Astronomy is a hobby that can become very expensive very quickly if you don’t stick to your budget and understand the range of telescope prices out there and what you can get for your money. The good news is that it is easy to get into this wondrous hobby for a few hundred dollars and be able to fully enjoy some spectacular sights as you learn with a smaller telescope before moving to the larger, more complex to operate and significantly more expensive models. From the telescope types section, we learned that a reflector is significantly cheaper than a refractor of equal size as mirrors are much easier and cheaper to make than lenses of equal diameter and this is reflected (no pun intended) in the telescope pricing.
As a rough guide, a 6″ refractor telescope, such as the popular Celestron Advanced Series C6 R-GT 354 x 150mm, can be had for around $1800 list price whereas a 6″ reflector, such as the Orion XT 6″ Classic, is around $300 with the difference in price between the two designs increasing as the aperture size goes up. A catadioptric design such as the Celestron 31057 Omni XLT 150, using the Schmidt-Cassegrain layout, weighs in somewhere between and reflector and refractor at around $900. A beginners telescope for kids such as the Celestron 21024 FirstScope is available for around $70 so there is never any need to buy the extremely low quality telescopes found in many toy shops or department stores.
At this point you should now have a basic understanding of what you want to get out of astronomy, the types of telescope available, the pros and cons of each as well as the pricing and budget requirements for each type under our belts. It is now time to start to look at the all important telescope accessories, some essential and some just useful, that will round out your new hobby and make it much more enjoyable and satisfying.
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