Meade Instruments – Infinity 90mm Aperture, Portable Refracting Astronomy Telescope for Beginners – Multiple Eyepieces & Accessories Included – Fun Space Activities for Kids & Adults – See the Moon

I have 40 years’ experience with telescopes and hope I can help. The 102mm is a great wide field scope and I can recommend this with no hesitation. The scope is portable enough and light weight if using the supplied accessories. The tube and focuser are metal. The tripod included with the 102 was surprisingly good and I have known people to but the scope for the tripod and use other small scopes on the tripod. Because I use much heavier 2 inch accessories I had to but a different portamount II tripod to handle the weight of the two inch equipment. I did put my heavy 30mm eyepiece in the stock tripod and it worked but I know I was using this beyond its capacity and it would not last long using the heavy accessories. In that case a stronger tripod (at the cost of some portability) would be best. The eyepieces included with the 102mm where another surprise and were very good but not as good as premium (and expressive) eyepieces. There are better eyepieces with better eye relief if you plan to stay with the hobby. While not required I would plan on replacing the high power eyepieces to gain a wider field and better eye relief. Many scopes come with low quality eyepieces to cut costs but the included eyepieces were perfectly good. The Barlow felt cheap because it was so light weight but it performed very well. The red dot finder worked well but I prefer a right angle optical version. The 102mm optics are excellent and produce sharp, bright images. If you are looking at this scope you probably know a larger aperture will produce a brighter image because it is able to capture more light. I was looking at the 80mm but decided on the 102mm for the larger aperture and the much better tripod and mount. The supplied diagonal is plastic but good and very study. I even put my premium 2 inch eyepieces in the diagonal with little to no worry. You need to know that this scope has an adapter which when removed fits a 2 inch diagonal. Even so the tripod and mount are not suitable for long-term use with heavy premium 2 inch accessories. There are some good lighter 2 inch accessories that will work but because this is a wide field scope, 2 inch accessories do not give you much improvement. I use 2 inch equipment on several of my other scopes so it made since for me to upgrade the tripod and mount. On a clear, dark night the scope will show very good views of star fields, galaxies, star clusters, the moon and several of the viewable planets. The scope provides the best overall image of the Pleiades compared to any of my other scopes and finding objects is much easier due to the wide field. Jupiter’s showed good surface details as well as Saturn’s ring division. In a smaller scope don’t expect to see much detail and Mars, Venus and other planets will only appear as small colorful dots even with an 80mm scope. Bottom Line: I would highly recommend this scope even for advanced users like me. This scope is portable and provides great wide field views. The supplied eyepieces are very good but I would add a nice 1.25 ES 24mm 68 degree eyepiece if you have the money. The tripod with its slow motion control’s is a must have benefit and is a valid reason to skip the 80mm version. If you think you will be serious about astronomy skip any telescope under 80mm and this is a good choice.

I read many reviews for various telescopes in this price range before choosing this one. In the end I chose this for the following reasons: 1. The specifications of the scope. 90mm is the largest refractor scope in this price range. 2. The image is not reversed or upside-down. This means daytime terrestrial viewing is possible. 3. The mount is not a typical alt-azimuth. It has fine tuning knobs so you can track during celestial viewing. 4. This scope came with 3 eyepieces and a 2x Barlow lens. It also has a red dot view finder. I was very skeptical due to the lack of reviews but it came with everything I wanted as a first time buyer. It arrived professionally packaged and with all the pieces. It was simple to assemble and I was outside calibrating the view finder within about 10 minutes. The moon is amazing, especially when less than half full. I can see Jupiter with 4 of its moons and if focused properly I can see the two major bands across its surface. To see Jupiter clearly I found the best method is to choose your eyepiece, focus it using the surface of the moon, and then use the view finder to target the planet. The only thing I think this telescope could benefit from is a finer focus knob. It is however adequate if you are patient or use the method I mentioned above. I am attaching a photo of the moon I took my first day of use. I took the picture using my phone by just holding it up to the eyepiece so it is not crystal clear. The image you see through the eyepiece is very clear. I hope this helps others who are considering this purchase.

This review is for the 102mm AZ. Why Amazon insists on putting reviews for all sizes of this scope in, is beyond me and not really helpful. I wonder if they do this for other products also, never really noticed. Anyway, backyard astronomy newbie here, and seeing as I live in a city environment with all kinds of light pollution and buildings, I wanted a good beginner scope that at least I'd be able to observe the moon and some planets well. I decided on a refractor and seeing as this was probably the biggest aperture scope I could find and afford, I went with the Meade 102. The scope arrived in a couple days, triple packaged well. Assembly was easy, just attach tray to tripod, slow motion controls to mount , scope to mount and red dot finder to scope. All done with out the need of tools (used a quarter to tighten the slow motion control screws, as there's a Phillips head and a couple wrenches in the tool kit, but didn't need them) The only issue I had is the fact the scope is attached to the mount by one thumbwheel and screw only (even though there are two holes in the bracket on the scope) which shouldn't be a problem as long as you check the thumbwheel for tightness occasionally. It's secure enough when tight. The red dot finder at first seemed to be sort of useless until lo and behold, I found the red dot. I lined it up outside in the daytime at first, getting to know how to use (don't forget to turn it off) it and have yet to "fine tune" it as the instructions say at night, where it should be easier using the moon instead of a tree trunk off in the distance. "Centering" in the scope is sort of easy, but the center of the finder seems to be a little subjective as you move your head. Oh well, figured I'm going to be starting out with the moon and Jupiter and whatever I can see during the day. Trying to decide which type of mount to buy was an issue also. I was close to buying a scope with an EQ mount but now that I have one with an AZ mount I'm glad I got this one. It's up and down, back and forth (you can lock it from going sideways), which seems to be enough for a beginner, plus with the a little practice the slow motion controls (fine tuned up and down back and forth) ought to be enough to track objects. Trying to locate the north star in my area is generally a pain anyway, and if I get the point where I want to see deep space anything I'll either have take a trip or buy a bigger telescope. The 3 eyepieces plus Barlow are a plus, and seem to me to be well made and good enough to start out on, but I did order a moon filter and a medium upgraded eyepiece just in case. Haven't played the dvd that comes with yet also, maybe there'll be something that'll help, maybe not. Over all though, I'm pretty happy with this purchase. The telescope, tripod and mount are well made and solid. If you're a beginner like me, don't want to spend a ton of money, live in a light polluted area and just want to get your feet wet in this hobby, you cannot go wrong with this telescope.

Meade Infinity 102mm Refractor Telescope review: UPDATE June 12, 2016: I've since upgraded and now own this Meade Infinity 102mm Refractor telescope and sold my Meade 90mm Refractor Telescope. Why Amazon have the reviews all mixed up for the different Meade Infinity series is not nice, especially when I had purchased two different telescope and have to use the same review to either rewrite or add to it is beside me and I think that is not the way it should be. Anyway I got this Meade 102mm telescope Tuesday 07, June 2016 and it came well packaged, all items intact and am fully satisfied with what I received. It took me less than 10mins to setup and have it ready for use for first light. I also got the Red Dot viewfinder set into the Telescope and did my adjustments, focusing the telescope on an object a few miles away. It took me about 5mins or less to get the Red Dot viewfinder perfectly aligned. I then looked at Saturn to see if the Red Dot viewfinder was perfectly aligned and all was OK. I then took out my Meade 90mm Telescope to compare the difference in viewing, using on both of them the same eyepieces. I selected the 26mm eyepieces, seeing I now have 2 eyepieces of the same from both telescopes. I placed both telescopes side by side and set it upon Saturn. I elected Saturn seeing its the smallest and easily seen planet at the moment, that way I can actually see how well both will display Saturn. Looking at Saturn from both telescopes have shown me quite a difference. Lets consider the 90mm; when you look at Saturn you definitely see it but much smaller and can make out the ring around Saturn but not the Cassini band and i.e. bare in mind using the 26mm eyepiece. Looking through the 102mm using the same 26mm eyepiece at Saturn brings the planet a little closer to your eyes and have a clearer and brighter view also you have a very marginal wider field of view but not much to make a fair comparison with the 90mm. I did not see the Cassini band using the 26mm eyepiece on the 102mm Telescope. The next day I took them out and decided to look at a communication tower located several miles away in the horizon and when I looked through using the same 26mm eyepieces you definitely have a much closer and detailed view of the top of the tower with the 102mm telescope. Whereas the 90mm you have a clear view but its seeing the tower a little further away and don't see too much details but just barely. In summing up I'd say that the Meade 102mm is much brighter and better viewing enjoyment than the Meade 90mm. All in all I still love both Telescopes but a friend of mine came by and saw the 90mm and asked me to buy it and I sold it. So now I have only the Meade 102mm which I'm enjoying very much. Meade Infinity 90mm Refractor Telescope review: This is the first Telescope I've ever owned, and also the very first time I ever looked into a Telescope. Setting up everything was just around ten minutes or less. I got a small packet of tools, 1 Phillips screwdriver, 1 triangular shaped flat head screwdriver and 2 different size spanner. I did not need to use any of the tools to setup the entire apparatus. I love the red dot viewfinder and found it very easy to align with the telescope. I aligned it using a distant object in the horizon with the Telescope, centering the eyepiece with the Telescope then taking the red dot viewfinder to align with the red dot. All that I did late in the evening time. I then used it at night and looked at a distant star with the red dot viewfinder then in turn looked at the star through the Telescope and it was perfectly aligned. Amen The tripod came already assembled in its own box while the Telescope came wrapped in its own box, all items was placed in a bigger box so it looks as one item. As advertised on Amazon I got everything as described and was not disappointed. As described with the Telescope all is seen completely upright as if you're looking through a binoculars with one eye. For terrestrial use this is ideally suited for me. So up is up, down is down, left is left and right is right. I will later on look at the planets and star clusters etc to see what more I can see and as much as I can see. I had a quick look at the Moon and its quite breathtaking seeing the craters of the Moon with so much details. UPDATE MARCH 19, 2016: I got up this morning approx 1:30 AM and could not go back to sleep and decided to walk out my back step and what did I saw was both Saturn and Mars with the Moon approx 30 degrees (i.e. from the horizon to the Moon) setting at the west. I decided to take my Telescope and view those planets. I was really amazed, it's the first time I've ever seen Saturn & its rings using all the different eyepieces. I also had a good long look of Mars and was all excited about my short night events. A few nights ago I also viewed Jupiter and was amazed with so much details to see the bands on Jupiter and seeing 4 of Jupiter's Moon. Coming back to the red dot viewfinder; I did some very fine tweaks to it and now its spot on. Once you find the object with the red dot and you look into the Telescope its right on the target.

Third update: I was able to overcome aligning the red dot site and works as you would expect. I did return it because 1) I found it frustrating trying to focus on planets, the mount and tripod are not that sturdy. It was also very difficult to set altitude and when focusing with an upgraded eyepiece it always caused the eyepiece end to fall down some. It one were not going to ever upgrade eyepieces or spend more than the cost of the scope it really isn’t that bad. Meade Infinity 70mm Updated review I bought this scope because I live in a heavily light polluted area and wanted something on a tripod to set up and use quickly; it’s difficult for me to hold binoculars steady enough and wanted the versatility a small telescope gives. If I lived in better area for backyard viewing I would save my money for a 6-8” Dob. Set up is a breeze and took no time. The tripod is cheap and lightweight but sufficient, the altazimuth mount is slightly better. This is a nice scope at the price point. For terrestrial viewing the 26mm lens is more than enough; field of view with the 9mm is too small and focusing is not pratical due to the overall lightweight of the design. The Barrow lens decreases the eye relief too much IMO; guessing due to cheap design of lenses and diagonal. UPDATE: My initial review was 5 stars but going to now have to give it a solid 4. Red dot site was so off axis after mounting, (red dot too dim to see in the day) and trying to center maxed out the adjustments. Cheaply made and will need to shim it to get closer to center before adjusting. Seems too easy to strip adjustment screws as you can, with some force, continue turning the knobs past the stop. Viewed Jupiter and it’s moons. Seeing was good enough to resolve the bands with a Plossl 9mm. Very good view. Viewed M42, Orion Nebula with a low quality 20mm lens. Too much light pollution to really appreciate. Ordered a Celestron 8-24mm zoom and Moon filter. Looking forward to using them as viewing the moon was to painfully bright and as an eye glass wearer, using red dot forces me to constantly take glasses off and on and hard to share views once set with others.

This is a very nice scope. The mount is nice and works well, though I did find the Altitude, which has no lock, to be a wee bit tight to suit me. A ratchet and a 14mm (to the best of my memory) socket and a wee bit of tweaking improved that situation. The Azimuth does have a locking knob which is very important to remember. The "slow-motion" controls only work for the Azimuth when you have the Azimuth lock engaged. I forget where I saw it, another review or perhaps a you-tube video, but someone mentioned the terrible grease on the rack and pinion for the focus tube. This stuff is more like Glue than grease. Alcahol won't even cut it. I took everything apart (do this only if you are totally confident in your ability to do so) and cleaned the metal parts with Dawn dish soap. I thoroughly dried the parts and put a very small amount of good Lithium grease in place of the donkey doo that was on them. Works much easier and smoother. Otherwise, a well built instrument that can't be beat for the price. Oh, forget the instructions, they are pretty much useless as others have already said. When using the Barlow you can insert it into the diagonal but it won't go in all the way. This is OK, and it will work. Insert the Barlow in place of the eyepiece, and then insert the eyepiece into the Barlow. But, in order to get the best performance the Barlow needs to go In Front (ahead of) the diagonal. The instructions do not tell you this, And it will not focus if you do so. You'll need to order a 1.25 inch eyepiece extention tube (Orion 5123 1.25-Inch Telescope Eyepiece Extension Tube). I would recommend this scope to anyone and would buy it again in a second.

This is a very affordable and capable telescope aimed at new amateur astronomers. It would be a great gift idea particularly for kids that have expressed interest in stargazing and you want to gauge how serious they are about it or if it’s just a passing interest. No need to spend big bucks if their interest ends up being short-lived and the telescope ends up in the closet after being used only a few times. I used this telescope to view the moon and I was very pleased with the results, once it was in focus you can clearly see the craters and other distinctive lunar landmarks. The three included eyepieces, 4mm (150X), 12mm (50X) and 20mm (30X), give a good range of magnification. When changing between the eyepieces the telescope inadvertently gets moved and rotated a bit, so you have to make some adjustments to get the object being viewed back in sight. It would be nice if this telescope had a more sophisticated mount with a fine tuned locking and adjustment system, but those are features typically found on higher end models. The rotation of the telescope on the mount is very smooth and I had no problems panning the view on a horizontal plane, vertical movement requires a bit more work to loosen and tighten the knob to allow adjusting. I am satisfied with the optical performance and quality of this telescope, I’m considering upgrading to a higher model in this line in the future. The installation was fairly straightforward and easy to understand but the instructions could benefit from additional diagrams of the different components. The instructions include one overall diagram/illustration of the fully assembled telescope with parts labeled, no close-ups of the smaller parts like the eyepieces are shown so some confusion can arise when trying to install those. For those unfamiliar with telescopes, a step by step guide with illustrations would make setup more visually oriented and foolproof. This is a well thought out kit that includes just about everything someone new to the hobby would need. I received this telescope for an honest and unbiased review.

As an amateur astronomer for 27 years, I've been using a 10" aperture computerized Dobsonian telescope, with which I've found all 110 Messier objects. But carrying the heavy scope and base out to the backyard has become cumbersome, and I can't see dim deep-space objects in my suburban skies anyway. I decided to get a smaller, lightweight refractor scope so I could just grab and go. The Meade Infinity 102 mm does the job. This is a serious scope, not a toy. It's solidly built mostly of metal. The tripod is stable if you are careful not to touch the scope while observing. The tripod does have some "play". Compared to a Dobsonian mount which goes exactly where you point the scope, this alt-az mount is a litle wobbly in the altitude or vertical direction: you need to push the scope slightly beyond where you want to point, then it settles back. A YouTube video by starastronomer suggested removing the lockwasher from the altitude bolt; that reduced the problem. I purchased a better mount, a Vixen Mobile Porta, which helped. I was surprised how sharp the images were with the lower-power lenses. The scope could split the double-double star Mizar in the Big Dipper, and reveal the Trapezium of four stars within M42, the Orion nebula. Jupiter was disappointing because the chromatic aberration of the 4" lens added a blue and orange haze around the planet. I'm going to switch to a reflector which doesn't have that problem. The 26mm and 9 mm lenses that come with the Meade scope provide images nearly as sharp and resolved as the expensive Plossl lenses that I have been using. If you want your images to be as sharp as possible, consider upgrading to better lenses sometime. But the supplied lenses are good. The 6mm lens had poor eye relief: you need to view in a tiny area over the lens to see the image. You'll need a better lens for high magnification. Or use the supplied Barlow 2x magnifier with the 26 mm lens. The instruction manual is clear and has helpful advice about using the scope for best results. I was able to set up the scope in 10 minutes. In some customer reviews, the users claim that they can't see anything through the scope. They need to take off the lens cap and follow the directions closely. All the viewing advice in the manual is valuable. The knobs that adjust the red-dot finder were stiff, and I found that they were near the limit of their rotation. I centered them before aligning the scope so they turned more easily. To look through the red-dot finder, you need to kneel on the ground if the object you want to see is higher than about 45 degrees above the horizon. That can be hard on your neck, so you might want to wait for a time of year when the object is lower in the sky. Using a good star chart, you aim the red-dot finder where the chart shows an object is located. Then that object appears in the 26mm lens view. Note that planets viewed near the horizon look blurry due to the thick atmosphere; it's better to wait until the planet is at least 30 degrees above the horizon. The slow-motion controls were stiff but some 3-in-1 oil helped. It's important to lock the horizontal (azimuth) rotation before you use the slow-motion azimuth control; otherwise it won't work. I'm happy with this purchase except for views of the planets and moon which are fuzzier than you'd get with a good reflector of the same aperture.. The Meade infinity 102mm lets you see four planets, the moon, star clusters, and the brightest galaxies and globular clusters .Although I can see fewer objects with this scope compared to my 10" reflector, the ease of carrying and setting up the Meade is a compromise I'm willing to live with. But I am switching to an Orion StarBlaster 4.5 reflector scope with a solid Dobsonian base.

No me gusta porque no se ve nada. He intentado ver con mi hijo y mi hermano en varias ocasiones la luna, así como la alineación que hubo de Júpiter Saturno y no vemos nada. Una decepción. Por la calidad de materiales y presentación se ve bien pero lo importante que es intentar ver algo, no hemos podido. He visto mucho tutorial pero no hay forma.

Lo compre para regalarlo a la amiga de mi padre y esta muy contenta con el

Ho scelto questo articolo per far osservare il cielo ai miei figli quando saremo al mare. Volevo un oggetto "da campeggio", piccolo, facile da trasportare e che ci permettesse di vedere i pianeti più vicini e la Luna. Volevo anche un oggetto economico: nessuno doveva rimanerci (troppo) male nel caso in cui inavvertitamente lo avesse fatto cadere. Non ho scelto oggetti da zaino perché avevo paura che il piedistallo traballasse a causa delle numerose sezioni telescopiche e per la lunghezza focale corta. Nonostante i 50mm di apertura, fa bene il suo mestiere: 600mm di lunghezza focale rappresentano un buon compromesso, gli oculari sono del tipo economico, ma vanno oltre le aspettative che mi ero fatto dato il prezzo, il treppiede è piuttosto stabile e tutto si monta o smonta in meno cinque minuti.

Nice telescope. But the finderoscope is a bit difficult to adjust. It gives very crisp and clear images. The lunar surface can be seen with it dotted with a number of crates on its surface. Very mesmerizing to see through it. Distant planets like Jupiter and Saturn are also seen. If you are experienced then you can Andromeda too. Distant stars like UY Scuti and Rigel are also seen. If you are a beginner then this telescope is the best one to go.

Mon jeune fils est passionné d'astronomie, mais n'a pas (encore) les connaissances pour la réglage d'un réflecteur. ce réfracteur était tout indiqué, et dispose d'une qualité d'image très correcte pour un débutant ! Il est ravi.