Celestron Travel Scope 80 Portable Refractor Telescope – 80mm Aperture, Fully-Coated Glass Optics – Includes Tripod, Smartphone Adapter, Backpack & Software – Ideal for Beginners & Travel

Fantastic telescope. Light weight easy to learn and fantastic company

I've had a 8" diameter dobsonian telescope for about 25 years but wanted a smaller scope I could take camping when I didn't feel like dragging the heavy, 4 foot long one with me. I also wanted one I could use as a spotting scope for birding.There are only two things I don't like about this scope. 1) tripod is way to wimpy. Even on a name brand heavier-duty tripod, it's less stable than a dobsonian. The tripod it comes with is barely adequate. It works best if placed on a sturdy table with the legs extended just far enough to make it less tippy. 2) There is some lense flare when looking at Mars, but this is to be expected for this price of scope. There is also some minor purple fringing around the edge of the moon, but the moon looks so gorgeous thru it that you forget to notice.Now for what I like:1) Portability - doesn't kill my back to haul it outside. Sets up in minutes. So easy to take outside, I use it all the time. I'd only haul my big scope out a couple times a year because it was too heavy.2) The moon looks so AWESOME thru this scope!!!3) Jupiter: you can see several of the moons. I haven't been able to make out any of the color bands as I kinda can with my bigger scope, but that's to be expected due to the size/cost of this one.3) Saturn: It's my favorite planet. Even though it looks tiny in this scope, you can see the rings and it's beautiful.I was able to see the nebula in Orion's sword from the city (I live on the outskirts of Salt Lake City) It was really beautiful on one especially dark night, but most nights it's not dark enough to see it well. I haven't been able to see other nebulas I've looked for. I expect that when I'm able to get away from the city lights I'll be able to see more nebulas and galaxies. (Nebulas and planets thru backyard telescopes don't look like most photos. You don't see the colors. Nebulas look like gray clouds. They can still be beautiful tho).The eyepieces feel cheap, very light weight, but are surprisingly good. Better than I expected for the price. They have enough eye relief that They work ok with my eyeglasses, but I prefer to take my glasses off when looking thru the scope.I haven't tried the digiscoping adapter yet, but I've experimented with a similar one on my other scope. Digiscoping is tricky and often not all you hope it'd be, but you might get some good photos of the moon.I haven't really tried it as a spotting scope yet, other than to look at some leaves at the top of a tree, and expect it'll be good for that. I'm considering buying a zoom eyepiece for that.All in all, I think this is an amazing scope for the price. Too bad the tripod isn't as good as the scope. If you can get a heavier tripod, you'll love this scope, especially if you can find some dark skies. But even from the city, the Moon, Saturn & Jupiter are so amazing thru this scope.

This was an interesting purchase. First, when it arrived, one part was missing (the smart phone adapter), and the cross hairs in the finderscope were way out of alignment. Contacting Amazon, I was given a choice to either return the telescope or contact the maker to see if they can help. I chose the second, as I wasn't in a big hurry to take photos. It is enough to learn everything else. They were very kind and shipped the parts with no problem. As for the telescope, I found a couple of areas they can improve. For one thing the scope is designed totally for right handed, or eyed, people. Needs mounting bracket on both sides. Also a more stable tripod. The whole assembly is wobbly, which makes finding targets very hard, and then keeping it acclimated is not easy. Really needs a more stable platform. The magnification is great. Can see the Moon very clearly, and planets are also visible, but less sharp. All in all a good value for startup.

Hi all, this will be a very honest review for the Travel Scope 80.Aperture diameter: 80mm,Focal length: 400mm,Eyepieces provided: 20mm (x20), 10mm (x40).Diagonal provided: Amici type prism with fully erect image and corrected left-right.Also provided is a tripod with AZ mount and backpack.OTA (Optical Tube Assembly): I must say it is a very good OTA for beginners. It is well collimated (at least the one I received was) and the coatings are good. The dew shield does its job. Stars look point-like and chromatic aberration is not that significant. Very good for observing the moon and Jupiter. I also observed Saturn, but got some chromatic aberration when pushed a bit with a Barlow. However, perfect for terrestrial viewing with the 2 provided eyepieces, which is why the manual explicitly says that this telescope was designed for terrestrial viewing.Mount: it is a plastic alt-azimuth mount. It is very difficult to use, not because it is complicated but because of the plastic I presume. It seems you can't get the right amount of tension to hold the tube firmly and when it is tight, you can move around well. It has lots of backlash. The mount can make you hate the telescope. I am very passionate and I don't mind the hassle but for someone else, it might be a handful.Tripod: I am sad to say, it is worse than the mount. In order to make the telescope portable, the tripod and mount were downsized considerably. To a point where the legs simply cannot cope. A slight wind will give you huge vibrations at high magnification. Even if you touch the telescope or the eyepiece or the tripod during an observation you will see huge vibrations. I sincerely think the tripod could have been better made with steel and a little thicker. This is space in the backpack which is left to exploit.Then you have the plastic focuser. You can make it work but everytime you touch it, the vibrations simply make it near impossible. You will need a lot of patience. The diagonal is Amici and very light. It is good for terrestrial viewing but for stars you will need a coated star-diagonal, else you will lose brightness and you will see a vertical line cutting your stars.Finally, let me tell you about my experience. This is my first telescope. I am a physicist and astronomer actually but I had no experience in optical astronomy. So, I gave this one a try. Good price and good bargain, considering it is easy to grab and run (which I do frequently due to the many trees in my back yard), and it is very very portable with the included backpack. I had some good times observing the planets, the moon and a couple of star clusters and nebula. Ok, don't expect to observe what some are claiming here. You will not see the clouds of nebulae nor any eye-catching colours. You will need huge apertures and good skies, or Hubble, to observe these. And the beautiful pictures of nebulae are done with long exposure astrophotography; for this you need at least a tracking equatorial mount. This little scope will only show you the brightest stars of the nebula and if you draw them and compare with Hubble's images, you will understand the patterns you were actually observing and what you were actually missing. I am a passionate astronomer, so I am quite happy with just that. I also like to climb to mountains, so I took the scope with me several times. I love this, even though the winds at the summit unsettle the setup easily.Good grab and go and an inexpensive little toy for kids and for terrestrial viewing. Good telescope for beginners although the mount and tripod might discourage some of you.

Good telescope