Telescope Reviews: Palm Planetarium - having a ball in Sagittarius!

Howdy all -

While awaiting the arrival of my Bogen 3063 head (with the 3046 legs I'll quickly part with), I've been making good use of my time wandering around Sagittarius these past few nights (well, not last night - rain). Skies have been pretty good to really quite good, especially as the Moon's faded away.

And Sagittarius is in a very convenient place in the sky for sitting on a comfy old card table chair and working with the 20x80s at a comfortable height and angle.

Finally - finally - after a year or so of trying to learn to find things (well, with time off for a death in the family and a back operation), I'm actually learning to find things!

The most recent breakthroughs have centered around using the 20x80s and running Andreas Hofer's Planetarium Version 2.40 on my Palm. You can switch it to night mode and the whole thing goes to red on black: turn it down dim and it works great, and stows in your pocket. Zoom angle of view from 180 degrees down to 30'. Set the limiting magnitude where you want. Superimpose a Telrad finder if you want. Absolutely works like a charm.

Here's the secret best part: I use a 3 inch magnifying glass to look at the Palm screen (it's a Treo 650 - nice high-res screen, but small). This works great because my glasses are off for viewing (I'm farsighted - easily corrected with individual focusing or diopter adjustment), so I just whip out the magnifier to view the screen then compare it to the eyepiece. Messiers show up on the atlas as special little spots. View a whole constellation at 20 degrees to see everything in context. Put the crosshairs on a Messier object by tapping it and you get identification and information. Hit the centering button to center it on your screen, knock the field of view down to 5 degrees, and you're in the neighborhood.

Plus, with the object cross-haired, you can just hit the Logging button and time and location info is transfered into a new blank logging entry. Very handy, and the Palm's portability (it's always with me) means I can see what I've done or plan what I'm going to do anywhere anytime.

So I guess I'm combining the convenience of a computer database of objects with a readily interactive zoomable atlas in the field - much more convenient than running Starry Night on my laptop (which I do indoors, but wouldn't want to mess with in the field) - and I'm still personally locating the object in the sky!

Having logged my entries, if I'm in doubt as to positive identification, I double check in Pennington when I get inside. So far my IDs have all checked out!

Tonight was all about M11 and M26 - up in Scutum just a hop and a skip from Sagittarius. The Wild Duck was beautiful: glistening, and M26 was faint but distinct - with averted vision I could see 5 or 6 stars surrounded by the tight little glow of the cluster itself. Pennington says a 6 to 8 inch telescope would reveal about 25 member stars in M26, so I feel this speaks well for the 20x80s.

Anyway, it's been great this week, the Garrett Optical 20x80 triplets are out of this world, even the 3047 on the 3051 has been a sheer pleasure to use, for its Gibralter-like performance under this particular pair of glasses.

Happy camper tonight!

Best wishes, all,

--------------------
Michael -

"I am obliged to confess that I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University."
William F. Buckley, 1963.

Orion (Celestron) 8" SCT on SkyView Pro, Telrad.
Garrett Optical Gemini 25x100 WP IF,
Bogen 3051 tripod w/ 3063 head.
Oberwerk 10x60 Mariner.
Palm Planetarium.
Stellarium on a Motion Computing tablet PC.