Due to the rotation of the earth, astronomical objects appear to move steadily across the night sky. When you use a telescope to magnify the view of an object, you also magnify the apparent speed of this motion. A standard tripod mount will hold a telescope steady and might suffice for tracking celestial objects at low magnification. Objects move so rapidly through the telescopic field that the telescope must be mounted to facilitate following celestial objects as they move across the sky. Smaller astronomical telescopes are often mounted on simple yoke-type mounts.
Altazimuth mounts permit vertical and horizontal motions of the telescope.
By combining vertical and horizontal motion, the observer can follow celestial objects in their paths across the sky. Astronomical objects do not move vertically or horizontally, however, but rather at an angle dependent on the observer's latitude. Tracking these objects through an altazimuth-mounted telescope therefore requires moving the telescope simultaneously on the two telescope axes. In this way, tracking of astronomical sights can be achieved by using one knob to move the telescope along a single axis, instead of the two simultaneous motions required of the altazimuth mount. However, altazimuth mounted telescopes with the Meade Autostar Computer Control System circumvent the need for a true equatorial mount as the Autostar moves and tracks objects on both axis simultaneously.