The XT10 is large. Some would even call it intimidating. The complete scope weighs 53.4 lbs, with 30 of those being the tube and 23 in the mount. The problems handling it don’t arise as much from the scope’s weight as its sheer width – the smooth metal tube has nowhere to grab onto except the bearings and each end, which makes carrying it awkward and difficult. Adding a handle or straps of some kind helps tremendously.

The XT10’s tube fits across the back seat of most cars, so portability is no worse than a 6” or 8” telescope.

One of the first telescopes I ever looked through was an XT10 (actually, two of them). These scopes are often decried as mere “light buckets”, only useful for deep-sky observation, but they perform quite favorably on the Moon, planets, and other high-resolution targets as well. A 10” is at just the right size for these things, in fact, as it is that largest aperture that only has to put up with one atmospheric “air cell” – that is, one column of turbulent air. A scope any larger than 10” is looking through multiple air cells and will suffer more from bad atmospheric “seeing” as a result.

The Moon is fantastic in a 10” telescope, with craters down to a couple kilometers in diameter visible.

Mars when it reaches opposition (the next time this happens will be in 2020) can show up to an astounding two dozen dark markings (areas of darker sand and rocks on the planet’s surface) as well as its ice caps. If timed correctly and if one places the Red Planet just outside the field of view, Mars’ outer moon Deimos is a pretty easy catch, while Phobos can be spotted on rare occasions (though I’ve yet to do so) if one can shield it from Mars’ bright glare.

The asteroid (4) Vesta can just barely be surmised as non-stellar on an excellent night when it is closest to Earth and is a brilliant gold color.

Jupiter’s moons are not only disks with a 10” scope, but they actually begin to show little bits of color. Io is a nice orange-yellow, Europa is a faded white, and Ganymede and Callisto are brownish-gray.

Saturn’s moon Titan is clearly a distinct yellow-orange color (which results from methane smog in its upper atmosphere). Saturn itself will show numerous cloud bands and about a half-dozen other moons.

Uranus’ moons can be caught with a 10” telescope. In mine, I’ve only spotted the brightest two – Titania and Oberon.

Neptune and its moon Triton are an easy catch in a 10”, while Pluto can just be glimpsed from a dark site with minimal light pollution to the south – something I am not blessed with.

Outside the solar system, a 10” scope shows you a lot. Many bright globular clusters (the brightest few dozens) are resolvable into stars, while scores of them are at least visible.

The Blinking Planetary nebula in Cygnus is bright enough that it no longer “blinks” like in a smaller telescope. Many other planetary nebulae previously invisible or dim in a smaller aperture are colorful, ranging from azure to turquoise, and can have structure visible in them.

The Virgo Cluster is pretty crowded in the spring, while the dimmer galaxy clusters in Perseus and Coma have several members. NGC 206, the star cluster in the Andromeda Galaxy, is visible as a grainy fuzz – and Andromeda itself stretches out as an oblong glow for several degrees. The famous Whirlpool Galaxy starts to show hints of spiral arms from a reasonably dark site.