This review of Sky Atlas 2000.0 is the second in a series of atlas reviews to help you decide which star atlas is right for you. My first review covered S&T’s Pocket Sky Atlas. Sky Atlas 2000.0 is a large-scale atlas beautifully printed in a large-page format. It has stars down to magnitude 8.5 and deep sky objects down to around magnitude 13. Sky Atlas 2000.0 comes in three editions: Desk (black stars on white background), Field (white stars on black background), and Deluxe (color-coded deep-sky objects on white background), and each edition comes in a paper version and a laminated version. All versions include close-up charts of crowded areas such as the Virgo cluster, as well as a transparent plastic coordinate-grid overlay for determining positions accurately.
Regardless of the edition, this is clearly a star atlas for serious star-hopping which will help you find objects well beyond the Messier catalog. It is a fantastic atlas, but for observers in urban (and even sub-urban) areas, Sky Atlas 2000.0 is probably overkill: most of the deep-sky objects won’t be visible in washed-out skies, even with relatively large amateur telescopes. Although having more stars plotted compared to Pocket Star Atlas or Norton’s Star Atlas can be an advantage for star hopping if you have a 50mm or better finder scope, I haven’t found the difference significant when star-hopping in light-polluted skies. However, if you regularly go to a dark-sky site in addition to observing from urban areas, Sky Atlas 2000.0 makes sense as an atlas that will serve you well in both locations....