Rating: 
Summary: Good first scope
Review: A caveat: I'm a complete novice, and this is my first telescope. Those more advanced may want to take this with a grain of salt, but I hope I can help other novices.On the advice of many here, I bought Terence Dickinson's "Nightwatch". It was well worth it; buy this book before buying a scope. I wanted to spend in the $500 range for a scope to prove to myself that I would use it and get a little experience. Others here suggested starting with a 6-8 inch Dobsonian, but I found that after everything tallied up I was closer to $1000. I'd rather start a little lower and then buy a really nice ($2k+) scope later. At the same time, though, I wanted to avoid a "trash scope". I decided on this scope over the lower end ETX Meade scopes because for the same price you get a larger aperture (114mm vs 70) and hence more light. Also, with a 1 meter focal length, you get larger magnification with less powerful eyepieces, giving you a better field of view. On my first pass, I discovered that the mirrors had come loose in the tube and shattered against each other. I returned it, and was told that several others had had the same problem. This disturbed me, but they had a replacement in stock, and all was well with that one. First off, the instruction manual is poor, and there's no packing list. It's not that tough to figure out what piece is what, but all the pictures in the manual are for the refractor in the same DS line, so they're not very useful to the beginner. Nevertheless, I was able to assemble it in less than an hour. Aligning the finderscope (6x30, which Dickinson calls "barely acceptable" but worked well for me) took another 30-45 minutes - I found the placement of the thumbscrews rather unintuitive, but perhaps they are all like that. The scope comes with a tripod which seems plenty stable, and a 25mm and a 9mm eyepiece. When I bought it, the electronic eyepiece was thrown in for free. All seemed to work well, though I did prefer the 9.7mm Plossl (sold separately) to the 9mm that came with the box. The scope was easy to use manually and gave me good views of the moon, sharp and clear. I'm in the middle of Dallas, and just used my back yard, and got surprisingly good (at least to me) seeing conditions. I was able to get to 100x power with no loss of clarity. Anything over that, though (a 2x Barlow and the 9.7 mm, or a standalone 6mm Plossl) was pretty much useless. My three gripes with the scope are the focuser, motor drive and the autostar controller. Perhaps this is normal, but the focuser isn't geared - there is no separate knob for fine adjustments. I found that when I changed eyepieces, I had to make slight adjustments to focus, and this was difficult with just the big focusing knob. There's a separate attachment which motorizes this, and that might help. Also, the scope quivers noticeably when you focus. This is more of a problem when you are moving the scope manually, and you have the locks off. I never lost the moon out of my field of view altogether, but I had to recenter almost every time after refocusing. The drive tracks smoothly left-right, but seems to stick at the beginning when going up-down. The result is that fine adjustments were difficult: you get nothing, then a jerk past where you wanted, and then smooth tracking. I haven't yet set up autostar to compensate for sidereal motion, so I don't know how big a problem this is going to turn out to be. My problem with the autostar is legibility. The text scrolls by reasonably quickly, and there seems to be some ghosting in the display, which combine to make the scrolling text pretty difficult to read. Luckily, aside from some text at the beginning (cautioning you not to look at the sun), this doesn't seem to be much of an issue. Despite this, I quickly learned how to compensate and was able to get around the problems, and once I had it was well worth it. On the whole, I feel like I got my money's worth, and like I avoided a trash scope.
Rating: 
Summary: Poor quality, not worth the money
Review: I bought this telescope 2 months ago from a local telescope shop. I wanted a simple "GO TO" telescope and I did not want to spend top dollars for my first scope. while unpacking the scope I made an observation that the primary tube was not packed very well (only one layer of bubble wrap), in any case assembling the scope took about an hour and the first time I started using it I realized the scope motor was failing to engage the lever responsible for the vertical motion (up and down) I packed the scope back in the box and asked the store for a replacement. This is when it gets really interesting; I opened the box, unwrapped the tube and heard something jiggling inside the tube. The secondary mirror has come lose and was hitting the primary mirror and damaged it, so I decided to try to swallow my frustration and attempt to fix it which I did ,I glued it back, looked though he provided 25 mm eye piece and could not notice any scratches, so I continued with the assembling the rest. I took the mount with the motor from it's box and it was broken in half, at that point I realized that this "THING" is not worth my time, I went back to the store returned it and got a Celestron GT114. All I can say about my experience with the Celestron is it's cheaper, far better quality, arrived very well Collimated.
took me 10 minutes to assemble. If you are looking for a good quality beginner telescope that would be satisfactory for a long time go with the Celestron GT114, or GT130.
Rating:
Summary: Poor quality, not worth the money
Review: I bought this telescope 2 months ago from a local telescope shop. I wanted a simple "GO TO" telescope and I did not want to spend top dollars for my first scope. while unpacking the scope I made an observation that the primary tube was not packed very well (only one layer of bubble wrap), in any case assembling the scope took about an hour and the first time I started using it I realized the scope motor was failing to engage the lever responsible for the vertical motion (up and down) I packed the scope back in the box and asked the store for a replacement. This is when it gets really interesting; I opened the box, unwrapped the tube and heard something jiggling inside the tube. The secondary mirror has come lose and was hitting the primary mirror and damaged it, so I decided to try to swallow my frustration and attempt to fix it which I did ,I glued it back, looked though he provided 25 mm eye piece and could not notice any scratches, so I continued with the assembling the rest. I took the mount with the motor from it's box and it was broken in half, at that point I realized that this "THING" is not worth my time, I went back to the store returned it and got a Celestron GT114. All I can say about my experience with the Celestron is it's cheaper, far better quality, arrived very well Collimated.
took me 10 minutes to assemble. If you are looking for a good quality beginner telescope that would be satisfactory for a long time go with the Celestron GT114, or GT130.
Rating:
Summary: Damaged during shipment
Review: I ordered the Meade DS2114ATS Telescope through Amazon.com, but it was actually shipped by J&R Music and Computer World (JR.com). It only took a couple of days for the telescope to arrive, but unfortunately it had been damaged during shipping. The smaller, secondary mirror had becomed detached from its mount and was bouncing around inside the tube. As a result the secondary mirror was chipped around the edges, and the primary mirror had numerous scratches. The telescope seemed to be packed well for shipping and there was no apparent damage to the outside of the box. The main tube of the telescope was packed in three levels of boxes. My impression is that Meade's process of gluing the secondary mirror to its mount just isn't strong enough to withstand the rigors of shipping. I decided the quality of the telescope was not quite what I had expected. I returned it to J&R and requested a full refund which I received about 3 weeks later. After doing some more howework, I have decided to try ordering my next scope from Orion.
Rating:
Summary: Damaged during shipment
Review: I ordered the Meade DS2114ATS Telescope through Amazon.com, but it was actually shipped by J&R Music and Computer World (JR.com). It only took a couple of days for the telescope to arrive, but unfortunately it had been damaged during shipping. The smaller, secondary mirror had becomed detached from its mount and was bouncing around inside the tube. As a result the secondary mirror was chipped around the edges, and the primary mirror had numerous scratches. The telescope seemed to be packed well for shipping and there was no apparent damage to the outside of the box. The main tube of the telescope was packed in three levels of boxes. My impression is that Meade's process of gluing the secondary mirror to its mount just isn't strong enough to withstand the rigors of shipping. I decided the quality of the telescope was not quite what I had expected. I returned it to J&R and requested a full refund which I received about 3 weeks later. After doing some more howework, I have decided to try ordering my next scope from Orion.
Rating: 
Summary: Was well worth the price (free!), some issues
Review: I ordered this 'scope because I'd always had a slight interest in stargazing, yet not enough to spend enough for a decent view. Where I live is pretty dark, no street lights, so when I had the opportunity to get this thing by using points on my credit card, I took it. Got the box, found that some thingy inside the big tube came loose (some lens) and was bouncing around. It did have minor scratches on the big mirror, but I polished them out. I saw where the glue came loose and reglued the lens, and it worked. The spotting scope is a real piece of work, took forever to get it to point where the big scope pointed. The "free" $89 software that it came with was crap. It wouldn't install on Windows XP, and was copyright 2000. Got it this afternoon. The help files and "manual" had links to www.starrynight.com, but the links were broken. Went to www.starrynight.com and found that the "bundle" had no upgrade path, and the new software was $149. Cheapest I found was here on Amazon at $130. I'll probably play around with the scope for a few weeks before deciding to get the software. Sure, $130 overall cost for this telescope is good, but $130 for a freebie, well, I have to sit on that for a bit :).
Rating:
Summary: So-so
Review: If you're not lucky and you need to collimate the telescope, you'll quicky regret buying this newtownian. Collimating a telescope is a real pain, the instructions are not clear and the customer support at Meade is mediocre at best. After many tries, I was able to collimate the thing and was able to see saturn's rings. The autostart is a wonderful thing, the tripod is pretty good. I did return the telescope because the altitude lock broke.
Rating: 
Summary: I did it..!!!
Review: In just few words..if you are a novice like me and never used a telescope before, and you think this is the time that you have to have one...let me tell you: I bought this telescope after reading so many reviews of every telescope on earth. With not so much money, you will have a reflector telescope with clear aperture of 114 mm and after reading the manual and going over the included software in the box, (if you are as lucky as I was) you will find a brilliant Jupiter (with its four moons) and a very well defined Saturn (with its ring) in your first night of observation using the included 9mm eyepiece . The hardest part...to align the telescope using Autostar...the clue...align very well your view finder and don't be afraid to investigate by your own. I recommend this telescope for you, if you are a beginner like me and want to enjoy the pleasure of using a good telescope and learn about planet, stars and constellations without paying to much. When you buy this telescope, you will find the answer about if you need to buy a more expensive telescope in the future and if astronomy is the hobby for you.
Rating: 
Summary: Meade DS2114 Scope
Review: Optically, the 2114 is a good beginner scope. I found it necessary to supplement the included 9 and 25mm eyepieces with a 4 and 40mm, allowing both high mag and wide field of view. Most of my viewing was done under urban conditions with a fair amount of light pollution. Under these conditions I am able to see cloud bands on Jupiter and the four moons, Saturn and the Cassini division (under perfect viewing conditions), Andromeda galaxy (small smudge) and numerous star clusters and a few nebula. I have encountered problems with the tracking motors skipping or failing altogether and have replaced 3 mounts under warranty. Autostar works well if tripod is perfectly leveled and the user has a basic knowledge of some sky based reference points. Those expecting to hit all the highlights right out of the box will be frustrated, some time with the scope is necessary for getting the alignment process down (learning curve). I chose this scope over the Meade EXT70AT for ease of focusing and the larger aperture (more light makes all the difference). This scope (like others of its kind?) is battery hungry. Expect 4 to 5 hours of use from top of the line batteries. Rechargeable batteries are a good investment. The scope is small and light enough for easy portability but unfortunately, Meade doesn't make a carrying case for this scope. I would recommend this scope with some reservations. As of 3/03 Meade has some deals on the EXT90EC that include autostar and tripod and may be a better bet. Have owned scope since 10/02.
Rating:
Summary: Meade DS2114 Scope
Review: Optically, the 2114 is a good beginner scope. I found it necessary to supplement the included 9 and 25mm eyepieces with a 4 and 40mm, allowing both high mag and wide field of view. Most of my viewing was done under urban conditions with a fair amount of light pollution. Under these conditions I am able to see cloud bands on Jupiter and the four moons, Saturn and the Cassini division (under perfect viewing conditions), Andromeda galaxy (small smudge) and numerous star clusters and a few nebula. I have encountered problems with the tracking motors skipping or failing altogether and have replaced 3 mounts under warranty. Autostar works well if tripod is perfectly leveled and the user has a basic knowledge of some sky based reference points. Those expecting to hit all the highlights right out of the box will be frustrated, some time with the scope is necessary for getting the alignment process down (learning curve). I chose this scope over the Meade EXT70AT for ease of focusing and the larger aperture (more light makes all the difference). This scope (like others of its kind?) is battery hungry. Expect 4 to 5 hours of use from top of the line batteries. Rechargeable batteries are a good investment. The scope is small and light enough for easy portability but unfortunately, Meade doesn't make a carrying case for this scope. I would recommend this scope with some reservations. As of 3/03 Meade has some deals on the EXT90EC that include autostar and tripod and may be a better bet. Have owned scope since 10/02.
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