SGPro Atik 460ex crash

[johnrt]

Nice & clear night tonight and I'm experiencing some odd behaviour from my Atik 460ex and SGPro. Each time I slew the scope using SGPro and ASCOM the Atik disconnects instantly, meaning I have to re-boot the laptop to get it back running. Quite irritating. Anyone come across this before?

 

John.

[michaelmorris]

Does the camera disconnect if you slew it when not using SGPro?  If yes, it sounds like a loose/dodgy cable to me.  

If it only happens when slewing with SGPro, then no idea, sorry. 

[D4N]

It certainly sounds like a cable but I'm not sure why a loose cable would force you to reboot the laptop though, if that were the case then the camera should just be re-detected when it has restarted.

To rule out a problem with SGPro try connecting to the camera via Artemis then issue some slew commands and see if you still get the problem.  If the problem goes away it may be something to do with how SGPro is communicating with the camera.

I did find on a separate issue with my Atik that Nebulosity would lose control of the filter wheel but if I connected in Artemis then closed Artemis and reconnected in Nebulosity it would work fine.

[ollypenrice]

An old bit of Ian King advice is, 'If it isn't working run it in its own software.'

However, I would suspect either the USB or the power cable which are both highly sensitive. I loop all cables back round to the camera body where I have elastic round the camera body to hold them in place. In a serious snag the elastic will give and do no harm.

Olly

[johnrt]

It is rather odd, not so much a disconnect but a malfunction. I have even had the windows USB device has malfunctioned message a couple of times. After the glitch the cooler switches off and doesn't report a temperature and the camera will take and complete an exposure but then just freeze up on downloading. The issue is only resolved by re-booting the laptop  

I will try another cable tonight as I had to get through about 8 re-boots last night. I'm not sure it is the cable though as even on small slews from my focus star to target resulted on an instant glitch, where there could not be chance to put any strain on the USB. 

[D4N]

Did you check if it happens when you don't use SGPro?

If it is hardware based then perhaps a ground loop from the mount to the camera if they are on the same power supply.  The extra current draw from the mount whilst slewing could be inducted into the data cables.  In this case try splitting their power supplies.

[johnrt]

Well a change of USB lead and Olly's trick with the mini loom made by pinching one of the Mr's elasticated hair bands seems to have done the trick