I bought a Megrez 80 second hand off of Astromart a year ago, so that I would own a portable scope that I could take with my on airplanes where I'm not willing to lug my LX200.
I wanted something better than a typical short tube 80, but not as expensive as a Tak or an AP, particularly since I wanted to be able to travel without worrying much.
Overall I've been very impressed with my Megrez 80. The biggest issue for me was coming up with a workable alt-az mount for it, since I got mine without a mount, though it did come with 2 tube rings. I ended up buying a Bogen 3001 tripod with a 3030 head, and with some creative use of the two tube rings and a mounting plate that I got with mine, I've made this scope quite usable without spending much money, with the added bonus that as a travel scope, its quite valuable to me that its able to use the same tripod I'd use for my cameras, so I only have one tripod to take on the trip.
The optics in my Megrez 80 are quite good. They seem much better than the views I've seen through some of short tube 80 type scopes. I wouldn't really consider this a "semi-APO" however, as I am more irritated by false color than most people, and when viewing objects at high power there's definitely false color to be seen. I recently borrowed some Naglers and had a look through my scope (don't own any of my own yet) and I was very impressed at the views from this small scope. From a dark location, this scope is quite capable, its easy to view M57, M27, M42 and lots of other objects with this small scope even from light polluted locations. The addition of a Rigel quickfinder is highly recommended, as this is what I use on mine, and I absolutely love it. I actually put the quickfinder in the scope case in one of the eyepiece storage spots, it works beautifully on this scope. My favorite use for this scope when I'm not travelling is to pop in low power eyepieces and look at stuff like the Plieades, or as a "quick look" scope to determine whether its worth my trouble to pack up my stuff and head out to a dark site with the LX200 for a night of CCD imaging. Its a great scope for that sort of use, and its so small that I'm often tempted to just leave it in my car so I have it on me at all times :-)

Overall Rating: 9
Optics:8 Ease of Use:10 Value:9
Weight: 5
Date: 09/10/2002 07:32:27 pm PST

Replies: 0

I've owned my LX200 for a few years now and have dragged it all over the place to go observing. It had held up remarkably well during the time I've owned it. I've used it in all kinds of observing conditions from hot and sticky summer nights to cold midwestern winter nights with temperatures down around 0 F, and this scope has survived very well so far.
I've been particularly happy with the scope's performance in the cold winter weather when its so cold that I can barely advance the film in my Olympus when I'm doing astrophotography. In the last year I've started doing CCD imaging which is one of the reasons I originally chose this scope. So far things have gone well. The main things I had to learn to get the most from this scope were to get it very well collimated, and to train the PEC so I could do 2 minute unguided CCD images at f/6.3. Getting this scope collimated well was the best thing I've done during the whole time I've owned it. It wasn't "bad" from the factory, but it wasn't dead on either, and I spent a single evening tuning it up and it has held collimation very well since then, despite taking trips out to dark sites etc. My only "gripe" about my LX200 is that I've found a few software bugs in its control system which will never be fixed, but fortunately they are quite minor. The scope does take a little while to cool off when taken from indoors and put outside in the winter, but this is trivially solved by storing the scope in the garage where its closer to outdoor temperatures, and by using a $10 computer fan from radio shack to help it cool down faster. With these two steps in place, it cools down in about 10-15 minutes. I like this scope enough that I don't imagine myself getting rid of it any time soon, its small enough that I can pack it and all of my CCD stuff in the rear hatch of my '94 camaro, and have room for a person in passenger seat if I wish. Its light enough that even a couch potato should be able to set it up without breaking much of a sweat.

Overall Rating: 8
Optics:9 Mount:9 Ease of Use:8 Value:8
Weight: 5
Date: 09/10/2002 07:18:08 pm PST

Replies: 0

Works well except that the sight glass dims out the stars you can see significantly when compared to the Rigel quickfinder or the Telrad. I own one of these which is attached to my
SBIG ST-237A when I use it in "eFinder" mode, for that purpose the even smaller size and lighter weight make this a good choice even compared to the Rigel quickfinder.

Overall Rating: 7
Performance:7 Value:7
Weight: 5
Date: 09/10/2002 07:02:26 pm PST

Replies: 0

I've had my ST-237A for about a year now, and have spent enough time with it to become somewhat proficient at imaging with it on my 8" LX200. I use mine with the internal color filter wheel, and the FR237 focal reducer and eFinder assembly. The FR237 makes this camera much easier to use and is highly recommended if you have a similar scope. Overall the hardware seems robust. I particularly like having the color filter wheel internal to the camera, as this helps cut down wires and clutter, and its easy to keep the optics clean.
One of the design points of this camera is that the head is small enough that it can be used on Fastar equipped Celestron telescopes, which I may eventually get a chance to take advantage of. Overall I've been very happy with the camera for what its capable of doing. The main reason to upgrade from this camera to other models would be to have a built-in autoguiding chip, achieve faster download times via USB, higher resolution images, and larger pixels. The ST-237A is a good compromise and is reasonably priced, so I've been very happy with it so far.

Overall Rating: 8
Performance:9 Ease of Use:7 Value:8
Weight: 6
Date: 09/10/2002 06:57:32 pm PST

Replies: 0