I bought the scope as a bit of an upgrade; a couple more inches of mirror and the dual-speed focuser were the main selling points. The first scope arrived with a manufacturing fault/transport damage. The Guys at FLO where very responsive and very quick to get a replacement unit organised i was very happy with the speedy service. The skies have finally cleared enough to take it out for a quick test and i was very happy. The dual-speed focuser makes a huge difference, and I was very impressed with the difference and improvement over my 130mm scope. I got a really pleasing image of Jupiter as well as some deep-space objects. I am more into astronomy and only take the odd picture occasionally, and this scope provides a great balance between observation and photography. I swapped out the provided finder scope for my 9X50 right-angled scope for ergonomic reasons and fitted the included finder to my 130mm scope and its a great addition in the box. The included 32mm 2" eyepiece gives a nice wide angle view too. All in all very happy with the hardware and the service.

This arrived on Christmas day from Santa, first class service from FLO as usual, due to the weather I have not used it yet but it arrived well packaged and in one piece. Will update once I have used it.

Chose this as my first telescope, after some research, for both visual and photography with my DSLR. Some patience was required waiting for the order, but it all arrived. I was lucky enough to have clear skies the first weekend after delivery. Worked well out of the box, great views and encouraging photographs (with a coma corrector) from my first night with it

All good

Not too much to do once it's out of the box. Just pop the accessories on, a bit of adjustment on the mirrors and ready to go. I didn't have long between setting up and the clouds getting in the way so went for a 24mm EP and did a bit of star hopping round Leo and the Plough.
Excellent clear views, the dual speed focuser really helps when getting those stars nice and sharp.
The difference in the amount of objects on view is definitely noticeable after moving up from a 90mm refractor. Can't wait for more clear skies!

Although the Covid Pandemic slowed down production and delivery of this scope, the delivery from FLO was flawless.
Upon opening the box I was surprised at the lack of packing from Skywatcher seeing as this is a scientific instrument.
Nothing was damaged though to everything is good.
I was lucky enough to have clear skies on the night of delivery despite the warning sticker on the box from FLO that it may contain clouds.
The box contains the scope, a small 6x30 finderscope, a 2" 28mm eyepiece, a 2" to 1.25" adaptor and several tools.
I thought I would need to upgrade the collimation screws but these are now thumbscrews so no need for tools to adjust.
The 2" dual speed Crayford focuser holds my eyepieces or cameras solidly and the focus knob is nice and solid. Once focused micro adjustments can be made for cameras or an eyepiece easily with gloves on.
I quickly set up and took advantage of Mars in the South. Fantastic views through a 17mm eyepiece and 3 x barlow. This is the first time I've ever seen the dust lanes on Mars through a telescope.
I would have taken advantage of Jupiter and Saturn but unfortunately from my garden I cannot see anything past South due to houses in the way.
Lovely, sharp optics in a lightweight scope despite its aperture. Goes easily on my AVX mount with guidescope and cameras.
One thing I will say though is to check everything before you mount it. I did notice that the scope rings attaching it to the dovetail saddle were at an angle and not square. Almost as if this part of assembly was rushed and not checked properly. However. A 10mm socket loosens the rings up enough to set them square again.
All in all very pleased with it and can't wait to start imaging.
Well worth the money.

I wanted a wide field scope to complement my 127 mak. I agonised for ages between this and the 130. I finally
bought the 150 and I'm really glad I did. It sits great on the skytee alongside the mak. I use it for purely visual and went for the PDS over the normal 150P for the bundle 2 inch 28mm eyepiece and thr dual speed focuser.

Great scope (I owned back in 2011)! I shall be using it for AP this time though, already used it with a DSLR straight into the focuser without a problem.
Hope to get a a Coma Corrector in the future but pleased with the results so far.
Well packaged and delivered on time from FLO, highly recommended.

After fitting this onto an EQ mount, it was immediate in delivering startling views.

Even at 6" aperture, this is plenty for most targets you can reasonably expect to find in a light polluted town. It is light enough and easily portable for one person to move simply without complication.

It was supplied with a 32mm 2" wide angle eyepiece which is a nice eyepiece to use for alignment. The moon is an amazing view with plenty of resolution to discern the craters and flat lands. Saturn is a great view with a 20mm, and even better with a 10mm. The best I had was with a 4mm eyepiece. I also tried Saturn using a 2x barlow and a 4mm eyepiece, which exceeds the recommended magnification, but was still good to see.

Jupiter is a beast in this telescope. A bit too much of a beast. 6" aperture blows the detail of Jupiter out completely, so I would recommend investing in some colour filters or a neutral density filter (like a moon filter) for bright extended targets like Jupiter.

The full moon definitely needs a moon filter. At this aperture, it was painful to look at without a moon filter.

The dual speed focus is a good touch, however, on mine it is a bit grounchy at certain parts and isn't smooth. But, I haven't noticed it impeding the fine control knob on the focus control and using a mask it is easy to achieve critical focus.

The main area for this telescope is for use in astro-photography. One of the casings for the eyepiece barrel already has a thread on the outside of it which goes into your t-ring, put it back into the barrel, balance and off you go. It's a pleasure to use and cools down quickly. I'm yet to collimate it but I haven't noticed poor performance and I've had it for about 5 months now.

For the price, you can't really go wrong. It's a great general use newt, for visual and photography use. I'm very happy with mine and I won't be changing it or selling it, or at least not for several years. I've rated it 4 stars purely for the graunchy focus rack, but as I said, it doesn't really impede the performance of the focus rack.

Unlike the previous reviewer,my focuser is silky smooth. I've also had the 200PDS and the 250PDS and they've both been excellent, so I can only presume the other reviewer had a duff example.

Anyway, like all Skywatcher newts, this represents great value. The mirrors are of good quality, and it's easy to collimate. I love the focuser, it's positive and snappy. Put one of these on an AZ4 and you'll have a superb grab and go setup.

They're not too heavy either, so they become a capable astrograph with a coma corrector on an HEQ5 or bigger.

Being a mass produced product, I don't expect world beating quality, but with a bit of tweaking (collimating the focuser, ensuring the centre spot on the mirror is actually centred) it can punch well above its weight.

I bought this telescope as my first imaging telescope for use with an ATIK 383L+ Monochrome CCD camera. Throughout the process of learning, I have been able to produce some amazing Deep Space images. The FOV provided by this telescope is perfect for Deep Space imaging as it can image large and small objects alike (subject to your CCD camera, of course!).

The size and weight of the telescope makes it very, very portable and easy to handle for good tracking performance. Collimation is easy to perform with a Cheshire Collimating eyepiece and together with Skywatcher's Coma Corrector, it produces perfect coma-free images across the ATIK 383L+'s large CCD sensor. All this with a fast f/5 focal ratio for fast imaging.

The telescope does have a few downsides though. The focuser is a bit rough and can have trouble to be pulled out when there's a decent amount of weight on it. Most annoying is the fact that locking the focus shifts the focus point, so there is no point in locking it. The only reason I was happy with this telescope was because I used a custom MoonLite focuser on it rather than Skywatcher's. A frustration there was Skywatcher using a custom screw hole pattern on the focuser opening so I had to drill new screw holes on to the telescope to be able to fit MoonLite's Universal Mounting Plate. Additionally, using Hutech IDAS LPS 2" filter in my imaging optical train produces some internal reflections. Hutech advise this can be the case with the filter but state that if your telescope optics are high-quality multi-coated, this should not happen.