QHY5 stops responding

[Parallax]

Right, this is really doing my head in.

QHY5 is the guide camera, Atik 16 ic-s is the imaging camera and the mount is NEQ6 pro.

The mount is controlled by C du C and ASCOM (or is it EQmod?) and the cameras by Maxim. Everything is mains powered.

The problem is that, after an indeterminate time (sometimes a few minutes and sometimes a few tens of minutes), the QHY5 stops responding. In order to elliminate possible causes I have:

Firmly attached the USB lead,

Changed the USB lead,

Plugged the QHY5 directly into the laptop (as opposed to via the hub),

Used different guiding software,

Installed the latest QHY5 drivers.

But the problem persists.

Any ideas what else I can try?

Steve

[malc-c]

Steve, what's the length of the USB lead?

I purchased a 5m USB lead for use with my Canon 400D and found that the camera kept locking as APT became non-responsive on the netbook. Changed it for a shorter one (2m) and now it work perfectly. - If your USB lead is of similar length try a shorter one might help ?

[Parallax]

Malc

The USB lead is, I think, 2m. Certainly no longer than 3m.

Here's another thing: Whilst the camera has stopped responding in Maxim, I can open another capture program (e.g. PHD) and it successfully downloads images. Close that down, go back to Maxim and it is still not responding.

I'm going to bring the camera indoors in a bit and see if I can reproduce the fault.

BTW, I'm using pulse guiding. I did think of trying ST4 guiding but didn't think that was relevent?

Steve

[Starjumper]

I also have a QHY5 and they can be very strange, I use a USB A-B then USB repeater cable x 2 straight to the laptop and it works fine I to am using Maxim to guide.

The other thing I do is I always use the same USB port for the QHY5 and never through a hub.

HTH

John

[Parallax]

I brought the camera in earlier on and it has been doing 3s exposures for about 4 hours now and is behaving itself.

I've just realised that although I put the updated drivers onto the laptop last night I didn't unplug and replug the camera in for the drivers to actually install. So maybe, now that they are installed, the problem has gone away. If it stays clear I will try again tonight.

Thanks for the replies, I'll keep you posted.

Steve