Armchair astronomy

[stedavey123 3]

Hi all i haven't been doing very much with astronomy for almost a year and decided last week that i really miss it and need to get back into it.

However i have always liked the idea of setting up a system to view and control my telescope from inside my warm house. so yesterday i was playing around with Stellarium setting up all my connections and making sure i could get the telescope to connect, after many many hours last night i finally managed to connect everything up via USB-to Com and finally my computer said connected !! YAY So at that point i obviously told Stellarium to slew my scope and it did NOTHING !  even though it still said connected :/ HMM so i sat scratching my head..... then after around 10 mins i restarted computer and then my computer would no longer detect that a USB had been plugged in ... tried on 2 laptops same problem. tried other USB devices and all is fine so it seems to be only when i attempt to plug in my scope it will no longer detect that i have plugged it in. today i have tried deleting USB drivers and restarting to let them reinstall.....still nothing :@ grrrr has anyone ever had this same problem or know any fix or what maybe wrong ? thanks all speak soon hopefully.

 

oh and i am using a skywatcher sky max 127 with synscan handset

[Pan Euro 137]

What is the distance between your laptop and the scope.? USB cables do not like distance.

[stedavey123 3]

1 meter at maximum ... like i said they worked absolutely fine then all of a sudden none of my computers would detect it

[michael8554 1,402]

Not Windows 10 by any chance........?   :-<

Michael

[stedavey123 3]

pc is windows 10 and laptop is windows 7 .

 

[michael8554 1,402]

If not a Windows problem then USB to Serial?

There are Chinese clones of FTDI's I think that get deliberately bricked by genuine drivers.

There's a procedure to unbrick and load earlier non-destructive drivers.

Michael

[Gina 21,983]

USB and particularly USB to serial adapters seem to cause many headaches

I'm having general problems with my Win7 laptop that I use for remote control and imaging via TeamViewer.  So I'm doing what several others have done and change to the Raspberry Pi and Linux.  I'm still having problems with getting the software set up properly but once I have it working, the RPi will replace the laptop and will be installed right on the mount.

A while back I was setting up remote control of my observatory roll off roof but shelved the project.  After upgrading the wheels and track for the roof I could open and close it with one finger and it was quick and easy to open and close the roof manually.  I had got to the point of having a motor winch (garage door opener) almost ready to operate the roof - just needed the chain attached to points on the roof and the electrics sorting out.

Once I get the imaging working reliably I think I might look into remote roof control again.  As I get older I'm finding it more difficult and unpleasant to go out in the cold and operate the observatory.  I'm thinking of resurrecting the remote roof project and also adding webcams to see what's going on.  That will be a project for the better weather (if we get any) in the spring or summer.