michael8554

Previous posts on sample rate will take you several days to read, it's a very contentious subject.. Are you happy with your results.? That's all that really matters. Michael

Would you all agree that if the first alignment star is in the ballpark after the auto slew to it, then location, date, and time are probably correct? Michael

Could be one of the encoders is not counting ticks correctly. Indoors you could try slewing 360 degrees without scope and weights attached, the handset should report the same Ra or Dec at start and finish. Using the setting circle should be accurate enough if your error is large like you report. Michael

No, I don't, merely hinting you have enough suggestions already without complicating the issue with WiFi. Michael

Some mount a mini computer on their mount, so the next move would be to contain it in the camera case. But rather defeats the object of cooling the camera to put a hot processor inside the case! Michael

Often the positive from the battery is wired to a make/break contact on the external power socket. When the external power plug is inserted it breaks the power from the batteries. You could clean up that contact by repeated insertion of the power plug. Michael

Not sure how adding WiFi is going to solve the alignment problem......? Michael

Did you confirm that location, date, Daylight Saving if applicable, and time, are the same on your mount, in SGP, and your PC, as Han59 suggested ? Michael

So centering moves the scope in the wrong direction, away from the target instead of towards the target? By roughly the correct distance, but the wrong way ? In Dec and Ra, or only one axis ? Perhaps you have accidently reversed the slew direction on that axis ? Or is it overshooting the target ? Michael

I would guess that the encoders are geared up to run faster, so you may still not be able to detect movement of the shaft. Make a mark on the shaft with a Sharpie pen and you might perceive movement after a while. Is Rate 6 too fast for fine adjustment? Michael

No problem, the mercury in the tuna will get him first......... Michael

This is the way to get high quality uncompressed video from a DSLR: http://www.astropix.com/html/i_astrop/eq_tests/canon_one_to_one_pixel_resolution.html ichael

Yes, daytime tests on a LX200GPS worked fine with PHD2, also Colin's driver cured the Custom Guide Rate problem I mentioned that's inherent with the old LX200GPS /R ASCOM Driver. Top marks Colin.!

Never mind the software, a guiding prog will need 1 to 3 second exposures, deep sky objects will require 30 second exposures at least. Michael

Hi Gabe Every scope has a range of focus (the distance from the front of the scope to the eyepiece) dictated by the in and out movement of the focuser. In your case the focuser is nearly all the way out with the THING (a diagonal) attached. If you remove the THING then you've removed a chunk from that distance, the eyepiece is now much closer to the front of the scope. To get focus back you have to move the focuser that chunk further out, to place the eyepiece back where it was in distance from the front, which you can't do. So basically you don't remove the diagonal. Michael

I got the same error message I'm afraid. I uninstalled v5 first, did I need to do that ? Also noticed that although I installed the NET 5.1 package, it shows 4.7 was installed at that time...... ? Michael

Ran Meade.net.Setup.0.5.0.0.msi First it asked me to install NET 5, which said it was only compatible with Win7 onwards. Windows XP is still used by a great many people, including myself until a few weeks ago, most astro progs work with it. Fired up PHD2 and looked for a new driver in the Mount window. Nothing obviously new, but I didn't remember seeing Meade Generic (ASCOM) before. By a process of uninstalling and reinstalling your driver I determined Meade Generic (ASCOM) was yours. Tried to connect and got this message: "Failed to load served COM class assembly ASCOM.Meade.net.Focuser.dll Unable to load one or more of the requested types. Retrieve the Loader Exceptions property for more info." The PC locked up for about 20 secs but then cleared and I could close PHD2. Are there any files you would like to see? Michael

The LX200GPS guys said your driver will send some commands the 200 will ignore, and will probably be missing some commands, but no harm will come from trying it, so that's what I'll do! Michael

SC = South Carolina Try Astromart or Cloudy Nights A complete dead mount for spares might be easiest to find. Michael

With the current LX200GPS/R ASCOM driver, when I set a custom Guide Rate with the handbox (say 90), when I connect with PHD2 it resets to 66. So I set to 90 after connecting with PHD2, which holds for that session, and is still present when I next switch on, but reverts to 66 next time I connect PHD2. Andrew Johansen gave me this info regarding the ASCOM driver. I understand that :Rg10.0# resets the Guide Rate. Looking in the "Meade LX200GPS\Telescope.cls" source Inside the "Let Connected()" function the code finds the mount and does some checks At about line 720, ( after everything is done ) it calls a function called Reconnect, which looks like it is meant to reset some old data. Inside Reconnect, ( at about line 2108 ) they forcibly reset the guide rate with no way to override it.

I see on the ASCOM Forum that many astro manufacturer's ASCOM drivers are flakey, and the poor user often has considerable trouble correctly uninstalling and reinstalling before the thing works correctly. I also see on the ASCOM Downloads instructions NOT to use the 497 on the 200GPS and vice-versa. Hence my reservations. Michael

An aquantance in the States with a LX200GPS is very excited at the many new ways of connecting to the scope your new driver will allow, but it will be a while before he can try it out. Michael

B***mer indeed, what went wrong? Michael

Why?

That's just asking for trouble, I won't be risking corrupting my LX200GPS ! I've posted a query on the LX200GPS Forum, there are developers there that will know the answer, but I suspect Autostar 497 and Autostar II are way different. I'll get back to you. Michael