"George Normandin" wrote in message
...

"Richard Crisp" wrote...

http://www.sbig.com/sbwhtmls/announc...rowband_f2.htm

looks like a great move from them.

Richard,

Thanks. I missed that one! I'll have to start saving my pennies!! The
equipment available just keeps getting better and better.

BTW: At NEAF the SBIG guys told me, that despite what the say
officially, my old AO-7 *will* work on the smaller chip STL cameras, (like
my 1301E) just not the 11k and 6303. I will need to have an adapter
machined, and they said that if the software didn't work they would
re-write CCDops so that it would. However, I still think I'll end up with
an AO-L at some point, perhaps using one of SBIG's new OAG's or their new
'artificial star' technique. However, I already have a Lumicon giant OAG
that might work.

George N

That just underscores what I have been thinking for years which is that I
never believe the spin from SBIG, especially from that lawyer guy they have
for a mouthpiece. My operating assumption is that they just say whatever
happens to suit their business agenda of the day and that's the sole
criteria they use for making public statements. My opinion of course but
that's how I see it. As a result, I always try to figure out the "angle" of
their statements, because I think there always is one that isn't discussed.

Back on the subject though, it appears to me that whatever marriage of
convenience SBIG had with AstroDon may be out the window. According to
something AstroDon told me about three years ago, they fought him tooth and
nails when he first popped up on the filter scene and really tried very hard
to prevent his products from being successful. When Don told me this he was
complaining bitterly about it at that time; he was really ****ed off at them
too, that was my key takeaway from that conversation.

But market forces prevailed and he managed to overcome their resistance,
presumably due to a lack of viable competition at the time in my opinion.
But now it looks to me that he has some credible competition that just
happens to be the German Dealer for SBIG and it sure looks to me that
Goldman may be on his way out at SBIG. For example they don't even list his
50mm filters on their pricelist anymore, at least I couldn't find them (I
looked) today (July 3,2007) http://www.sbig.com/sbwhtmls/Pricelist_u.htm

I applaud that development because I think his filters are way overpriced
for the quality and performance delivered. I see nothing exceptional about
his filters other than the price: which is ridiculously expensive in my
opinion. I used a set for over two years so I have lots of experience using
them.

I say the buying public is the big winner the it has been prohibitively
expensive for many people to try emission line color imaging until now. But
now that Baader is establishing a new price point in the industry, it looks
no more expensive to do tricolor emission line imaging than RGB, or very
close to the same price. That's really a very positive development in my
opinion.

I'm sure glad I unloaded my set of AstroDon emission line filters before
this new price point was established. I wonder how much longer he will be
able to get top dollar for those filters and how much longer a person can
still unload their AD narrowbands and still get close to what they paid for
them.