Dear friends,

Now i have finally able to focus on two telescopes. 1. Orion Apex 127mm Maksutov Cassegrain Telescope. 2. Orion 120mm f/5.0 Refractor Telescope.

Please advise me which one of them is a better telescope?

I am looking for a compact and easy to carry around telescope which is suited both for astronomical and terrestrial use.

With warm regards,
Prabhu

I'm lost by this choice. They are so different each has it's purpose but they really don't over lap at all! Neither is a general purpose scope. The Mak is a narrow field high power scope best suited for planets and small bright deep sky objects like planetary nebula. The other a low power wide field scope best suited for viewing the large emission nebula and star fields of the Milky Way using wide field low power eyepieces. For that you need good dark skies. It is just an achromat which at f/5 is unsuited to high power work due to severe color problems. For that at this focal ratio you need at least an ED refractor.

Orion says of the refractor:
Perfect for deep-sky pursuits and excellent for astrophotography
I'd argue the astrophotography point as true only if you use color filters to isolate its severe color problems. But at least they limit it to deep sky which is correct. It's use otherwise is severely limited.

Of the Mak they say:
Bright views of star clusters and nebulas and stunning lunar and planetary detail

I have more quibbles here as the FOV of this type of Mak with its small secondary is capable of fully illuminating a small FOV compared to the refractor. So the nebula and star clusters are limited to much smaller ones than the refractor. While globulars would mostly fit don't expect much resolution except the edges of a few brighter ones. You need 6" or more for that something neither provides.

Note the 25mm eyepiece the Mak comes with offers about the widest FOV it is capable of delivering yet is running at 61 power and about a .8 degree field of view. The same eyepiece in the refractor would give 24x and a 2 degree FOV covering 6 times the area of sky! Hardly similar scopes.

So if you view from light polluted skies and plan on viewing planets and other small in angular size but bright objects the Mak is a good choice. It is heavy and not all that portable. For a quick grab and go deep sky scope for dark skies then pick the refractor. If you want both deep sky and planetary there are better choices.

This is why I constantly harp on attending a few star parties before buying a scope so you know what each type of scope can and can't do. All are a compromise but which compromises you can live with and which you can't only you can decide and then only if you've used the scopes enough to know what these are.

The vast majority of our club members who bought a scope before attending star parties bought the wrong one for them and soon were spending even more money to get one better suited to their interests.

Rick

If those were the only choices, and given the desire for portability and use in the daytime, I'd probably go with the short refractor.

I don't like using scopes with central obstructions in the daylight, I find it a little distracting. Maybe that is just me.

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