Telescopes (Meade ETX 70 & Skylux) in Lidl Monday 22nd N

I have bought some products from Lidl and have not had a problem. One is a Tronic power supply which I use with my scopes. Its great!!! and a third of the price of the ones on sale in Astronomy shops.

Most of us here have some experience of telescopes and, buying from Lidi ,we can open the box to vet exactly what it is we are going to buy. You cant do that on e-bay.

I dont for one minute suspect that these scopes are not genuine or are "under the counter". Meade are probably off loading stock as revised models come in. The ETX70 has been around since the mid/late 90's?

Most of us considering buying from Lidl already have larger scopes and see this one as a handy "throw in the boot of the car just to be ready" sort of scope. There is also the "Now that I know my way around the night sky , I wonder how far I could push the seeing with this little scope" sort of challange.

I am sure a young astronomer would enjoy the views of the moon through this scope. Its an ideal inexpensive starter scope which a young person would hopefull graduate from to a larger scope in a number of years.


I suggest going to Lidl and opening the box. In fact you will probably meet a few IFAS members there who will check the scope for you!

Just dont fight over the last one!!!!!!!


Liam

dont know if this link was already posted or not but theres a review of this scope on cloudy nights ->

www.cloudynights.com/reviews4/ETX70.htm

A very positive review at that.


Me, im getting one. I think itll balance the 10" dob nicely

Hey all.
New to the forum. Looks like a great resource.
New to astronomy myself but I've always had an interest. About time I got myself a telescope!

Anyway, i think I'll go and get the ETX70 come Monday.
I was going to get the Skylux but spudnik's previous post has sealed it for the ETX70.

Conclusions

Pros: Very nice handy (holiday) scope which is fully computerised and can show you in a very short time many of the brighter deep sky objects and gives reasonable views of the planets and moon. It is a pure fun scope

Cons: Well honestly, considering the price actually there are none. It does everything you can expect from a 70mm F5 achromat.
I obtained my ETX via the standard commercial way and have no special commercial interests nor in the ETX nor in Meade.

That and the comments in the previous pages helped me decide.
I can deffo see where Orion is comming from. I bought a laptop from Aldi a while back (yes, Aldi) and was very pleased with it. Lidl, being similar, just might have the same quality hardware this time too and make me happy once again. We'll find out on Monday.

Welcome Bren.

You dont have to be mad here but it helps!!!

We are all a bit wired to the moon... or Jupiter .. or M33 ....


Seriously though, if you have any questions or need advise or information there are plenty of knowledgeable people in here who will help.



Liam

Anthony,
I think you've hit the nail on the head.
When I first saw this offer, the first thing that occured to me is that Meade is going to change this scope soon and is getting rid of their stock.

There are historical precendents to this, when the LX200 range was upgraded to the GPS system, meade had a very good sale before the change over.

Meade also got rid of most of their 4000 series plossl in the offer that ended a few months ago, again to accomodate the arrival of the 5000 series eyepieces!

All the other ETX scopes went through an upgrade only in the last month or so, the 70 will change along with them or be phased out.

Orions Neb,
I completely understand your concerns about this scope.
I'm always wary of budding astronomers buying scopes uninformed and end up seeing nothing !! I've seen it happen.
I respect your views and please dont think we're picking on you for having a different opinion, its good that people have different opinions and one of the mian points of the IFAS is that differing opinions are allowed and that a single idea isn't pushed down everyones throat.
If a starting astronomer is going to get either of these scopes, I'd hope that they would be informed as to what they will see and what they will not see through it.

Here's a quick guide.
Easy objects = planets, moon, bright open clusters, double stars, M31
medium/hard objects = bright globular clusters, bright nebula (a handfull)
Impossible objects = most galaxies, most planetary nebula, everything else not mentioned above.

Forget those voyager 2 images of Saturn, objects will be hard to see ...
you need to be realistic about this.
When I say M31 above, I mean you will see a fuzz, even through a 12" scopes its a fuzz !! forget about arms, dust lanes etc.

For me its the portability factor and the goto, I know what to expect through this scope, so there will be no surprises for me atleast.
I used a 60mm EQ tasco for 5 years until I got my hand on a 13" dob.
I remeber that in 1986, it costed £200, but we didnt know any better, but I got great use out of it.
If we prevent one person from making that mistake, then thats one less budding astronomer lost to the cause.

IF this scope is a lemon optically, then I'll be replacing it.
Alot of it is plastic but then agin the price and weight is small, if it was a big scope, then it would be a different story.

If this is not a genuine Meade, I wouldn't touch it with a barge poll, I'll be the first to email Meade telling them that lidl are selling cloned equipment, Meade are good at suing companies, as celestron found out.

I've seen the ETX90 in action and if its as good as it mechanically, then the mount alone is worth that money.

Cheers Liam. I might have a few questions come Monday

I just wanted to mention the review above said that the ETX70 is metal.

As for the scope itself, the tube is shiny blue metal.

Hopefully a solid build.