Meade DS-114AT


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Brand and Model:Meade DS-114AT
Price ($USD):$368
Type:Newtonian
Attributes: checked Go-To un-checked PEC
Aperture:114mm (4.5")
f Ratio:f/8
Focal Length:910mm
Finder:5X24 plastic
Electric Power:10-AA Cells
Mount:Altaz
Tripod:
Weight (lbs):lbs.
Dimensions (w/h/d):
Description:From Wal-Mart
Includes the AT425 Go-To

Vote Highlights Vote
Meade DS-114AT
I Purchased a DS-114AT telescop from Wal-Mart on Friday. My birthday present to myself. Mirror was beautifull. However, all lenses sucked big time and the mount, electronics and tripod are junk. I returned it for a full refund on Sunday. I am disapointed with Meade for ruining the their reputation by putting such trash on the market. I have talked with several people about this telescope and they almost all said the same thing "it's good starter scope for my kids" but, they also said "afetr a couple of times out with it, my kids put it in the closet."

Shame om Meade for ruining astronomy for these kids. I am still looking for a tlelscope for myself and you can bet that it will not be a Meade product.

Sincerely, TJ

Overall Rating: 0
Weight: 3 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=40723

>I Purchased a DS-114AT telescop from Wal-Mart on Friday. My birthday present to myself. Mirror was beautifull. However, all lenses sucked big time and the mount, electronics and tripod are junk. I returned it for a full refund on Sunday. I am disapointed with Meade for ruining the their reputation by putting such trash on the market. I have talked with several people about this telescope and they almost all said the same thing "it's good starter scope for my kids" but, they also said "afetr a couple of times out with it, my kids put it in the closet."
>
>Shame om Meade for ruining astronomy for these kids. I am still looking for a tlelscope for myself and you can bet that it will not be a Meade product.
>
>Sincerely, TJ

Unfortunate, Meade however does have loads of other models, 

the older ETX90 Mak is now available for just $100 more with amazing optics, solid mount, fun Autostar, nice portable at bowling-ball weight, aprerture slightly low for full resolution, but found nearly all Messier, 

caution some dislike its smaller aperture, I love it,

recently viewed Mars SPC south polar cap in August 2005, even see eliptical shape.. 

comes with two nice eyepices, does have plastic mount but durable, enjoyed looking at Venus at Noon, simply a fun fun scope, lacks resolution for fainter objects, but a good entry level, and rates near number one in grab and go, EXCELLENT..

WARREN .<> ..

Meade DS-114AT
The plastic in almost all parts is loose and of poor quality. The Barlow is junk. The overall quality of the drive system is horrible. The is a holiday purchase for someone else, not for the beginning enthusiast.

Overall Rating: 3
Optics:1 Mount:7 Ease of Use:1 Value:4
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=472359


Meade DS-114AT
I would not trash this scope too badly, afterall it is a starter scope and what you pay is what you get. I have had this scope for more than 6 years now, the reason why i decided to keep it was because of its light body and ease of transport. The mount is not very stable, you just have to make sure you don't dance around it. The optics is not great, but I was able to spot many marvelous planetary images with the two default eyepieces. The motor is somewhat jerky, but with patience it is not differcult to track moving celestrial bodies at all.

Overall Rating: 5
Optics:5 Mount:3 Ease of Use:3 Value:8
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=414621


Meade DS-114AT
I could not beleive the poor quality of this product from Meade.
The telescope is constructed using large amounts of very poor quality plastic,the fit of which was so poor it was hard to beleive this was not meant to be a "toy".
The supplied tripod will without doubt fail very early on in it's life to to the very flimsey nature of it's construction.
The optics.......terrible.

Overall Rating: 2
Optics:1 Mount:1 Ease of Use:1 Value:2
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=217334


Meade DS-114AT
Save for a better model

Overall Rating: 3
Optics:3 Mount:1 Ease of Use:2 Value:4
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=163869


Meade DS-114AT
I bought this scope hoping to learn more about GoTo and the
software. I have not managed to get the GoTo to work. The
cords always gets wrappd around and prevent the scope from
moving. I have tryied watching the cords, but nothing worked.

The optics seemed okay. The images looked nice. I would not
recommend this telescope.

Overall Rating: 4
Optics:8 Mount:3 Ease of Use:0 Value:3
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=138848


Meade DS-114AT
Carted this massive sucker with me on vacation. I spent about an hour assembling it. Went outside, azimuth motor wouldn't work. I trained drives and checked for problems as well as rebalancing the tube. Nothing worked. Can't tell you about the quality of the optics or the mount as I couldn't use it. My only enjoyment came from using its finder to look at boats.

Overall Rating: 1
Ease of Use:2 Value:0
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=81887


Meade DS-114AT
[webmaster note: This vote was moved from the product description]

The primary and secondary mirrors were OK for a scope this size. Surprisingly,
the .965 MH 25mm and 2.5mm and the R4mm were pretty good also. I frankly did
not think that a 2.5mm ep would be any use at all, but it was pretty good for
lunar observation at high magnification. Though the FOV was small on the 4mm
and 2.5 mm EP's, I think this was a plus, since you want to see a small object
or area when using high magnification, not a lot of surrounding sky. If the mount and go-to had been OK I would have loved it. But the finder was useless with the tremendous chromatic
aberration from the plastic lens, and the large amount of play in the altitude
axis (several degrees!!). The go-to would not stay aligned for even a few seconds. I suspect it was the old, buggy, software version.

Unlike the Meade DS-114 ES, this scope has a black tube.

Finder and mount problems caused me to rate this scope a 1 in spite of the
fairly good optics of the primary, secondary, and eyepieces.

Overall Rating: 1
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=66323


Meade DS-114AT
good price, easy intructions

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:7 Mount:8 Ease of Use:8 Value:10
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=65215


Meade DS-114AT
I was very dissapointed in this scope. The salesman who sold it to us at Discovery wouldn't answer any of our questions, and wouldn't even go back to check on the manual. We bought it on impulse after he had carted it out before we decided. I was supposed to get it for christmas, but I convinced my parents to let me take it on the trip, because we were going to a fairly dark sky area. The tripod's locking device wouldn't work either, and if you keep your eyepieces in plastic cases, they don't fit on the tray. I took the thing out that night, after assembling it, and the thing wouldn't slew in altitude. I tried retraining the drive motors, testing motors, remounting to take some weight off of the back, and then I finally just gave up. I gave it a one because it only did 1 astronomy related task, slewing in azimuth. On the plus side though, my brother had lots of fun playing with the box it came in, and the finder scope was pretty cool looking at boats, although difficult to use, due to image inversion.

Overall Rating: 1
Weight: 1 (Unreliable Vote)
Date:
By:
Link to this vote: http://www.excelsis.com/1.0/displayvote.php?voteid=40732

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