My DSS is broke

[neil groves]

I recently downloaded the beta version of DSS version 3.3.4 since I changed my camera and 3.3.2 wouldn't take my files, it worked a couple times very good but now for some reason it won't work for me.

I threw 59 lights, 30 bias, 30 darks and 20 flat    .RAW frames into it and it gave me a black screen I checked it in photoshop just in case but there is no information whatsoever, I then tried to process the lights by themselves in case the other files were too much and causing the problems, DSS gave me a window with a question mark and stopped working, didn't lock up, just stopped processing my files.

any idea's guys?

Neil.

[neil groves]

just researched and found there may be some issues with running DSS with windows 8 64 bit since it is currently just a 32 bit program (whatever that means) so I guess i'll be buying nebulosity.

Neil.

[ChrisLX200]

Works fine on Win 7 64-bit so must be something specific to Win 8? (which wouldn't surprise me)

ChrisH

[davedownsouth]

I am using a Windows 8, 64 bit Laptop and DSS works fine for me?

[carastro]

Try asking the author, there is a DSS forum on yahoo I think.

Carole 

[Kirscovitch]

Works with my Windows 8 64bit.

[Kbramley]

I'm on windows 7 64bit and the other day I had a mare with DSS too, for some reason it was losing all the data too during stacking. I ended up rebooting and the problem went away. Also had it refusing to find any stars in an image full of stars, changing the star detection % did nothing, again a reboot fixed the issue. 

Overall though for a free program it's great  and I couldn't live without it

Keith

[neil groves]

ok after much fannying around it finally works, I can't tell you what I did because I don't know LOL, I went to the DSS download site and downloaded the latest version again and manually transferred the files into the folder where DSS resides, I had a few windows pop up and I clicked a few options/links and shut DSS down again, when I reopened and loaded the autosave file, it now appears to be working, can someone tell me though, the 3 primary colours are very separated in the histogram in DSS, do I equalize the colours here with the RGB/K levels or do I wait till I move the image to photoshop and equalize everything there?

Neil.

[neil groves]

I'm on windows 7 64bit and the other day I had a mare with DSS too, for some reason it was losing all the data too during stacking. I ended up rebooting and the problem went away. Also had it refusing to find any stars in an image full of stars, changing the star detection % did nothing, again a reboot fixed the issue. 

Overall though for a free program it's great  and I couldn't live without it

Keith

Thanks Keith, I had exactly the same issues, it told me there were no stars when I knew damn well it was lying to me cos I could see them on a single sub in photoshop, also I have had the black screen as I said earlier, unfortunately I thought my subs may have been corrupted and threw them away (1 hr of data lost) but nice to know there is a simple fix like that and next time instead of getting mad, i'll be more patient

Neil.

[ChrisLX200]

ok after much fannying around it finally works, I can't tell you what I did because I don't know LOL, I went to the DSS download site and downloaded the latest version again and manually transferred the files into the folder where DSS resides, I had a few windows pop up and I clicked a few options/links and shut DSS down again, when I reopened and loaded the autosave file, it now appears to be working, can someone tell me though, the 3 primary colours are very separated in the histogram in DSS, do I equalize the colours here with the RGB/K levels or do I wait till I move the image to photoshop and equalize everything there?

Neil.

Nothing you do here will affect the Autosave.tif file, but you can play about with the data to visualise what you have, and you can save the result by choosing 'save to file' with the option to include the adjustments you just made checked. To be honest though Ps is the better tool because you get immediate feedback to the changes you make, and overall it is easier to colour balance and adjust levels - it does depend on your familiarity with Ps though.

ChrisH

ChrisH

[Gina]

I found making all adjustments in Photoshop produced better results.

[ollypenrice]

If you want a very controllable, flexible stacking programme that is also fast, try AstroArt 5.0. Firstly it does a good job. Secondly you can easily break the stages down to see what is working or not working and causing the problem. The boxes for flats, darks, bias and lights are nicely laid out on one page. There are first class filters, too, notably for hot pixel removal, column repair etc. I'vetried DSS but, boy, it is so slow and awkward to fathom if there is something not working well in the stacking.

Olly

[Earl]

I also found Astro Art very easy to calibrate and stack with.

[DaveGarland]

How do the colours come out with Astro Art? I always find things come out very grey with DSS.

[Earl]

How do the colours come out with Astro Art? I always find things come out very grey with DSS.

I found it fine I had no problems with colour balance, I gave up on DSS as it basically did not work half the time.