Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #74 in Camera & Photo
• Brand: Celestron
• Model: 93970
• Dimensions: 2.50" h x 4.00" w x 7.50" l, 3.31 pounds

Features

• Locates and identifies over 6,000 stars, planets, and constellations with GPS technology
• Red LED backlit display for easy-to-read information
• Accepts SkyTour SD multi-media cards for interactive tours of the night sky
• Includes USB port for easy download of database updates
• Measures 7.4 x 2.5 x 4.0 inches (W x H x D)

From the Manufacturer
The SkyScout is a revolutionary handheld device that uses advanced GPS technology with point and click convenience to identify thousands of stars, planets, constellations and more.

Identify
Simply point the SkyScout at any star in the sky and click the target button. The SkyScout will tell you what object you are looking at.

Locate
To locate a star or planet, select the object's name from the menu and follow the directional arrows through the viewfinder. SkyScout tells you when you are on target. It's that easy!

Learn
Once you have targeted an object the real fun begins. The SkyScout includes entertaining and educational audio and text information, including facts, trivia, history and mythology about our most popular celestial objects. A fun learning tool for all ages, the SkyScout personal planetarium puts the knowledge of an expert astronomer in the palm of your hand.

SkyScout features

• Identifies celestial objects with the click of a button.
• Locates over 6,000 stars, planets and constellations from built-in celestial database and provides scientific information for each object.
• Provides comprehensive text and audio descriptions providing history, mythology and other entertaining information for the most popular objects.
• Tonight's Highlights: a customized list of the 20 best objects to view for your exact date, time and location anywhere in the world.
• Constellation lessons: if the star you identify or locate is part of a constellation like the Big Dipper, you can actually take a guided tour through all the stars in that constellation and even see an onscreen map of the constellation.
• Built-in field guide includes:
  • Introduction to astronomy: a six part audio lesson on the origin and history of astronomy
  • Glossary of terms: text defining popular astronomy terms including planets, comets, galaxies and more
  • Great Astronomers: text bios on some of the world's greatest astronomers including Galileo, Einstein and Copernicus
  • Man-made space objects: text description of some of the coolest objects man has sent into space including the International Space Station, the Hubble Space Telescope and the Space Shuttle
  • Comet guide: text descriptions about history's most famous comets including Halley's Comet and Comet Hale-Bop
• SD card slot: for optional Sky Tour audio presentations that provide hours of entertainment on a variety of topics
• USB port: allows database to be updated with new objects as they are discovered, comets, etc.
• Simple enough for all ages: just turn it on and it's ready to use
• Built-in help menu: includes a quick start instruction guide for using the SkyScout
• Bring it anywhere: compact and light design makes it easy to carry and durable construction makes it safe for rugged environments
• Backed by Celestron's 2-year warranty

Customer Reviews

Nice item
Nothing more I can write that has not been written,I waited till amazon had this at a price I could not refuse.I had to walk around till it could get its fix,and then it worked like claimed,I was Wowed and came back inside elated.

Very Cool and Useful Stargazing Aid - Highly Recommended!
The "Celestron SkyScout" is one of coolest stargazing aides we have come across. We have never been able to get our Meade XTA90 telescope properly aligned to automatically find celestial objects and this has been a point of contention between my wife and I (she thinks I should be able to "fix" it). The solution was to buy the SkyScout.

The SkyScout worked perfectly right out of the box for us, the GPS satellite acquisition was amazingly fast, and the unit literally pointed out our first target (Venus) in less than 5 minutes from the moment we powered it up. We also like the one touch "Target" button that can identify the object the unit is pointed at.

The "Tonight's Highlights" is a very nice feature that presents a list of the best viewing targets for the current day. We were able to find several galaxies that we hadn't viewed before, which was very exciting for us and our kids. Speaking of group viewing, I recommend using the Celestron 93985 SkyScout Speaker (Black) if more than one person is going to be around when using the unit. This is especially true if you are going to be using the SkyScout's informative audio guides. The SkyScout does come with earbuds, but no one really likes to share them.

While the SkyScout comes with a case for transporting this unit and it's cables, it does not protect the unit while it is in use. We bought the Scoutcase Deluxe Soft Case for the Celestron SkyScout Personal Planetarium for extra protection since our kids also use the unit.

We highly recommend the SkyScout for it's ease of use and relatively low price. This has brought us a new level of enjoyment to our stargazing!

Amazing
I received this as a gift. I had seen it previously and was slightly skeptical about whether it could deliver as promised or be as accurate as you would need it to be. Anyway, took it out of the box and read the three pages or so of quick start up instructions. took it outside and it had a little trouble getting a gps link. I moved farther away from the house though and it synched properly. So, I pointed it up to a star, looked through the eyepiece and pressed the button and *bang*. It told me what it was. Wondering about its accuracy, I pointed it to another star nearby to see if it would give me the same name and lo it gave me a different name (the proper name). I plugged in the headphones and started listening to the audio commentary about the stars I was selecting. It was so cool. All these stars that I had no idea which ones they were, just press a button and it was telling me. It is really accurate, much more so than I even hoped. Pointing at stars and clicking is one way to use it, but you can also use the locate function and select an object, and then follow the arrows in the eyepiece until you zero in on it. I sat in my backyard in the freezing cold for about a half hour just selecting all the bright stars in the sky. I still cant believe how well it worked. A few weeks ago (after pointing Venus and Jupiter out to my 3 year old) my son started asking me the names of the stars in the sky and I had no idea, now I can tell him its Procyon, or Rigel...how much fun is that. I learned more about the stars in a half hour than I have in all the rest of my life.