Thanks for the insight. I plan to order one for my sone and his young
children.

Other comments below.

Phil

3. Will a barlow lens help this scope be much better?


The barlow will add flexibility to the included eyepieces, but not a lot in
the case of the XT4.5.

A plus of the Barlow is that the 25 mm plus Barlow may give much better
eye relief than the 10 mm EP.



4. I think this scope will see rings on saturn and moons around
jupiter which the kids will think are cool. Will this scope see any
deep space objects worth seeing?


The first thing I ever saw through a telescope (the XT4.5) was the moon.
The next was Saturn. Not only will you see the rings of Saturn, you will
see the cassini division and possibly some banding on the planet (on very
good nights). 3 or more moons should also be visible. Mars will show you
the south polar cap and some nice dark mare features. Jupiter will reveal
at least 2 bands and maybe a bit more on very good nights. You will also
get to see all 4 moons around Jupiter. For deepsky, Andromeda will be a
wonderful sight. Although mostly a smudge, it will be amazing to realize it
is another galaxy. The Orion nebula will amaze you and you will easily see
4 stars in the trapezium. Globular clusters will be a nice sight. If your
skies are dark, you can go after some of the more popular planetary nebulae.
These will be more in the smudge category, but it is remarkable to think
what it is that smudge represents. And don't forget the double stars out
there. These went overlooked by me for a long while until I began looking
at them. Some of them are truely beautiful.

Now, I'm going to do the standard thing and recommend a more expensive
telescope, but only by $49. Take a look at the 6" dob from Hardin:

http://www.hardinoptical.com/dsh6.html

Good advice: I will look into it.

Phil