Celestron 22403 Inspire 100AZ Refractor Smartphone Adapter Built-In Refracting Telescope - Blue

Product Information

For the most part you can add your smartphone with its case on, but if you have an extra large case you may need to take it off for it to fit the adapter. Additional Accessories For this process to work, it’s important that your camera’s lens is aligned centrally with the eyepiece and the adjustable elastic straps on the dust cap make doing that easy.Next, the dust cap is placed over the eyepiece and held in position with two thumbscrews.

This is generally what makes it a good beginner telescope. It will introduce any prospective astronomer to the different aspects of astronomy and won’t get too bogged down in any complicated details which can overwhelm new people.While other astronomy apps may claim that they can help you find objects, they rely exclusively on the phone’s gyros and accelerometers, which aren’t as accurate as LISA technology. No other app can accurately tell you when your target is visible in the eyepiece. Although your smartphone camera already has a lens and therefore can’t be used at prime focus, light collected by the telescope can be projected into your phone’s camera by an eyepiece in a process known as afocal photography. With your fingernail on either side of the battery, pry the battery up and out of the battery compartment. The Inspire 100AZ includes two standard, interchangeable 1.25” eyepieces: a 20mm Kellner providing 33x magnification and a 10mm Kellner providing 66x magnification. These are all-plastic in construction (the lenses are, thankfully, glass) and will work well. You’ll probably want additional eyepieces to get the most out of this telescope, however—both at the low power end for wide-field vistas of deep-sky objects and at the high power end for viewing the Moon and planets. Although this telescope and its non-motorised mount are not designed with astrophotography in mind, the Inspire 100AZ’s dust cap has a novel feature – you can strap a smartphone to it and then attach the pairing to one of the two eyepieces that come with the scope.

Terrestrially, the telescope doubles up to be used as a Spotting Scope which will enable you to use it to enjoy when Bird-Watching, Hiking, or simple land-observations. Just use the provided Star Diagonal and you can easily erect your images. The Inspire 100AZ comes with a 10mm Kellner eyepiece providing 66x, but it can handle a fair bit more magnification than that—up to about 200x. As such, we might recommend a 6mm “gold-line” for 110x, which is probably all you really need for the Moon, planets, and double stars. A little more power (165x) can be achieved with a 4mm Aspheric or 4mm planetary eyepiece. You could also use a 2x Barlow with the 10mm for 132x or with the 6mm for 220x, which is usable, albeit a bit above what one should really be using with this telescope due to its aperture and optical quality.As for the 100AZ’s dimensions and size, the Inspire 100AZ is small and quite lightweight. These specs are 96.5 x 83.8 x 132.1 cm by 6.1kg without the tripod and 9.07kg with it, meaning it’s not the lightest system out there but, it’ll still be a fairly easy system to move around. Accessories Included In The Box?

Being a larger achromat with a relatively fast focal ratio (by refractor standards, anything below f/10 is considered fast), the Inspire 100AZ does suffer from some chromatic aberration, or “false colour”, which manifests itself as an obnoxious purple halo around bright targets such as the Moon, Jupiter, Venus, and many double stars. Some people will spend thousands of dollars on an ED triplet apochromatic refractor to get basically the same views as the Inspire 100AZ without the colour; you can simply choose to ignore it. Though it does prevent one from getting the sharpest images possible of the Moon and planets, for 99% of viewing, the Inspire 100AZ’s optics do just fine. You really need not worry. It’s then a simple matter of pointing the Inspire 100AZ at a Solar System object (including the Sun if a suitable front-mounted solar filter is used), adjusting the focus and capturing a short video for processing in AutoStakkert! or RegiStax. Celestron Inspire 100AZ refractor. Credit: BBC Sky at Night Magazine Celestron Inspire 100AZ best features StarPointer Pro Red Dot Finder Turn on “Save Images & Logs” from the Menu as described above. After you use StarSense Explorer at night, there will be images and log files stored on your phone. Accessing them requires connecting your smartphone to a computer. To retrieve the files: Lastly, and most controversially, is the lens cap/smartphone adapter. Celestron’s design here is straight up bizarre. By removing a small plug from the cap and removing the eyecup from your desired eyepiece, then camping the assembly together with a small plastic screw, you can slide your smartphone between the elastic straps on the lens cap and use it as a crude smartphone “digiscoping” adapter. However, this has a few caveats. For one, it won’t fit any aftermarket eyepieces that don’t have a flush barrel and removable eyecup. Secondly, it obstructs a portion of your smartphone’s screen, which can make setting your phone camera’s focus and other features somewhat difficult. Last but not least, you are entrusting your smartphone’s safety to some cheap elastic straps and a singular nylon thumb screw. So keep that in mind.

The relative size and weight of all the components affect its overall portability. The mount will of course add to this. If a telescope has a shorter Focal Length it is typically more portable, but will require better quality eyepieces to ensure great views. Pros and Cons of a Refractor: As for the Inspire 100AZ’s specs, it has an aperture of 100mm, a focal length of 660mm resulting in a focal ratio of f/6.6. What this means is that the device will be pretty balanced in the sense the images won’t be too wide or two narrow due to the focal ratio and in turn will be able to provide a roughly a 200x magnification when used at its highest magnification. For most people, this will be more than adequate. You will not run into the problem of running out of things to look at. If you get bored of the solar system, take a look at deep space. If deep space is too vague for your liking, take a look at the planets. Just because the images of each individual thing aren’t as sharp as its more focused competition doesn’t mean the views aren’t great. Because they are great, for the most part. Smooth Viewing A 40mm Plossl and 32mm Plossl provide the same field of view due to the limitations of the 1.25” barrel size, and the higher magnification of the 32mm means a bit more contrast under light-polluted skies with the Inspire 100AZ due to the smaller exit pupil. Almost any 32mm will do, and most of the cheaper ones are very similar, but we particularly like the 32mm Plossl from SVBONY– which is literally the same as the one Celestron sells at a significantly marked-up price. An ultra-stable altazimuth mount provides a sturdy foundation for StarSense Explorer DX. Slip clutches and geared slow motion controls in both axes help you move the telescope smoothly and zero in your target. As celestial objects appear to drift across the night sky, you’ll be able to follow them with just a few turns of the knobs. It’s all anchored by an adjustable, full-height tripod.