Review on 🔭 Explore the Night Sky with the Zhumell Z100 Portable Altazimuth Reflector Telescope by Rey High

. For the record, I'm a total novice. I did a lot of research before getting one of these. When I stumbled across r/dontbuyapowerseeker I was very confused when I got it. From what I've learned through research, Dobsonians are the way to go. It's the best value for money and this particular model doesn't deviate from that. When I bought it, I also bought a Celestron FirstScope. I decided to test both to see what works best for me. Both are fantastic telescopes for beginners. However, FirstScope was missing some areas that this one did, so I chose that instead. I believe the price difference is worth the added benefits. So with that said, let's get down to business. What's good: Lens: The package includes two wide-angle lenses: 10mm and 17mm. Both are perfect for viewing and ideal for children as they are wide enough to allow plenty of room to look around. All images, except the Flame Nebula, were taken with these lenses. Portability: The visor itself is detachable from the clinking mount it's mounted on. This is particularly useful when transporting the telescope, as the mount is bulky and won't fit anyway. Haven't found a case for this specific area yet so I made my own out of an old case, but that's not strictly a necessity. You can take it with you wherever you go. Red Dot Detail: Probably one of Dobson's most underrated tools, especially when he's so small, is the red dot finder. You will find it very difficult to use a finder scope with a chunky Dobsonian shape, so having a simple red dot scope to tilt the scope at a specific spot is very nice. Just remember to turn it off when you're done so you don't drain your battery. It's really like a GPS telescope that makes it easy to find objects with the red dot. Visibility: This is based solely on what comes out of the box. Viewing power is better than first glance simply because it's larger and wider, but the scopes provided don't offer great magnification for close-ups of planets or deeper space objects. I would recommend getting a good Barlow lens with this and something smaller in mm. 6mm or 4mm will increase your magnification significantly, and given the width of the scope, it doesn't sacrifice brightness too much. The photo of the nebula was taken with a 6mm lens. Materials: This is a practice scope and everything feels solid but too clean. It is very easy to leave fingerprints on it and cleaning the inside is a tedious process but necessary for good vision. You should know that this is true of almost any telescope, but if like me you have OCD and hate getting fingerprints on it, you need to constantly clean the outside. Collimation: So with most telescopes you have to survive the collimation process. Basically, it's all about aligning your telescope so that you can see objects more clearly than a focuser can offer. This telescope doesn't allow you to do that. This is fixed collimation. While it's almost perfect out of the box, I'm not sure how it will hold up over time. The reason this can be bad is that it is important for a beginner telescope to learn all the mechanics of basic viewing and collimation, which is very important to learn. Platform: This is the standard for almost all desktop Dobsonians. They are very inconvenient to use. You will have a hard time finding a vantage point as there is no tripod. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO BUILD A TRIPOD. There are reasons Dobsonians are stable and really easy to see. You have to find that yourself. I usually put it on the back of my car and it works great. In cases where you only have land. It gets a little more difficult. Large Dobsonians are usually the same height as you when standing, so this is not a problem for them. Why it's better than the FirstScope: For an additional $40, you get a better red dot finder, a better lens, and an overall better view. , stronger base and stronger materials. The FirstScope is made of thick plastic while it is thin sheet metal. The First Scope comes with 20mm and 4mm plastic lenses and 17mm and 10mm metal lenses (also wide angle). THEY ARE BOTH GREAT BEGINNER TELESCOPES. To be honest if I had more money I would buy FirstScope because I still have a great viewing experience. It is very difficult to find good telescopes with this viewing capability for less than $100. These 70x400 telescopes for sale cannot get the images they produce. And for a beginner telescope, why even try the equatorial mount that Celestron performance seekers advertise? They're both excellent telescopes, but the z100 costs $40 more than the FirstScope in my opinion. Conclusion: It is very difficult to find telescopes that are not plastic waste. To be fair, if you found this telescope at all, consider yourself lucky. Many people have fallen into the 70x400 hobby or the PowerSeeker and never see the true beauty of astronomy. It's a pretty obvious choice in my opinion that it's the best bang for your buck. Great for kids, great for beginners, great for college students who need something small for their dorm, great for everyone. This is one of the best viewing experiences I've seen with a sub-$100 telescope. And if you can shell out money for Z114 or Z130. do that. Zhumell has done a fantastic job with this line of scopes and I don't see a better product on the market at this price point.