The HEQ5 Pro mount from Skywatcher is widely regarded as one of the best starter mounts for anyone getting started in astrophotography. It is an equatorial style mount, which means that it is set up to align one of its rotational axes with the polar axis of the Earth. This alignment results in the mount only needing to drive one motor to track the movement of objects across the sky.

The main reason this mount is so frequently recommended is that it sits in a sweet spot of affordability and performance. Nothing in astrophotography can really be considered low cost, but this mount delivers very good tracking performance (when correctly polar aligned) for up to 11kg of imaging equipment.

My specific model of this was purchased used on Ebay at least 10 years ago (I don't remember exactly when) and it's still performing very well - maybe even better than when I first received it. A couple of summers ago I completely disassembled the mount and cleaned and regreased all of the bearings, and adjusted the gear meshing in an effort to improve its performance. No mechanical device can ever be perfect, but I'm happy to rely on the evidence of my recent images in making my assessment that this mount is still extremely capable.

Further information about this mount can be found on the Skywatcher website.