More Kit - cost Nil

[stevetynant]

A long time ago - before my scope was but a glint in my eye - I considered buying one of these http://stargazerslounge.com/members/stevetynant-albums-phone-picture15867-41qx0ktx60l-sl500-aa300.jpg

£232 on a well known South American Jungle website - I'm not sure how useful this toy would be but just to show my new found restraint I have quashed all signs of gadget ambition with this starr finder and replaced at cost zero with this http://stargazerslounge.com/members/stevetynant-albums-phone-picture15866-phone1.jpg

Is this a sign that technology is getting infinitely better very quickly or have I underestimated the power of the aforementioned hardware.

How soon will gotos just be a usb into your I phone / Android away. Just a thought :0)

[jgs001]

Nice one Steve... Actually, you can use bluetooth from your iphone, not sure on Android... to drive your goto mounts now... if you have the spare cash to do it...

[Caelus]

If you'd be willing, I'd love a breakdown on what the astro apps and the widget at the bottom are! I've had an android smartphone for over a year but the only astronomy app I have is Google sky map.

[Parus major]

Skeye and our very own Shibby's Astro Panel. Astro panel actually tells you to get out you gear for when it's lovely outside.

[stevetynant]

Hi Caelus - the easiest way to do it is just type in astronomy app in the android market and see what comes up - read the reviews and away you go - but if you look at my phone I've got (all free- too mean to pay lol)

Apod- which is just an app to give astro wall papers- the one on mine is the witch head nebula - it changes every few days

Google Sky which you have

SKEYE which is similar to google sky but better in my opinion - personal choice I guess

Google maps and navigation for when I'm finding dark sky sites

short cut to star gazers lounge- of course

Astro Tool - which contains star maps - haven't fully got to grips with it yet yet

The widget at the bottom showing the moon ad sun phases is called LunaSol cal - these are the ones I use the most - I have another few - planet counter which updates the number of discovered planets in the universe and a few others I play around with but these above I find most useful - I'm sure theres others on here that can suggest apps just as useful or even better

best of luck

Steve

[SwampStar]

The iPhone version I use is simply called 'Planets'...also free!

It has a 2D map - the circle one, and a 3D map where you point your phone at the sky and it tells you what you're looking at.

Also a visibility chart telling you the rising and setting time of the planets, and an option to change the visible view to infra-red, x-ray, Hydrogen a, Microwave and radio...but i'm not sure how useful that is (yet).

A very useful gadget!

[Caelus]

Thanks for the breakdown of your apps, Steve. The reason I ask is because quite often I don't find the apps I'm looking for, even though I know they exist. I'm not sure that the android market place doesn't have some sort of hidden filtration based on your phone model or OS version. A case in point is Skeye - it just doesn't return on my search results!

[stevetynant]

strange you say that- my mate tried to find it on his tablet the other night and said the same thing - I'll search for it again just to check

[stevetynant]

really - odd that - tried again went straight to it

not sure it has any relevance but I'm running it on a Galaxy S1, T Mobile (Galaxy S3 should be out in the summer just when my contract runs out woo hoo), Android version is Gingerbread and its the latest update of the android market ?