Celestron Table Top 76 Telescope

by Celestron

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 9 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B000051TIV
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #60,459 in Camera & Photo (See Top 100 in Camera & Photo)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: September 4, 1973

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Celestron made the Table Top 76 telescope small but powerful. Its compact tube is extremely portable, making it ideal for traveling or those with limited storage space. It sets up easily and quickly, so you can start observing the rings of Saturn, the moons of Jupiter, or the lunar surface in no time.

Product Description

With the 76mm Celestron 31034 portable telescope you can now bring the stars to you....from your very own pocket. This compact telescope is small but powerful -- study lunar details, Saturn and its rings, Jupiter and its belts and moons, and hundreds of deep-sky object including galaxies, nebulae and star clusters.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not the best choice, February 10, 2001

By 

Michael J Edelman (Huntington Woods, MI USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Celestron Table Top 76 Telescope (Electronics)

When Tasco bought Celestron a while ago, there were two immediate results. One was that Tasco brought a large cash influx to Celestron that finaiced the development and production of a number of excellent new scopes, like the Nexstar series. The other was the relabeling of a number of Tasco scopes as Celestrons- including the unit under review.

This scope is a 3" short focus Newtonian scope on a flimsy tabletop tripod. It's an attractive looking little package, but as an astronomical telescope it lacks both a stable mount and sharp, contrasty optics. The various 60mm refractors sold by Celestron and Meade for a similar price are a better choice for the beginner on a budget.

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Avoid this scope, June 1, 2001

By 

Michael J. Wood "Flight Surgeon" (Kaneohe, HI) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Celestron Table Top 76 Telescope (Electronics)

As much as I hate to say it, avoid this telescope. I bought it expecting very little, and was still disappointed. In it's defense, it is a small, very portable scope. Also, if it broke, I wouldn't be heart-broken. Also, it isn't too bad for showing kids about different types of telescopes. It also isn't too bad to look at the moon with, but I recommend buying a moon filter. And, you can see the rings of saturn in the scope, which quite honestly is almost worth the $99 price tag, despite all the flaws. And this scope has a lot of flaws. Just looking at the box, I know I'm going to be disappointed. Lots of cool pictures of planets and galaxies that I know will never be seen in this scope. Set up was quite easy, but without even looking through it I notice that the cheap high power eyepiece might as well be thrown away. The low power eyepiece is fairly good, however. The single arm mount was a neat idea, but unfortunately the thing vibrates like a tuning fork anytime you touch it. Looking through the scope, the optics need some adjustment to correct flaws, and this is a routine matter with reflector scopes, but there is no way to correct this scope easily, and no instructions on how to do so. Buying a better medium power eyepiece and moon filter helped considerably into making this a usable instrument, but then the final flaw really kicks in...unless you're really, really short, be prepared for significant back strain. You have to either get on all hand and knees, or carefully lean over whatever table you put this on to see through it; if you touch the scope or the table, forget about looking through it due to excessive motion (like most scopes, but this one has a "table top" mount).

Overall, not a great scope. There are certainly worse ones out there (some for sale here at Amazon, so I would give this a 1.5 star rating if possible, but...), but for under $300 I would recommend going for an 80mm refractor with a good mount. I also have the 70mm Celestron firstscope EQ, and to be honest, despite more effort to set that scope up, use it a whole lot more!

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great scope for its size, January 5, 2007

By 

Daniel Slowik - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Celestron Table Top 76 Telescope (Electronics)

I think most folks who don't like it are new to scopes.

Here's the flat truth. For a 3" scope it's really very good. Celestrons optics are by far the best I have looked through. They don't play the "Gotcha game" like Meade either. You get a 20mm and 4mm eyepiece. PERFECT. Why? 600/20=30x. 600/4mm=150x.
They give you a 2x barlow which you use with the 20mm to get 60X (600/20=30x) (30x2=60x)

Since reality in optics will tell you you can only get 50x per inch of aperature. The usable magnification for any 3" scope is 50x3=150. Here is your scale.

0...........30.............60...................150.

NICELY EVEN SPACED OUT FOR FULL RANGE OF MAGNIFICATIONS.

It does have the older .96 eyepieces but don't let that fool you. I get really good
images with this for a three inch scope. NO! you are not going to see details on mars or a spiral image of galaxies with ANY 3" scope. ANY 3" SCOPE!

But if you try many 3" scopes. You will come back to this one. It's very smooth and easy to track with. You'll get used to it in 5 min. It's pretty easy to adjust as well. The spotter could be better, But spot something in th house in the scope dead center in the 20mm eyepiece. Tighten the tripod right there. Then adjust the spotter cross hatches on that image you have centered in the eyepiece. Once you get that. Do not mess with the spotter. It get get knocked off alignment if you bump it good. Now spot a star with it. The 20mm will be dead on. The key! "Do not touch your spotter. Don't grab it. Don't hit it. And it will be great. You should not anyway. Common sense.

To align the mirrors are all done from the screws on the front spyder. Very easy once you get the hang of it. Yes. Front not bottom mirror.

Now. If this was mead's scope they would give you a 40mm and a 4mm eyepice. Why?
it would give you. 15x , 30x and 150x They know you will be begging for the eyepiece to get that missing 60-70x magnification. So give us MORE MONEY and meade will be glad to sell it to you. Meade loves those games and Meade has very poor tripods. My lx 80 is collecting dust and I use this celestron far more. I won't even get going about meades clutching mechanism breakages and poor software.