telescope and have been more than impressed with the results.

The first place I pointed the very attractive Meade telescope was to my favorite Nebulae. I found there was definite structure and some color in the Horsehead Nebula. The Galaxies were dramatic and the Globular Clusters were sharp and well defined.

As a serious planetary telescope I found it to be better than some other 8″ Meade telescopes. The planets had good definition, they were sharp and clear and I could see a lot of structure in Jupiter’s cloud bands. You can clearly see the great red spot and the swirls in the clouds.

The optical performance of this Meade telescope is excellent especially when you consider the low cost of this Meade telescope. The LX10 has the same 8″ optical tube assembly as the more expensive 8″ LX200.

You can have this Meade telescope set-up in 5 minutes and they are just as quick to put away at the end of the night. Its ease of use makes it perfect for field work. The drive on this Meade telescope is very smooth when in motion and has a hand controller for micro-guiding, making it excellent for astrophotography and CCD imaging.

I would recommend the deluxe package if your budget allows. You get an electric declination motor, which will permit duel-axis corrections, you will also get the 8×50 viewfinder and Meade epoch 2000 sky software with 10,000 object database.

 Product Description

•  Aperture – 8″ Schmidt-Newtonian
• F/10
• 6×30 Achromatic Viewfinder
• LXD55 equatorial mount
• Eyepiece – 25mm MA
• Worm gear drives and electric slow-motion controls
• Autostar dual-axis control with 9-speed drive controls
• 30,223-object database and Go-To

Recommendation

I would recommend this Meade telescope for the serious amateur astronomer on a budget. It is an easy to use and has a lot of power. I can highly recommend this Meade telescope, it will give many years of great viewing.