(Richard) wrote

I think alot of you are avoiding the fact that many new amateurs are
not star hoppers nor do they want to be. In such a case, a Dob will
definitely not give them more pleasure.
-Rich

As someone who owns and uses both an ETX and a Dob, I have no dog in this
fight (if you take my meaning) and am certainly NOT attempting to avoid any
facts. The OP specifically said it was for his father in law and needed to
be very user friendly. He didn't specify his father in law's age, but my
father in law couldn't run an ETX if his life depended on it.

There is no escaping the fact that an ETX is NOT a trivial scope for the
"average" non-computer, non-science oriented person to set up and align
properly, and even when aligned provides less than spectacular (to be kind)
views of most DSOs, owing in large part to its long focal length.