What is the best telescope with these features...?

I wish to give a telescope as a gift. I would like to keep it under or up to $4,000. The main thing I want it to have is the ability to move with the earth so that you dont have to keep reajusting when viewing a distant planet (just knowing the name of this feature would help a lot too). Another nice feature would be able to auto locate certain plants or stars. I dont know much about telescopes, but the reciever of the gift has some expierence. But the more detailed you are the better. Thank you

What is the best telescope with these features...?
The biggest thing you need to know is how interested in astronomy is the person getting the gift. If they are then by all means buy the gift. Either Meade or Celestron make great scopes for under how much you have to spend. Either cassigrain or refractor will do what you want. Both sites will explain how each one works and give list prices. Most retailers sell for under list price
Reply:You have a lot of options if you're williing to spend as much as $4000. The best brands are Meade and Celestron as far as I'm concerned. I have an 11" Celestron Reflector scope with GPS that cost less than that...although I purchased it 4 years ago. With that, you get a hand held control that can align with the earth's rotation, as well as a database of various charted celestial objects that you could make the scope move to...the GPS enables it to know your latitude and longitude and coorelates the night sky on a given calendar date accordingly. Its awesome. With the wide 11" aperture, you can see the planets VERY well at higher magnifications...and the fainter deep space objects like nebulae and galaxies, etc. come through very clearly.
Reply:I agree with the above two answers. The feature that keeps things centered as the Earth turns used to be called a clock drive, but that is so last century. Now they have computerized goto telescopes that point themselves AND track objects for you. Meade and Celestron are the big names. Orion is a runner up for the more beginner crowd.
Reply:This is a huge purchase and being the person you are giving the gift to has some experience, and probably has a dream telescopes in thier head, it'd be best to get them something like a set of very nice eyepieces or one or two super nice eyepieces such as those made by TeleVue, and purchase a debit/gift card with the rest that he can use anywhere to choose his own telescope. It will also give him the option of buying a used telescope via PayPal or simply using check or money order and offsetting the cost with the gift card. Buying used will allow him to get a telescope for sometimes as much as half the cost new so he'll have pleanty for accessories!





In the $4000 range, new, you will find some larger apochromatic refractors, Meade's top of the line LX200R 10" Ritchey Chretien telescope, Celestron's top of the line CGE 1100 11" telescope, and many many more, all with goto AND tracking.





In the $4000 range, used, the options are endless.



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