Why is Magnification not Important when Selecting a Telescope?
Magnification isn’t the most important thing that a telescope does. In fact, you might be surprised to discover that experienced amateurs don’t consider magnification very much when they shop for a new telescope. There are two reasons for this: • The magnification is changeable. All telescopes use removable, interchangeable eyepieces. By removing one eyepiece and inserting another, I can get any magnification I want. I can use a low magnification eyepiece for star clusters like the Pleiades, or a high magnification eyepiece in order to view subtle details on the planets or the Moon. So you can get just about any magnfication you want on any telescope. Whether or not high magnfication is usable on a given telescope is another story. • The most important determining factor for a scope’s resolving power is its aperture, or the diameter of its main optical element (called the primary). Depending on the type of telescope, this is either a lens or a mirror. The larger a telescope’s aperture,
