What a lousy Nov for AP!

[Gina]

Looking promising here too   Just hope it doesn't change by then   I have several things I want to test too.

[Phillyo]

Next Tuesday evening is looking promising...but a lot can change between now and then. I normally only look one or two days in front, and even then it can change on the night. It has been very disappointing this month...all the more reason for a permanent setup...?? No?

Just have to get it past She Who Must Be Obeyed...even though it's my house :|

Phil

[pyrasanth]

I remember a night a few months back when the sky was crystal clear. I went into the garage to get a different eyepiece & the sky had clouded over- literally in the space of a minute- 45 minutes to set up & 1 minute of observing. I packed the scope away......looked at the sky before bed......and it was crystal clear again......  That is why I now have a permanent setup even though I sacrifice the portable bit & the flexibility to move to darker skies.........

[Gina]

The local weather forecast seems to change almost hourly   The forecast clear night for Tuesday has gone - to be replaced by rain and cloud   OTOH it's now showing a possible 3 or 4 hours for tonight.  Time will tell

[Gina]

Humpffff...    Now this evening's forecast is for FOG starting around 6pm   And no clear night skies whatsoever in the forecast

Oh well - plod on with the gear setup and maybe fit the super strong toggle latches for the observatory roof.  If I get all the gear ready for action I can make use of any odd half hour the gods give me

Now where did I put that chocolate - I need it

[Thalestris24]

Anticipating a 'What a Lousy December for AP!" thread...

[lensman57]

Anticipating a 'What a Lousy December for AP!" thread...

Please don't tempt  the gods for DEC or JAN.

A.G

[Thalestris24]

Please don't tempt  the gods for DEC or JAN.

A.G

I don't think my musings make any difference! The Glasgow weather was rubbish before I arrived here. It will always be rubbish most of the time

[Gina]

Got my scopes on the mount and aligned onto the tree on the far hill just before it disappeared in the mist    The moon is still shining clearly though.

[pyrasanth]

The weather is still not good......but hey......last night I could see the moon!

[Gina]

I was imaging through the mist last night   Now that is desperation!!!    Strangely enough I got a half decent result

[DaveS]

Clear last night as forecast, but so humid that everything was orange, and the dew horrendous. Next clear night according to Clear Outside coincides with the full moon, what a surprise. Not.

Oh, and the few subs I took were rubbish, straight in the bin 

[lensman57]

Clear last night as forecast, but so humid that everything was orange, and the dew horrendous. Next clear night according to Clear Outside coincides with the full moon, what a surprise. Not.

Oh, and the few subs I took were rubbish, straight in the bin 

Nope, it is still cloudy and damp in good old Manchester. There is so much moisture in the air that even if it was clear no sensible imaging could be done.

Regards,

A.G

[Thalestris24]

Nope, it is still cloudy and damp in good old Manchester. There is so much moisture in the air that even if it was clear no sensible imaging could be done.

Regards,

A.G

Hiya

Same here Though I did set up and test the new laptop earlier All seems to work ok with all the astro software though having to keep an eye on the battery level is a bit of a pain. There is a program called TiWorker.exe that keeps hogging the cpu. I read this could be got rid of by troubleshooting Windows update. This works - but it comes back again...

Open to suggestions from anyone who's had the same and cured it properly

Louise

[lensman57]

Hiya

Same here Though I did set up and test the new laptop earlier All seems to work ok with all the astro software though having to keep an eye on the battery level is a bit of a pain. There is a program called TiWorker.exe that keeps hogging the cpu. I read this could be got rid of by troubleshooting Windows update. This works - but it comes back again...

Open to suggestions from anyone who's had the same and cured it properly

Louise

Hi Louise,

Sorry to hear about the laptop problem. I had a quick search of the net and it appears to be a well known bug that Microsoft has not produced a fix for. It is something to do with this EXE file constantly checking the computer and looking for updates. I just don't understand why we need to have all this automatic updates and unknown processes working in the background checking our computers. This link seems to have a couple of fixes if you are computer savvy which I am not.http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-performance/tiworker-50-of-cpu-and-updating-doesnt-work-in-any/e0dfd97b-efbd-4c99-8c3f-21311fc86f3e>

Regards,

A.G

[Thalestris24]

Hi Louise,

Sorry to hear about the laptop problem. I had a quick search of the net and it appears to be a well known bug that Microsoft has not produced a fix for. It is something to do with this EXE file constantly checking the computer and looking for updates. I just don't understand why we need to have all this automatic updates and unknown processes working in the background checking our computers. This link seems to have a couple of fixes if you are computer savvy which I am not.http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_8-performance/tiworker-50-of-cpu-and-updating-doesnt-work-in-any/e0dfd97b-efbd-4c99-8c3f-21311fc86f3e>

Regards,

A.G

I'll have a fiddle - it's annoying that one should have to with a brand new computer!

Louise

[Gina]

That's the trouble with Microsoft - they think they know what you want better than you do!   I hate all this background stuff and automatic this, that and the other   Mind you Apple don't seem any better - in fact even worse I would say.  When I got my MacBook some years ago I was very pleased with it - it just worked and was fast.  But since then it's got slower and slower for no apparent reason   I'm thinking of putting Linux Mint on it sometime.  I only use it for net browsing and playing music nowadays but when it just sits there with a silly little icon turning round and round while it "thinks" about what it's doing I get very frustrated!

As for Windows, I have a Win 7 laptop in the observatory which seems to behave uitself most of the time but does sometimes disconnect from EQMOD ASCOM and then needs rebooting

[Thalestris24]

On the plus side, I think I've cured the tiworker.exe problem by disabling automatic Windows updates. It occurred to me that many people might not realise there was a problem so, in turn, might not realise 25% (on mine) of their cpu was being hogged! I don't know how prevalent this problem is but I've seen a number of complaints on various Windows/PC sites. Big fail for Microsoft! I expected a laptop (this is my first one! ) would run slower than a desktop but didn't really have anything to compare with. I've also found that disabling the wi-fi saves a lot of battery use! - to the extent that the system will probably be ok for imaging with away from the mains. The proof of the pudding, of course... I still need various bits before I might venture into the scary outside. One step at a time

Louise

[Thalestris24]

That's the trouble with Microsoft - they think they know what you want better than you do!   I hate all this background stuff and automatic this, that and the other   Mind you Apple don't seem any better - in fact even worse I would say.  When I got my MacBook some years ago I was very pleased with it - it just worked and was fast.  But since then it's got slower and slower for no apparent reason   I'm thinking of putting Linux Mint on it sometime.  I only use it for net browsing and playing music nowadays but when it just sits there with a silly little icon turning round and round while it "thinks" about what it's doing I get very frustrated!

As for Windows, I have a Win 7 laptop in the observatory which seems to behave uitself most of the time but does sometimes disconnect from EQMOD ASCOM and then needs rebooting

I'm not using eqmod on my potential outside rig - it's the AVX. However, I did have troubles with usb connectivity when I was trying to control everything from my living room with long cables and hubs to the bedroom where the AVX is - about 28 ft. Maybe I asked too much... Worked ok from a desktop with the same cables but the laptop wasn't having any of it! So I moved the laptop into the (cold!) bedroom and everything ok. The laptop usb sockets don't seem the best - a slight movement and got a disconnect. In any case, I'll be getting some high quality gold plated usb cables for outside, I think. It's, um, often lack of maintenance which causes computers to run slow e.g. disk defragmenting, browser cache clearing - and, not to forget, automatic update bugs! Anti-viral scans don't help either... In the past, I've checked systems with PC Pitstop - just the free scans from their site. Quite useful. I must revisit one of these days.

Louise

[lensman57]

That's the trouble with Microsoft - they think they know what you want better than you do!   I hate all this background stuff and automatic this, that and the other   Mind you Apple don't seem any better - in fact even worse I would say.  When I got my MacBook some years ago I was very pleased with it - it just worked and was fast.  But since then it's got slower and slower for no apparent reason   I'm thinking of putting Linux Mint on it sometime.  I only use it for net browsing and playing music nowadays but when it just sits there with a silly little icon turning round and round while it "thinks" about what it's doing I get very frustrated!

As for Windows, I have a Win 7 laptop in the observatory which seems to behave uitself most of the time but does sometimes disconnect from EQMOD ASCOM and then needs rebooting

I may be wrong but was there not an issue with the Intel chipsets kind of reporting back to Intel about the activities of the computer a few years back? Mind boggles does it not?

A.G

[kirkster501]

That's the trouble with Microsoft - they think they know what you want better than you do!   I hate all this background stuff and automatic this, that and the other   Mind you Apple don't seem any better - in fact even worse I would say.  When I got my MacBook some years ago I was very pleased with it - it just worked and was fast.  But since then it's got slower and slower for no apparent reason   I'm thinking of putting Linux Mint on it sometime.  I only use it for net browsing and playing music nowadays but when it just sits there with a silly little icon turning round and round while it "thinks" about what it's doing I get very frustrated!

As for Windows, I have a Win 7 laptop in the observatory which seems to behave uitself most of the time but does sometimes disconnect from EQMOD ASCOM and then needs rebooting

+1 Gina.  Apple are goign the way Microsoft went in the late 90's.  I am disappointed with OSX of late.  And recent IOS have been bug riddled as well and has pretty much rendered my iPhone 4s an unstable brick.  We're on the fourth update of 8.x if you count the initial release.

[Thalestris24]

Anticipating a 'What a Lousy December for AP!" thread...

Wish I hadn't said that!

[lensman57]

Wish I hadn't said that!

I think this lousy spell is going to be with us up north for a while yet. I have now started to reprocess some of the older data. I just hope that by the time that we get a decent spell the lovely winter targets are still with us.

A.G

[Thalestris24]

It doesn't look good ahead Still, I have things to do like implementing autofocusers and I'd still like to get a better frac at some point... I'll build and program usb control for the autofocusers - that will keep me busy for a bit. I also have some data that might be worth processing. I'll have a practice at handling layers as well

Louise

[lensman57]

It doesn't look good ahead Still, I have things to do like implementing autofocusers and I'd still like to get a better frac at some point... I'll build and program usb control for the autofocusers - that will keep me busy for a bit. I also have some data that might be worth processing. I'll have a practice at handling layers as well

Louise

Best of luck Louise, if your auto focuser works I might even commission you to build me one.

A.G