Skywatcher Telescopes

Reviews

This is a wonderful device that both demonstrates magnetic levitation and realistic models of a few of the planets and the moon. It does take a bit of patience to learn how to position the globes in the magnetic field so that they float. There is a balance point so like anything you are trying to balance, you got to find the sweet spot. For mine, the top of the globe is about a half inch below the upper magnet. Also the red dot on the globe must be up. Using the focusing lights help, once you see how the lights behave as the globe is moved into and out of the balance point. Hold the globe lightly, with just enough grip to keep the ball from being pull out of your fingers, by the magnetic field. Then move the ball into the area underneath the top magnet and feel for the sweet spot when the globe comes into balance and hangs in mid air. Too close to the top and the ball will snap up to the top magnet. Too far away and it will fall. Takes a bit of practice, but it is not all that hard. Once small caveat to be aware of. If your electricity is lost, for even a split second, the globes will drop. Good thing they are made out of plastic. Just place the gravitation somewhere where you can easily retrieve the globe.

I'm not sure what some of the reviewers here are doing wrong, but I had no problems whatsoever with this. It took a small amount of effort to position the planet just right between the magnets so that it would float, but once you master that it works exactly as advertised. I like the Saturn globe best. It hovers in mid-air like magic as it slowly spins.

I bought this for my husband for Christmas and we are both very disappointed. The planets don't easily suspend and instead readily snap magnetically to the top, and it makes an annoying humming sound. I wouldn't mind how poorly it's made except that it's pricey --- the value is simply not there for the expense.

I got this item today and I've been playing with it for hours and I have yet to make the planets float. I would not recommend this item to anyone.

Would not work, right out of the box. The company's service URL doesn't work, emails bounce, and their web domains (.com, .org) are no longer active. I'd be embarrassed to offer this item in a garage sale.

Reviews

This video is only pictures of space with music playing. Some of the pictures have a caption saying what galaxy or nebula it is but that's it. I did not watch the whole thing, I got bored after ten minutes. The shots from the Hubble telescope are cool. The picture quality was not great and it didn't fill the width of my monitor. Maybe after ten minutes of music there is a narrator but I doubt it. These shots would make a cool screen saver.

We are very interested in outer space and would have appreciated commentary instead of "mood music". This was nothing more than a slide show. A cheap way to sell pictures of the Hubble spacecraft.

The music was fine, as were the images. Little titles for the moving images with a few names i could recognize. It was a good program without the pre-sales hype - unlike some of the other ones which i dare not provide feedback for. Trying to keep my aura positive this year. They say it makes one live longer - we'll see. Have fun.

Good product and service. Thank you, Bill

I rather enjoyed this DVD. The DVD images are stunningly brilliant in color and clarity. The music was very well done with sort of a groovy motion slide show thing going on. Since i've seen it half dozen times already, I would certainly recommend this to any space enthusiast.

Reviews

Neither glamorizing nor demonizing this important man of science, this video is a good overview of his life, his scientific contributions, and his controversy with the church. Recommended as a serious introductory examination of his life.

Reviews

This is one EXTREMELY mixed bag! Don't believe the hype. Of 461 images, the large majority TIFF format, I saved to my HD only 86. That's right, only 86 impressed me as worth viewing more than once. I think this set was put ("cobbled") together by some amateur who simply downloaded a bunch of Hubble photos, put them together, made up a business name for themselves and put them out on Amazon. Hubble images, for the most part, are copyright free. So I guess anyone can piece together a DVD or bunch of CDs like this. The set might be a lot more interesting if one only knew what the pictures were supposed to be or to represent. But no! Believe it or not, there's not one single word of text anywhere on the DVD or CDs that names what's in the pictures or explains anything at all. A sample, totally typical title is this one: 1990-07-a-full_tif.tif That's exactly like ALL the titles. No explanation where to go to get more info. If you own a copy of DK's 2005 truly beautiful "Universe: the Definitive Visiual Guide", which is HIGHLY educational and full of explanations, you can ID a fair number of the 86 images I thought worthy. Otherwise, you'd not have a single clue what you were looking at! There are a ton of boring images and small, grainy images, and beautiful fine images and ones so big that I STILL have not opened them for a view (one set of four range up to 240 MB or so). A real hodge-podge. Unbelievably uneven. If you are hard-core, like I sort of am, then this DVD is almost worth getting. But it's only value is to provide you with maybe 60-90 nice to very nice images in a format that you can use for display or printing or sharing or etc.? That's worth something, for sure. But really, who pieced together this mess?

Reviews

This telescope is my more like a toy. It's large but also very light and unstable. We tried for several hours to use it with bad to medium results. Mostly bad. The software is also old. This telescope would be fine for a child of five to maybe eight years old, but not for a serious user or someone who wanted to study the night sky. I guess considering the price, you get what you paid for, but I honestly believe, that due to it's construction it should have not been priced more than half what it's advertised for.

I bought this telescope for my 9 year old son and he loves it. I just have to remind him that it only works when there are no clouds above. It has been really cold here in Kansas so we were limited by the weather. We are looking forward to some clear nights so we can enjoy the stars, planets, and moon. It was very easy to assemble and we were able to start using it within 20 minutes. I'm sure we both will have alot of fun together. I would reccomend this telescope to any beginner as it is a good price and great product.

I purchased the telescope for my son. I do the setup and alignment of the telescope on targets and found it to be very easy to use. The 20mm and 6mm lenses give you great views. The Planetarium CD is also a nice addition. It was a worthwhile purchase and I recommend this telescope.

I have this tendency to look for a cheaper product when I'm not sure if I'll be interested in something, then purchasing a better one later on to fulfill my original thought. The FS-80 was just such a purchase. The FS-80 is easy to set up and use for the beginner looking to see the moon close up, or see Jupiter as more than a dot in the sky. My only complaint is the mount. The slightest touch of any part of the mount or scope, and it shakes so much you have to step back and wait for it to calm down. While this seems bad, you learn to compensate for it. I'll be moving on to a better scope when I have the money to do so, but I will pass this down to the kids.

This was a great gift idea for someone just starting out. The software was easy to follow along and the item came almost fully assembled, only had to attach tripod. So it made it all very easy.

Reviews

Poor product, fuzzy, blurry optics, Amazon had this item listed for $49 new but when other vendors advertize this item, the price goes up to $119. Don't waste your money, go to another brand, anything but this particular product.

Microscope is pretty cool, but it came with a piece and no instructions on how to use it. it's good for a starter microscope for kids.

I bought this for my daughter as a birthday gift. She absolutely loved it! It came with more than I thought it would. I give this item an A+++!

This Microscope was Xmas present for my son, 10. He was just happy to got it and did installation by himself. He completed every experiments from manual. :) Even make growing up small shrimps. That was interesting even for me. Better to see if you put a sun beam to reflect mirror or you can use installed lamp with batteries. For 10 years old boy - good choice

I wasn't holding much hope when I purchased this because of all of the other reviews I had read about childrens Microscopes and this one is no different! It works very very well on low magnification and we could look at a lot of things (including the brine shrimp we hatched that came with the kit), but at the 1200x power you can not see anything!! On the bright side, this one does seem more durable than others that I considered purchasing and it does have a case to store it in. However, if I had to do it over, I think I would have purchased either the EyeClops remote magnifier or one that was capable of viewing 3D objects.