Judging from the reviews in the App Store I am not the first to be enchanted by Sky View, the augmented reality astronomy app. It was Ed Ting’s raves about this little gem that turned me onto the FirstScope in the first place. If you want to invest into a higher quality telescope, I recommend Ed Ting’s reviews at ScopeReview. This is an adequate first telescope to try out sky watching for a small investment. It will also focus as close as 30 feet away we’ve used it as a terrestrial telephoto lens to scan the wildlife on the mountain behind our house. With one of those you can view a few bright galaxies. (I missed that recent comet.) Many other buyers mention that if you substitute decent eyepieces (from another scope) it improves the view tremendously. With its 3-inch mirror you can see moons of Jupiter, ring of Saturn, and lunar craters. It is compact for storage it can fit onto a shelf - and it is the perfect size for a small kid. It needs a sturdy chair or table to perch on, but otherwise is easy to handle. But I’ve been using the FirstScope, and it is sweet.

Since the FirstScope costs only $48, you might be tempted to dismiss it as more useless junk.

Most entry-level scopes are crap, and most useable scopes start at $300. The Celestron FirstScope is the best pick for an absolute beginner level telescope. Sign up here to get Tools for Possibilities a week early in your inbox. The tools might be outdated or obsolete, but the possibilities they inspire are new. Once a week we’ll send out a page from Cool Tools: A Catalog of Possibilities.

Ninite pc download