Layor

You can say that again, Gina! Very useful.

I've been involved with electronics for nearly 40 years and still make mistakes and get things wrong

But as an example of why things need to be checked out, in the first thread on this subject 'EQDit for under £4' there is a photo of a usb plug showing the green wire on Rx and the white on Tx. I've just opened one of mine and it's the other way around, green Tx and white Rx!!

What's the old saying...measure twice, cut once... in our case, check a thousand times, solder once.... :grin:

By the way, are you going to the Norman Lockyer Obsy Astronomy Fair.

Colin

Thanks Malc, Yes, it is a DIL package but they are soldered to the board not in a socket. I'm good at soldering but I think that woulld test my skills!

I did check the connections, just in case, but they are fine. I've got a horrible feeling that, as careful as I am, I could have shorted one of the pins when checking for voltages.

I know that the cable I made is okay, but as I said in one of my posts the yellow wire was only giving milivolts but the green was giving a stable 5v, which made me wonder if the wiring was different. But what I will do for the sake of being sure, is get a cable from FLO. It might save a lot of headaches :grin:

Colin.

Sandy, thanks for that info, yes, they are expensive but not as much as I expected!! I thought they may have been around the £200 mark.

So if all else fails I'll order one of those.

don't suppose they do 'part exchange' do they :grin: :grin:

Colin.

Okay, thanks Tinker, I'll perhaps go down that route then. the version number is: 3.26.

If Malc or Chris could give me a rundown on installing the new firmware it would be appreciated

73 de MW6CQO

Colin

Good Morning All,

I've had a check of the board and as far as I can tell none of the components have failed. All of the inductors, diodes and caps appear to be okay.

The chips are PIC16F886. I think the version is above V2 but until I reconnect the handset I can't be sure. I'll be doing that in a short while.

Is it possible to get new boards? And if so, does anyone know how much, it might be easier than trying to re-program this board.

Cheers, colin.

P.S.

As a point of interest. I connected the TTL232R to the computer and the yellow wire was only showing millivolts, the orange was 5v, but I checked the othe wires and the green was showing 5v. I cannot open the USB as it appears to be a one-piece unit. Otherwise I'd check the connections.

Oh, *!%**,

Okay, I'm not going to start on it now, so I'll have a good nights sleep and start afresh in the morning.

Thanks for your help Chris.

I'll let you know how it goes, if at all

Cheers, Colin

Chris,

I may have found the problem.

I've just connected the hand controller but get no response. The H.C. comes up with 'No connection to MC. which, I presume means mount control.

There is obviously something gone short or open circuit in the mount. Is there a circuit diagram of the mount?

Colin

Okay, I have uninstalled everything telescope related, Ascom, EQMod, Stellarium, Stellariumscope, and anything else I could think of!

I've cleaned the registry of any leftovers and re-booted. So now I should have a clean machine.

The EQ6 is connected directly to the computer via the RS232 socket and the TTL 232R 5v. There is 5v on each of pins 6 and 9, they are connected up the right way.

Would someone like to tell me which programs, versions, etc, to install and if necessary, what order to install them in? Perhaps then, with no other programs to conflict with them I might be able to get things working.

Hi All,

I have eqascom/eqmod installed on my window 7x 64bit pro laptop and am also using eqdir to my HEQ5 pro.

Ascom, Eqmod, Eqdir are all installed (by default... by the ascom installer file) as win32 programme files and it uses the 32bit drivers.

I also run all these packages as ADMINISTRATOR... which often helps with such problems.

I was always under the impression that ASCOM et al were 32 bit programmes by default, have yours installed as 64 bit? if so then this could be the problem.

Hope this sheds some possible light.

Best regards.

Sandy,

I watched ascom as it intalled and it appears to load 32 and 64 bit files.

I also tried installing some of the older versions of Stellarium and Stellariomscope just in case, but still no go!

Colin

Hi All,

Just finished in the garden had a shower and read all the recent posts.

Will now go and try the sugestions!

Yes, I have installed 'Stellariumscope', can't remember what was happening to it though. I'll have a run through in a while and post back.

Cheers, Colin.

Oh, and if, after applying all the settings, I start 'toolbox', I get 'port not available'.

Colin

Hi Malc,

Yes, I did a double check on the ports, it is definitely COM 10. Yet when I try to start EQMOD I just get a brief flash of the window before it disappears from the screen, only to reappear 10 seconds later before disappearing again. It does this until I shut down and restart the computer.

Software prob???

Colin

Thanks Neil, I've had a quick check of the event files, yes, there are many that refer to 'toolbox.exe' but it will take a far better computer wiz that me to decipher what is going on!

I think what I may try is, using the old xp drive and see if I can get it to work from there. If I succeed then I'll know it's a 64bit problem for sure.

In fact, thinking about it, why take the drive out of the old machine, why not use it as is. I know it's slow but, hey, who cares as long as it works!

Right, that will be my task for later, right now I have to go to my amateur radio club. So, come tomorrow.......

I'll keep you all posted.

Thanks again, all.

Colin.

Totally agree. Must be software. Just have to find out where! Still have a gut feeling it could be 64 bit problem. Shame really because I installed the 64 bit thinking it would make for a better computer, and I don't think you can revert to the 32bit after installing the 64bit.

Unless anyone knows any different..........

Colin

Tinker, welcome to the club!!!!

Colin

Correct. Pins 4&5 to black (0v) pin 6 orange (Tx) pin 9 yellow (Rx) No problem.

Cable correct, voltages correct. Start Stellarium, connect scope, connected. No joy when pressing ctrl +1 or alt

+ 1 (or any other keys come to that! )

Tried ascom 'toolbox' to connect, click on 'register' get small window that says 'success', but on top of that comes two other small windows that both say 'unexpected error, quitting'. I get rid of them both and am left with the 'success' window, which I duly click 'ok'. click on 'Driver setup' check everything is okay and click 'connect'. I either get 'error - timeout' or 'port not available as' I go through the routine for each port from 1 to 10.

It has got to be something stupid I've overlooked or just not done. In a perverse way it's got me hooked

Why, for instance, does the CPC800 work fine when connected to Stellarium using nexremote and yet will not work when trying to use ASCOM where it says the scope is neither recognised or connected. Yet exactly the same settings are in use?

You are not the only one dying to know what the problem is, NC :grin: :grin:

Colin

Cheers, Jamie.

I've fitted a 'booster' to the line now and am getting 5v on one pin and 5.7 on the other, so as far as that goes everything should be okay. I'm about to test it, so will let you know in a short while.

Colin

I agree nc, the cable is no problem as far as making one up. If your voltages, measured at the RS232 plug are near or similar to what I have got then that will eliminate that part of the problem I have.

Many thanks,

Coin

You could be right, Gina. But it still might not solve the problem of the ports not being available. If something is amis with either the way I have things set up or the program configeration, then the EQDIR will not come into the equation.

I know the cable I have made up is okay, and I am using the TTL232R, the only concern I have is that because of the length of lead and the voltage drop that could be part of the problem. I measured the voltage at the mount plug (RS232) end and got 4.56v, that should be enough to trigger the Tx and RX. However, just to be sure I'm going to make a 'booster' to get 5v at the plug. If that doesn't solve it then it has to be the software.

But thanks to all for all the suggestions and help, keep them coming It is really appreciated knowing that, out here in the middle of nowhere, that I can turn to the forum for answers to obscure questions

Many thanks, Colin.

P.S.

I have an old drive with xp on it. I might just try that in there and see if I can get it to work. It will mean a bit of fiddling to get it to work, but it might be worth it.

I do have the 64bit drivers installed, but I was just wondering if the 64bit system was a bit flakey with EQMod.

Colin

I 've had a thought. (no, don't laugh!) The computer I've built is using Windows 7 64bit. could the fact that it's 64bit be a problem?

Colin.

That might help as a check, especially for the drivers. Thanks.

Colin

By the way, that's a nice idea of yours with the junction box!

Yes, thats right. I even tried it in reverse, orange - 9 and yellow - 6 just in case. But I'm still getting a 'timeout' window.

As a matter of interest, when I try and 'register' in toolbox I get three little windows on top of each other which I have to cancel. the first gives an error report, the second gives an error report and the last one, which is underneath the others, says 'success'. I'm presuming that the' success one comes up first then the other two on top.

I have also tried to connect my CPC800 which is working okay with the Nexremote on the computer using COM3, but I either get the 'timeout' error or no COM port available with EQMOD.

I'm going to try and take out all of the USB ports and put them back one at a time.

Colin