Originally Posted by dazastar

OK this might be a consideration, Maks have alot less obstruction from the secondarey mirror than small schmids. It is not surprising to see a 6" Mak beat the pants of a 8" schmid. Ive demo'd my Mak at many star gatherings and have had the same comment time and time again that the Maks vere clearer and more vibrant than the other schmids in the same class.

I also have solved the portabilty issue one way. I got one of those ioptron cube's, then I obtained a skywatcher mak 102 and used the cube to replace the eq2. What I ended up with was a fully goto gps Mak system (80,000 object database too) that is fully portable and cost a total of around $800.00. After flashing to the latest fimware, found it to be the scope I now use the most. I have very little problems locating dso's and planetary use is superb.

Hope this helps.