Orion StarMax 90mm TableTop Maksutov-Cassegrain Telescope Small But Powerful Portable Telescope for Adult & Family Stargazing of Moon, Planets & More

This is a great grab and go telescope, I already have a large refractor telescope which is amazing but heavy and it takes a long time to set up. This telescope is very light, and I was very impressed with how easy it is to set up on a table, or tripod, you can also remove it from its mount and attach it to an equatorial tripod, if you need to have it mounted higher. I would not recommend using this telescope for viewing stars or nebulae as you tend to lose a lot of light gathering capacity due to its compact design, however it is excellent for viewing the moon or planets.

Good: Amazingly small, nice looking object, great magnification - can see rings of saturn with both lenses But: the magnification is so high and the field of view so small that its very hard to firstly find anything and secondly keep it in view. I umm'd and err'd about it for while but in the end returned it (great service amazon) because of the bad points above

Got this for ten year old who is interested in astronomy. Had the usual cheapo ones that you can't see anything with and decided to get this as a first proper telescope. Only negative to this scooe is the small field of vison, which is expected at this price for a cassegrain. Other than that its brilliant! The moon is incredible, the detail of the craters etc. Would recommend getting an orion moon filter though as light from the moon will wash out the details without one. The red dot finder works reasonably well, you might have to fiddle slightly with it for objects other than the moon, the trick is to follow any light picked up by the telescope. Can't wait to explore mars etc with this. Would also suggest buying a barlow shorty x2 as it greatly improves magnification. If you are looking for a decent beginner telescooe that is also fairly small and easily tranported this is highly recommend.

Brilliant. This telescope is great for viewing planets and the moon. Not so good on Deep space objects such as nebula and galaxies, however they are visible but just not that bright, apart from M42 the orion nebula and Andromeda galaxy (these two DSO's are quite bright and so they do show quite well). But you can easily make out the cloud bands of jupiter and lots of detail on the moon etc. I recommend getting a 2 x Barlow lens as well as that makes the planets even better. I compared this with a 130mm Newtonian and in my opinion this is just as good (although slightly dimmer due to having a smaller aperture and a longer focal length) but the planet size and detail of jupiter and the moon was about the same. I also ended up mounting mine on a EQ2 mount because the mount that it comes on is designed really for a quick grab and go or to be placed on a table etc., and I use mine in the garden so I put it on a more substantial and bigger (taller) mount.

For it's size, this is a fantastic and portable telesope. You can easily see Mars, the rings of Saturn and the cloud belts of Jupiter. Globular clusters also show up very well; all in all, a great, quick, and easy to use telescope. Because of its versatility and portability, I tend to use this more than any of my other telescopes.

Was a fault with the telescope but geoff from customer service was incredibly helpful and is sending a brand new one out to my 6 year old son. Cant wait to see him use it as it seems a great piece of kit.

A good compact telescope. Easy to use once you get used to it. Can be improved by purchasing superior eye lenses

I love this scope. It takes up very little room, has good zoom power and light gathering ability. The bundled eye-pieces are good quality. I've stuck it on a camera tripod to take it outside but I generally stargaze from my windowsill. The moon views are great but I've more exploring to do for planets.

Antes que nada decir que ésto ya no es un juguete, es un telescopio de verdad, para poder observar la luna de manera increíble, júpiter y sus lunas, marte, saturno y sus anillos, etc... En mi caso lo elegí porque quería uno muy transportable, como es el caso, ya que no sabía si seguiría con ésto de la astronomía, y no quería un trasto más ocupando sitio en casa. Éste lo tengo encima de la estantería y cuando me da el puntazo lo cojo lo meto en la mochila y me voy al campo. No hay que montar nada, es sacarlo de la mochila y "apuntar". Tiene una focal larga, como todos los mak, ideal para observación planetaria, aunque su montura minidobson no es la más apropiada para ello, los planetas se desenfocan rápido y puede ser un poco tedioso seguirlos. Requiere paciencia. El buscador va bastante bien a la hora de enfocar, práctico y fácil de usar, nótese que hay que ajustar primero de día, para que apunte bien, pero es algo muy fácil de hacer. Viene con dos oculares plössl, bastante normales, pero que hacen la función perfectamente, proporcionan x50 y x125 aumentos, mi consejo es a parte comprarle otro ocular de 5/6mm, para llegar hasta los x200 aumentos, el máximo recomendable, para así sacar partido al potencial del telescopio, así como una barlow x2. He visto en vídeos que se le puede añadir un trípode, que va roscado a la base inferior. Considero que está bastante bien de precio tratándose de un mak. Anyway.... si alguien le interesa, tiene una opción parecida pero más económica, siendo el telescopio en vez de un mak, uno de tipo reflector, con sus ventajas e inconvenientes. Tb comentar que orion es una buena marca que hace telescopios de calidad, y eso se nota una vez lo usas, ya que tienen buenas ópticas Hasta ahora, muy satisfecho con la compra.

I have used this scope on about 3-4 nights and so far I am impressed. My main telescope is a 10 inch dobsonian, its very good, but I wanted something smaller that is easy to set up and carry around. I purchased the Starmax 90mm primarily as a travel telescope and for that purpose its great. I can fit the optical tube, the mount, a travel tripod (a Dolica TX570B150SL) and all the accessories I need in a 20" x 10"x 7" camera bag with room to spare for a pair of 10x50 binoculars. Its easy to take anywhere and can easily be put in your car to take to a good spot with dark skies. The two eyepieces supplied with the telescope (a 25mm plossl and a 10mm plossl) are a good start, but you might want to consider buying a lower magnification eyepiece since the lowest magnification eyepiece that comes with the scope (25mm) gives a magnification of 50x, which you might find to be a little high for low power. The finder that comes with the Starmax is very easy to use, and it only took me about 2 minutes to properly align. Optical Performance: I tested the scope on the Moon, Jupiter, the Orion Nebula, and a few open star clusters from a urban/suburban location. When viewing the Orion Nebula I was able to see a decent amount of nebulosity and some very faint level of detail, but of course, with its 90mm aperture, you can't expect to be able to see as much as you would with a larger scope. But the Starmax still showed enough of the nebula for it to be an good view. The stars clusters, M41 and M50, both showed a nice view with many stars visible with the use of the low power eyepiece. The Starmax, being a Mak-Cas design, has a relatively narrow field of view, but I still was able to find deep sky objects without much trouble. However I will likely consider purchasing and even lower magnification eyepiece for use with the Starmax to make hunting down faint objects easier. The Moon and Jupiter is where the Starmax really shined. The views of the Moon were very sharp (sharper than my 10 inch dobsonian) and wasn't too bright, which can be a problem when viewing the Moon with larger scopes. Jupiter was very sharp as well with lots of detail visible both with the 25mm and 10mm eyepieces. On a good night with stable atmosphere I was able to see several cloud bands even on low power. I would say that the Starmax does best with lunar and planetary viewing, but can also show users decent views of the brighter deep sky objects (for example the objects in the Messier catalog). Mount: If I had one small criticism of the Starmax it would be the mount. Its simple and easy for anyone to use and when used on a table its quite stable. However, the table top mount only has 3 small legs on its base. This means that it can be toppled over if you aren't careful and you push the telescope the wrong way. This almost happened to me the first night I used it. Its not a major problem if you use the scope and the mount correctly, but you might want to be aware of this if you plan on having small children use the Starmax. Most of the time when you are using the telescope away from home you won't have a table to use and you will want to tripod mount the Starmax. Since the mount has a tripod adapter on the bottom its easy to do, but its not the most stable of configurations. I use a Dolica ultra compact travel tripod with the Starmax and its usable, but you have to give the scope a few seconds to stabilize after you move it or touch it. I put up with the shakiness in exchange for portability, but I recommend using the most heavy duty tripod you are willing to carry around when using the Starmax. Overall I think the Starmax 90mm is a great buy for anyone looking for a first telescope (especially if you are interesting in viewing the moon and planets) or anyone who already has a larger telescope and wants a small scope to travel with or one that can be set up quickly.

The telescope arrived with two defects in the primary mirror. Totally unacceptable for a new scope.

In passato avevo già acquistato un telescopio riflettore da 114mm, e non ero molto soddisfatto della sua qualità ottica, nonostante i vari tentativi di collimazione. Così, dopo alcune ricerche in rete, ho deciso di acquistare questo piccolo Mak-Cas. Sono molto soddisfatto dell'acquisto, prima di tutto per la qualità delle immagini: queste sono molto nitide fino a circa 100 ingrandimenti, e comunque ancora decenti a 200 (seeing permettendo). Ciò grazie anche alla collimazione delle ottiche fatta in fabbrica che, almeno nel telescopio da me ricevuto, è molto buona. Gli oculari forniti (un 25mm e un 10mm, che permettono di ottenere 50 e 125 ingrandimenti), sono di buona qualità e la base da tavolo (unita alla configurazione Cassegrain che rende il telescopio estremamente compatto) si è rivelata molto utile per l'utilizzo sul davanzale della finestra. La base ha sotto la filettatura che le permette di essere montata su un treppiedi fotografico. Inoltre, il tubo ottico del telescopio dispone di un attacco a coda di rondine che mi ha permesso di utilizzarlo con la montatura equatoriale del mio vecchio telescopio. Con questo strumento sono riuscito a vedere, fino ad ora, Mercurio (un piccolo dischetto arancione), Venere (si distinguono chiaramente le fasi), Giove (i satelliti medicei, le bande equatoriali e, con l'aiuto di un filtro, la grande macchia rossa), la galassia di Andromeda (almeno la parte centrale, più luminosa), le Pleadi, la nebulosa di Orione, l'ammasso del Presepe e vai crateri lunari. Se non avete mai utilizzato un piccolo telescopio, non aspettatevi le immagini definite che si vedono sui libri o sui siti dedicati all'astronomia, ottenute con strumenti ben più costosi. Ma, sicuramente, questo piccolo telescopio permette di ottenere tanto considerando il prezzo, e, soprattuto, l'emozione di vedere le meraviglie del cielo con i vostri occhi. P.S.: Ho apprezzato anche il software Starry Night (all'interno della confezione c'era il codice per scaricare una copia dal sito).

I am 71 years old and I have been an amateur astronomer since the age of seven. Recently I decided to purchase a truly portable (and also inexpensive) telescope, that I could carry in and out of my house through my front door without having to first "brace myself". After reading several reviews, I decided to try this one. It comes with a pretty good mounting but I decided to remove the telescope tube and attach it to a very lightweight, high-quality, inexpensive camera tripod that I purchased approximately one year ago on the internet. I even rigged up a simple slow motion control in altitude (I simply slide one of the tripod leg sections up and down, with a range of approximately one inch; I wrapped a large elastic band assembly around the tripod leg to keep the sliding motion within the one-inch range and to keep the tripod leg from accidentally completely collapsing). I constructed a simple, cardboard dew shield. I added an enhanced aluminum 90 degree diagonal mirror that I had previously purchased very inexpensively on the internet. I tried this telescope out on Jupiter, Saturn, and the moon with my relatively ancient and extremely excellent Orion Premium zoom eyepiece (maximum power approximately 160). The views were amazingly sharp and clear and the collimation of the telescope's optical system was excellent. I could begin to see some very subtle details in Jupiter's cloud belts and I could detect the delicate orange-brown color in Saturn's equatorial cloud belt. I could see amazing detail in the mountains and craters of the first-quarter moon. I tried a 28 mm. Plossl eyepiece and the entire field of view showed a decent image, which means that I should be able to get some pretty good views of open star clusters and large galaxies with this telescope at low power. The optics seem to contain some kind of transfer lens that is of very high quality, improving the width of the field of view and leading to good light baffling. I will have to do a bit more observing to better evaluate the situation, but it looks like an overall excellent job of optical design and construction, especially for such an inexpensive telescope.