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i have the 6" celestron sct, and on a clear night this is pretty much the amount of detail i can make out directly:

https://www.reddit.com/r/telescopes/comments/pmlbne/jupiter_...

i'm sure with tracking and stacking it would be much more.

Just to clarify is that the detail you can make out with the naked eye or a digital censor? If you meant digital censor, how much of a difference with the naked eye would you say it is? I've had this telescope on my list for some time but am not sure if my expectations are realistic.

Yeah, naked eye, although with a 6” telescope, I’d expect it to be a bit fainter - certainly that is the case through my 9.25” scope. I can often see a band in its rings.

It also depends a lot on atmospherics, if there is a lot of turbulence in the atmosphere it makes things less crisp (well, “dancey”, like looking through a heat haze.)

Look up your local astronomy group and go along one night, and see for yourself before buying anything. Saturn isn’t great at the moment (assuming London-ish latitudes) but Jupiter is around all night and you should be able to see it through a variety of scopes and eyepieces if you went along to a sky party.

Honestly, the first time I saw Saturn through a telescope I nearly cried. Truly amazing.

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