It's time for my annual holiday telescope buying guide. I want to thrill that stargazer in your life when he or she sees what's under the tree.

I also want you to make the right buy for whatever age or level. I have to warn you that there's a lot of junk out there and I don't want your loved one stuck with a lemon.

In my opinion, the best telescopes are made by Meade, Celestron or Orion.

Meade and Celestron scopes can found on www.telescopes.com and Orion telescopes are at http://oriontelescopes.com.

I think equally as important as getting a telescope, be sure your astronomical giftee knows his or her way around the night sky. Otherwise, outside of the moon and some of the brighter planets, they won't know where to look.

I recommend that along with a telescope, you also get them a good astronomy stargazing book or software so your stargazer will get to know the constellations and where to look for star clusters, galaxies and other stellar targets.

There are many good books like "Nightwatch" by Terrence Dickinson, "David Levy's Guide to the Night Sky," and if I can suggest with all humility, "Mike Lynch's Pennsylvania Starwatch." You can find it at many bookstores as well as www.voyageurpress.com. The best software I've seen is "Starry Night Enthusiast 6.3" that you order on the Web site: www.starrynight.com/.

As far as telescopes themselves, there a three basic kinds: refractors, reflectors, and cassegrains. All have advantages and disadvantages but the most important quality is light gathering ability. That has every thing to do with the aperture. The wider your scope, the better.

The magnification range on any type of telescope takes a back seat. The more light you can gather into your scope the sharper the image will be and the greater magnification you achieve without significantly losing clarity.

You can change the magnification or power by changing eyepieces. Any decent telescope will include several eyepieces. Most of the time, though, you won't need more than about 200 times power to get a good look into the universe.

The refractor is the type most people visualize when it comes to telescopes. Light comes in through the objective lens and winds up in the eyepiece on the other end.

The minimum diameter of the objective lens should be at least 60 millimeters but preferably 70 millimeters or greater.

That should be easy to determine when you're shopping because that's how refractors are sold.

A 60 millimeter refractor means it has a 60 millimeter diameter objective lens. The main advantage of the refractor type is portability. The main disadvantage is that you can usually find a reflector telescope with the same optical ability at a lower price.

Speaking of which, reflector telescopes were invented by Sir Isaac Newton, and I think they're the best all around telescopes as far as ability and price. You get a lot of optical bang for your buck.

They collect light with a concave, parabolic mirror at the back of a nearly open tube. The reflected light then bounces back to a diagonally orientated flat mirror near the opening of the tube. From there, the image is directed at a right angle through the side of the tube and into an eyepiece.

Reflectors are sold by the diameter of their mirrors in inches. The minimum diameter reflector telescope for a serious backyard astronomer should be at least six inches and you can pick up a decent one generally for less than $400. For another hundred or so you can get an eight diameter reflector that'll bringing in nearly twice as much light as a six inch scope and really provide some fantastic views.

Of course, you can get even larger reflectors for even more money. I own a 20 inch reflector, and it's by far my favorite telescope. As much as I love reflectors, one disadvantage is that they can get big and bulky and more difficult to transport on those stargazing adventures into the countryside.

One other thing I should add about reflector scopes is the mounts. I think Dobsonian mounts are the best and easiest to use. The scope has two axes, up and down and right and left. You can also get them with an equatorial mount but that'll be more complicated to use, and you'll definitely spend more money.

A cassegrain telescope is more or less a hybrid between a refractor and a reflector.

Light is collected by a mirror and reflected back to a specially cut secondary mirror that sends the concentrated image back through a hole in the mirror and out to an eyepiece that's mounted in the back of the scope.

By and large these are more expensive than reflector and refractors of the same aperture. The advantage is that they are very portable, but I've never found one that gives as good as an image as a reflector telescope with an equal aperture.

What can also add greatly to the cost of any telescope but greatly help the observer is the ability to mechanically track celestial objects across the sky through the course of the night. You can even get mounts with a small computer that can actually steer the telescope to whatever you program it to find in the heavens.

Believe me, there are a lot of other tools, toys, and accessories you can buy for the stargazer on your wish list.

I have one more important thing I want to leave you with. Just make sure to tell whoever receives a telescope to let the scope and all the eyepieces sit outside for a good half-hour to 45 minutes before they're used, especially this time of year.

The optics must cool and acclimate to the outside temperature. If you take the scope outside and use it right away, you're bound to get fuzzy views. It needs to chill.

For what it's worth, the telescopes listed in the graphic above are the ones I'm recommending as gifts this holiday season.

Mike Lynch is an amateur astronomer and professional broadcast meteorologist for WCCO Radio in Minneapolis and is author of the book, "Pennsylvania Starwatch," available at bookstores and at his Web site www.lynchandthestars.com.