|
 | 
 enlarge | Brand: Celestron
Category: Photography
List Price: $199.99
Buy New: $183.24
You Save: $16.75 (8%)
New (30)
Avg. Customer Rating:  95 reviews
Media: Electronics
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Optical Zoom: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 3.3
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 4 x 2.5
MPN: 93970
Model: 93970
UPC: 050234939706
EAN: 0050234939706
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
|
| Customer Reviews:
Sky Scout - finally a decent review October 30, 2006
33 out of 39 found this review helpful
Some of the "poor" reviews for this product remind me why I find reviews to be worth less than the time invested into their composition.
Some info for people pondering the purchase of the Sky Scout, and perhaps a little education for those "unsatisfied" users...
1. This product is way cool. I really like the quality of the product overall. It met my expectations. It features:
- coated optical windows for reduced reflection and glare
- solid construction (sturdy plastic with rubberized housing)
- large, easy to read red-backlit LCD screen
- large, easy to press buttons (membrane style - my favorite!)
- clear speech (use good headphones, not the chinsy included ear-buds)
- metal tripod threaded socket (many pocket digi cameras use plastic!)
- easy to use - for people of all ages!
2. Products containing computers and sensors tend to draw more current, therefore require better batteries! Li-Ion or NiMh rechargeable batteries would be a good idea. Use the correct battery types for the toys you purchase! Don't forget, colder weather means battery output will be reduced as the cells cool down. This is not a defect!
3. Cheap plastic battery compartment lids tend to have snaps which quite literally "snap" off. A slot-screw is a bit of a pain, but it's better than the alternative. I'll take the screw over the snap any day. A Canadian or American dime works well as a slot screwdriver if you're caught out in the field without tools.
4. Starry Night on a Laptop is too bulky, and too expensive for many people, simply to find out what a particular bright light in the sky is. The right tool for the job, I always say.
5. Don't expect devices, such as the Sky Scout, which contain sensitive electronics (sensors) to work in areas high in electromagnetic activity, such as near hydro transmission towers, across from radio transmission antennae, underground iron deposits, etc. Perhaps there should be a warning on the boxes, but at the same time, one needs to be aware that living in such areas may not be good for one's health.
6. For most people, a 2D GPS fix is more than enough, because most people don't care if they are 500ft above sea level, or 10ft below sea level. From what I understand, the Sky Scout requires a 3D fix, which takes more time, and requires more satellites to aquire. 3 satellites are required for simple tiangulation (2D), and 4 satellites are required to determine altitude as well (3D). More Northern and Southern locations have more satellites available at any one time, and often there are at least 5 satellites available. Line-of-sight is required, so hills and buildings will affect satellite aquisition.
7. Celestron really "cares". Their competitors are a lot more difficult to deal with. Celestron has never made me wait more than 10 minutes on hold before offering me the chance to leave a voicemail. Celestron has excellent tech support, and I'm talking from 13 years experience with Celestron. Do understand, they are very busy right now, and offer them the courtesey they deserve. Their primiary business is robotic telescopes, and secondary business is sporting optics.
Don't be put off by the poor reviews for this product. And people, stop writing poor reviews without putting some serious time and effort into them!
I am not affiliated with Celestron at all, but I do put a lot of time and effort into understanding the products I sell.
 I LOVE IT... August 19, 2006
32 out of 33 found this review helpful
Well worth the wait, this Skyscout delivers. It does exactly as advertised. I live in New York City, not exactly the astronomy capital of the world. So I was a bit hesitant to order because of the limited visibility here in the city. I ordered mine from Amazon on June 11 and was tired of waiting for my order to be fulfilled. So I ordered when I noticed the Discovery Store had it in stock. I had to pay more in shipping and tax but I HAVE IT IN HAND!!!
The Skyscout comes with
one skyscout, a padded case, earphones, wrist strap, usb cable, quick start guide, and instructional CD-ROM
Setup is a snap. Just insert two fresh double A's in the protective shields inside the battery compartment. Tighten the screw and hold the power button until you get the startup screen which reads SKYSCOUT.
After that the GPS kicks in to locate exactly where you are. That takes about a minute or so. You then press continue and your ready to go. You can choose from: Identify, Locate, GPS, Field Guide, and Settings. Tonight I went to Cunningham Park, stood in the middle, and started the show.
Under the option Locate, you search for planets, stars, deep space objects, and it also gives you the option to choose tonights highlights. This narrows space down to what you can see that night. Brightest stars, planets, constellations, whatever you are in the mood for.
I started out looking at Jupiter. I pressed the identify button and it tells you to search for a star and press the target button.
I pointed to the biggest and brightest star and the Skyscout identified it was Jupiter. It then gives you the option of getting information in text form, or by audio narrative. The Skyscout contains audio narration for over 200 hundred celestial objects. I am sure Celestron will add more to that number with updates. It is a great feature that brings your star gazing to life.
The skyscout is great, but as with any new technology it has its bugs.
My skyscout on a number of occasions just shut off. I would have to power it back on and wait for the GPS to relocate my point of origin. It happened about five or six times, today and yesterday. I have no idea why it happens. I was in the middle of the park so I do not believe there was any magnetic interference. It was fustrating and disappointing, I got over it. I love this thing.
One thing I felt could be improved was the viewfinder. I live in the light polluted city so I feel that if it had a wider field of vision it would be much easier to locate what you want to see. You need dark skies and I understand that, but if it had a wider field of vision I would be able to see the stars much easier. There are two red led rings within the viewfinder that provide directional arrows to find an object. But maybe if those rings were shutoff while you are looking through the veiwfinder it would be easier to see the stars as well. Just my opinion. It is a zero magnification viewfinder so you do not have to hold it up to your eye.
The skyscout is worth every penny. It gets five stars for doing what it is supposed to do. If you have children you will have hours of fun with them. If your an adult and love star gazing, grab the wife as I did and have some fun. You will not be disappointed. Unless of course yours shuts off for no reason too.
 Outstanding new device, but needs some improvement September 10, 2006
28 out of 32 found this review helpful
Lots of reviews so far on how great this device is, and I agree with all the accolades. However, my unit gobbles up batteries like crazy. I went through 3 sets of batteries in 3 or 4 hours. Changing the batteries should be a LOT easier. You have to unscrew a battery cover instead of having a latch. The batteries are hard to pull out with the springs pushing the battery and no place to grasp the battery to remove it. You have to put shields over the batteries to reduce magnetic interference. So changing batteries in the dark in a field location is somewhat of a hassle.
The device powers down in 5 minutes to conserve power. Instead of "sleeping" and remembering the satellite locations, it starts all over again and took 4 or 5 minutes to acquire the satellites in an open field. That delay takes away a lot of the fun. I can see why it could take time to acquire the first time. But if you don't move, it would be nice if the SkyScout started with the last observed satellites and did the acquisition in seconds instead of minutes...further reducing the devices useful time due to the high battery drain.
All that said, it is, indeed, a wonderful device. I mounted a green laser pointer on the top and use it to point out stars and plugged in a powered speaker so others can hear the voice descriptions.
Related to the SkyScout is the support available from Celestron via the internet:
The little program that comes with the SkyScout works well for downloading firmware updates. However it only works running under a Windows OS. The Celestron support area for the SkyScout, in general, is poor. I hope this is due to the "newness" of the device. When I accessed the top level SkyScout page it says the latest firmware release is 1.20.29 but the release notes were only current to 1.20.23. The downloads area doesn't identify which version of firmware of Windows SkyScout utility you are downloading and has multiple entries that look the same but are different versions.
The support knowledge base has no entries in it for the SkyScout. When you submit a ticket to point out problems, you are guided through a list of irrelevant topics before being allowed to submit your trouble ticket.
(I'm an Intel Mac user and was a little disappointed that I have to use Windows XP to do the firmware downloads. It would have been nice if the firmware update process wasn't made Windows specific. I tried to do the firmware upgrade with a virtual machine running Windows XP, Parallels, but the Parallels USB support isn't robust enough for this device. Maybe sometime soon, I'll be able to use Parallels for the SkyScout and other Windows centric devices and ditch my PC which is now only used for USB downloads for devices like this.)
I finally returned my first SkyScout to Celestron. It was consuming batteries way too fast. The replacement unit arrived about 10 days after I sent the original unit back to Celestron. I did a quick GPS test on the back deck and it did acquire the GPS signal much faster.
It has been a couple of months since a firmware upgrade. I do hope the GPS acquisition process gets improved in future firmware. My Garmin GPS units "remember" the last satellite pattern and start acquisition with that pattern, making the process much shorter if I'm still in the same area of the glove. Of course, if I move, the Garmin has to start all over again. It appears the SkyScout starts with no knowledge of the last position so it takes much longer to do any acquisition.
I was happy with the speed that Celestron answered my appeal for help on their web based system to get tech support. I was provided some ideas to try and the process to get an RMA within 2 days of posting the request. I mailed the original SkyScout back to Celestron using priority mail so they got it in 2 days. The return back to me was via UPS so it took 8 days. I live on the east coast. They shipped a completely new unit.
Beautifully Engineered August 16, 2006
27 out of 30 found this review helpful
This thing does just what it says it does, and well. You point it at something and it tells you what it is. You ask it to locate something in the night sky and it leads you there with a ring of friendly flashing arrows. It's light enough to hold at arm's length for minutes on end, the eye relief is generous, the controls are easy to master, and the battery life looks good.
The flaws I've found so far are minor. It can't see GPS satellites well through clouds, which limits its use as just a GPS device. (Obviously, the designers had starry nights principally in mind, and may have saved some weight or power consumption by sacrificing some sensitivity.) On the other hand, it complains too easily about magnetic distractions, though that has yet to compromise its usefulness, best I can tell. And the guide arrows are kinda dim for daylight use. But what the heck -- overall the design is superb.
I'm taking it to Hawaii next week for a real workout. Airport security can keep my Dom Perignon, but I'm not parting with my SkyScout for anything.
Very Cool November 29, 2006
24 out of 24 found this review helpful
I just got a Sky Scout from Woodland Hills Camera and Telescope last night. Since they are backordered until Spring all over the country, I'm feeling pretty lucky. I brought it home and installed the batteries into their special metal shields and took it outside to try it out. I was in the middle of our apartment complex in Los Angeles with 3 story buildings surrounding me and it managed to find GPS lock in under 2 minutes.
This thing is seriously cool. The operation is very easy and I was identifying objects very quickly. I asked it to locate the moon and it took me right to it! Wow, that is cool. The audio narrations are few but very informative.
Now like people have been complaining it does have some issues:
It goes through batteries like water ( 4 power on's and they were half dead.)
The GPS is slow/under powered ( GPS lock can take up to 2 minutes, and does not store your location on power down)
It does not like to be near metal objects (Cars, Fences, Gates, Beams...etc)
Limited audio narrations
Its made of plastic
Cheap earbuds
Red lights inside the scope make it tough to spot dim stars.
No Mac support
Despite all this, I really love this thing. It works like it says it does, and it's easy to use.
If you can find one, I recommend checking it out.
|
|
|
2005-2007 Zone1electronics All rights reserved.
| |
