Apple Mac software

[Astro_Baby]

You'll soon get the hang of it.  I am an old Mac user having cut my teeth on an original '84 Mac back when PCs users thought even a mouse was amazing.  Moved up to  Mac IIcx when they were e beast (6 grand as I recall for a fully loaded one) and ended up with a G3 - round that time Apple lost the plot and my internet work needed faster and better so I got dragged over to a PC and been using them for a long time.  Long enough to think system crashes, half hour load times, inability to render in something quicker than geologic times scales was normal.  My last PC finally went to Silicon heaven a few months ago and I decided to bite the bullet and go back to Apple.  Bought the top end iMac, 27" tube with max config, max memory, fusion drive etc and WOW what a difference it makes to photo editing and video - massive speed mean rendering even complex stuff takes like 10 seconds.

I have the ability on it to run Windows either on separate boot or as a session under the Macs OS. Its totally brilliant - boots in 7 seconds.

You will soon get used to the Macs ways of doing things and see that Wozniak was right all along and that Bills been blowing smoke all these years

The old PC was about to hit the skip when I managed to get it working again, rebuilt it from the top so it ran fine, reloaded with a fresh copy of XP and Office and it was shipped off to Romania recently along with a set of software, screen, spare keyboards and mice  etc where it will be used to to give children far less lucky than mine a start with computers at a school there.

[Starlight 1]

I got a mac last year for Astro ,Then the wife use it to look on ebay , so I am back on the PC but I still look for Astro programs for the Mac .

[Tim99]

yeah, I know what you mean about the quality of the display on a Mac.  I bought the PC for around $400 and while it's 1/3 the cost of a Macbook, you get what you pay for!  I just didn't want to take my Macbook out into the elements.  BUT... just the minute I get my Observatory built, I will go back to my Mac.

[Tim99]

About Nebulosity ... I downloaded a bunch of programs for the PC then I discovered NEBULOSITY.  This is a very good program for about $100.  I use Nebulosity exclusively now for Image capture and preprocessing.  It yields very good results and is easy to use.  One license allows you to use it on a PC and a Mac at the same time so I capture on my PC the come home and process on the Mac..... all with one program.  No need to stack with one program then switch to another for preprocessing.

Nebulosity has a very cool focusing routine that helps you to focus and fine focus.  No need for masks.  

Here is a very good tutorial on Nebulosity's preprocessing capabilities if you want to watch it:  

[uhb1966]

again thank you for all the comments guys will have to try some of the software out.

I'm just wanting to use my macbook pro for it all as its got the retina screen which is a hell of a lot better then my other laptop screen for colours ect so editing images hopefully will be better on this once i get the hang of it as I've only had mac a couple of months and after having windows for years its a little weird to say the least.

thanks darren.

i am also using a mac and i have specifically bought vmware for running astro-related programs. i'm still using xp for astro processing. 62 euros for vmware... worth it.

[D4N]

Just be aware that VMware and Parallels both have a nasty habit of not working in new versions of OSX. It isn't that they aren't compatible it is just that they want you to pay again for new features that you don't really need so it just refuses to start up.

This can be very annoying if you are relying on it for running see software and have installed a free OS update from Apple only to find that your software no longer works.

/Dan

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Astro_Baby]

My advice would be NEVER upgrade software from Apple - Apple are terrors for releasing hardware showing how powerful it all is and then 90 days later issuing new software which will slow your hardware down to convince you to upgrade.  They learnt this habit from MS I am sure because the older MACs never suffered from this.  Those were the days when we were all dancing under rainbows emitted from Steves rear porthole

Unless you have a very real need to upgrade to bug fix or take advantage of a new feature I would always say leave well alone - this is especially true of iPhones and iPads where your options to go back are almost non existent.  And....just the same as MS don't be a pioneer with the latest - its the pioneers who get the arrows in their backs.  Wait and let others trail blaze.  I am still near traumatised from the XP SP2 fiasco where people who let their PC make the decision on upgrading to SP2 found one day all of their data had disappeared as SP2 release 1 had a nasty 'smash your disk to bits, destroy your data and wipe your lifes work out' sub routine I got off light as my machines were never configged to do autoupdates but plenty of my sub contractors at the time weren't so lucky and the disaster it caused was seriously unfunny.

People seem to have forgotten that episode now but its stayed with me as a salutary reminder NEVER to let anyone (especially Uncle Bill or the Apple Evil Empire) have control of upgrades to your machine and remember there very little kudos having the latest in a world where whatever you have will be superseded even before you have finished reading the upgrade notes but theres plenty of laughter from the cruelly experienced at the kid crying by the side of the road with a mashed up machine and their life in tatters courtesy of an ill advised upgrade.

[iapa]

Thanks for the replys.

Will have a look into some of the programs that's been mentioned, but am I being stupid what is wine ?

Thanks Darren

Hi, I have a similar issue, and have found that in addition to the limited software availability, there is also limited hardware compatibility.

One reason so much software is available for Windows is due to the ASCOM library where most 'mounts, CCD, USB wheels and various other hardware is support.e

Support unser OSX is much more limited.

I have a QHY 6 CCD, where PHD ( a popular guide package available for Windows and OSX) supports the CCD via ASCOM drivers, no such support is available for OSX.

There is an equivalent to ASCOM for OSX, namely INDI, but there is no driver for the QHY6 - and still limited support for a lot of other hardware.

I should reiterate, that the sis my experience - after 16/18 months looking for such things.

[iapa]

You'll soon get the hang of it.  I am an old Mac user having cut my teeth on an original '84 Mac back when PCs users thought even a mouse was amazing.  Moved up to  Mac IIcx when they were e beast (6 grand as I recall for a fully loaded one) and ended up with a G3 - round that time Apple lost the plot and my internet work needed faster and better so I got dragged over to a PC and been using them for a long time.  Long enough to think system crashes, half hour load times, inability to render in something quicker than geologic times scales was normal.  My last PC finally went to Silicon heaven a few months ago and I decided to bite the bullet and go back to Apple.  Bought the top end iMac, 27" tube with max config, max memory, fusion drive etc and WOW what a difference it makes to photo editing and video - massive speed mean rendering even complex stuff takes like 10 seconds.

I have the ability on it to run Windows either on separate boot or as a session under the Macs OS. Its totally brilliant - boots in 7 seconds.

You will soon get used to the Macs ways of doing things and see that Wozniak was right all along and that Bills been blowing smoke all these years

The old PC was about to hit the skip when I managed to get it working again, rebuilt it from the top so it ran fine, reloaded with a fresh copy of XP and Office and it was shipped off to Romania recently along with a set of software, screen, spare keyboards and mice  etc where it will be used to to give children far less lucky than mine a start with computers at a school there.

Do you use the MAC for guiding/imaging or just for image processing?

If the former, what hard/soft ware are you using?

I have found 

• Canon - EOS utility (supplied free)
• Nikon - Sofortbild
• QHY6 CCD - nothing found as yet
• Celestron AVX - alignment using StarSense, Sky Safari 4 Plus for object selection/tracking

Have you other recommendations?

[JamesF]

I have a niggling feeling that there are still some problems with Nebulosity and (some?) ZWO cameras.  Not entirely sure though, so worth checking if your intent runs in that direction.

James

[JamesF]

Oh, and USB3 support appears somewhat ropey in both OSX 11.0 and 11.1.  I've not tried the 11.2 release yet though I've heard it does fix some problems.  If you're not sure though, it sounds like El Capitan is best avoided for the time being.

James

[D4N]

The QHY cameras are supported under indi.

You would need to create a local indi server and connect the camera then use Astroimager or Astroguider depending on what you are trying to do.

/Dan

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[iapa]

The problem I have found with INDI is that you need to be a programmer to understand what they are talking about...... I have absolutely no idea how to 'build' a package.

There were recent comments in a forum somewhere that the QHYCCD INID software was not compiling properly - there was a whole lot of debug listings but no simple instructions on how to 

1. download the necessary file(s)

2. get then installed

3. what software to use it with.

[iapa]

Under OSX I have some apps the work quite well for my kit:

• Mount: Celstron AVX & polarscope, CG 2 & CG 3, Alt-Az 
• OTA: Celeste SLT130, 114 Astromaster, 130 Astromaster
• Imaging: Piggyback DSLRs (Nikon D90, Canon 700D & 70D), lenses fl ranging 18mm to 300.
• Guiding: QHY6 (well, I would if I could in OSX).

My images leave a lot to be desired, but that takes practice - and I need to have worked out how to use the kit properly first

Nebulosity (<£60) to capture and stack - imaging with a Canon 750D/70D.

Canon Utility (free) to capture

Soforbild (free) is good for capturing with a Nikon (D90 in my case).

EZCap (free) just found an OSX version yesterday which is very basic. Will update results if I can see past the snow.

SkySafari Pro 4 (OSX) is used for GoTo and tracking (I do do polar alignment with polar scope first to get a decent start on alignment.)

I have not tried my Celestron Starsense with SkySafari yet. It should work with the OSX version SkySafari 5 on my iPad/iPhone. 

I have a QHY6 which, until yesterday, I have not been able to use in OSX. The QHYCCD site doe snot make it easy to find the QHY6 I can't remember how I came about the current ASCOM drivers, last night. I have a Surface with Windows 10 and those drivers do not work.

PHD2 does not support the QHY6 in OSX.

INDI  - I've no idea how to make that stuff work, need a degree, and 10yrs experience, in coding to work that stuff out. Much more difficult implement than ASCOM seems to be. Anyway, the QHYCCD INDI file seems broken.

Looked at the TheSkyX - seems to be very good for planning what you want to capture. But not sure I want to spend $300 to setup a timetable (SkySafari does all I need there). Imaging is a separate addon for TheSkyX - another $200, and it still does not seem to have guiding functionality. PLEASE correct if I am wrong in this. Oh, and it does not support my QHY CCD - so I would have to fork another £300+

[D4N]

You shouldn't have to build anything for the OS X version of indi, it should just be a case of download and run.

I must admit that when I bought my guide cam the fact that the ZWO SDK was freely available for download from their website helped me decide. It is a lot easier for software developers if the manufacturer makes the SDK so readily available.

/Dan

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[Astro_Baby]

iapa - I don't use my Mac for much in astronomy.  It makes Stellarium run really well though.  No lags and it really loads superfast.

My Mac is mostly used for video editing, photo editing and boring stuff like database design and spreadsheeting.  Because of the vast cost of updating Fireworks for web editing I have a dual boot Mac so the web design stuff is done under Fireworks on Windows but everything else is Mac based.

I don't use computers much in astro, I only do visual so there is not much call for a computer in the field for me and to be honest because I spend most of my working day sat in front of one I have no real desire to use my relax time looking at one.