[sink]

I'll add one more thing to my sibling comment. This person is clearly unaware of whether there is ongoing R&D in the realm of hobby astrophotography mounts. They mentioned they're just considering getting into it. They're talking about mass manufactured goods. They were not aware that this is a field of active innovation.

We could have given someone a warm welcome to the hobby by clarifying that politely.

I know when I was getting started, I didn't know what made some things more expensive than others. I didn't know about doublet or triplet refractors, Strehl ratios, Chroma vs ZWO filters, why a MACH2 is such a grail mount over a Optron CEM120. Luckily I had nice, friendly, helpful people to talk to, instead of a wall of arrogance.

[dylan604]

>We could have given someone a warm welcome to the hobby by clarifying that politely.

If this was Cloudy Skies or some similar site dedicated to the hobby subject matter, then sure, let's hold someone's hand while they decide to make expensive decisions.

HN is not that. It is, as the name applies, a place where tinkerers in any hobby gather. As someone that hacks/tinkers/plays/circumvents/etc, it is clear that research is step 1, 2 & 3.

[Aachen]

Thank you the comments you wrote. There's no contact info in your profile so without going too off topic, I appreciate this really a lot.