Newby Questions and Problems

[WaikoloaNewby]

I was given an 8" LX90 (AutoStar, GPS, ACF) for Christmas. Yippee!  Unfortunately, I know little about astronomy (other than what I learned in Physics in college and watching Cosmos on TV [dating myself a bit there]).  Any reccomendations on where to start or what to read?

Luckily for me I live in Waikoloa Village on the Big Island of Hawaii which is at almost 1000 ft elevation below Mauna Kea (I can see the observatories from my neighborhood).  We get some incredibly clear skies here...which is why I was given the scope.  The stars are amazing with the naked eye and I'd love to know what I'm looking at and see the planets up close.

I've been through the manual half a dozen times and have used it during the day (aligning the smartfinder and spotter scopes with the main scope).

Now for the bad news.  I have yet to successfully complete the auto alignment exercise.  First, the scope won't get a GPS fix...I've waited as long as 20 minutes and nothing happened. 

When I enter the data manually (zip, date and time) and try to do the two star alighnment I also fail  Despite a sky full of bright stars, there are never any in the viewfinder to pick during the alignment exercise.  I've trained the drive and tried skipping to the next (and next, and next) stars, but it never seems to be pointing at anything "brighter" than normal.  Sometimes, it manages to find a part of the sky with no stars (and that's hard to do around here).

Since I'm a newby and don't really know what I'm doing, perhaps I'm doing something (or many things) wrong?  I called Meade about the GPS problem and they said to send it back for repair.  That's going to be horribly expensive, so before I do that, I thought I'd check with this group for some advice.

So...what do all you experts and enthusiast suggest?

Thanks in advance,

WaikoloaNewby

[donald]

HI  i used to own an LX90 with no GPS and i found out that there two ways to align one is by pointing magnetic north and the other(more accurate)is to point it to polaris(last star of the little dippers tail.if you are still under warranty you should ask MEADE to send you a shipping slip so that you won't have to pay shipping.the scope is new and should be working properly(not your fault).i just went through this with an ETXLS.cloudy nights classifieds is a great site to find info.i've just purchased an 8"LX90 so we'll see what happens.i spoke to two techs at meade david @ext 6289,and mark@ext 5131.great guys to get help from.   good luck Don

[donald]

one more thing,if you recieved this scope for christmass then i take it that you are past the return date.if not,i would say return it for a replacement.meade will probably want you to purchase the extra warranty.i believe the extra warranty covers free shipping and a new replacement after 3 returns.check it out cause usualy no one tells you unless you ask.treat these guys nicely cause they are there for you and they will usualy go out of their way for you.remember,"you get more with honey than you do with vinegar". i wish you well and don't worry other people in the forum will most likely be writing you.  Don

[donald]

how are you doing?i was looking in the book in the utilities menu,at the gps i put it to go on at startup cause i usualy have the scope plugged in.the- as needed -i believe is to save the batterys.just a thought.    Don

[donald]

HI,Don again,i was wondering how your doing with the GPS problems.i set my LX90 up last night.i set level&north with the level compass but when it was supposed to go to alignment stars,i really didn't see any that stood out.so i'd appreciate hearing from you soon.   Don