Stellarium GOTO control

[beamer3.6m]

Following a laptop upgrade which is now capable of running Stellarium with ease I would like to control my HEQ5 with synscan upgrade from the programme, but I am very confused as to how to do it.

Could someone please provide an idiots guide to getting this to work. I will be using the serial cable which came with the upgrade and a USB adapter as I have no serial port on the laptop.

Many Thanks.

[Starflyer]

I've got it working with my EQ6 using PC direct mode and the latest handset firmware.

I installed the Ascom platform / drivers and EQASCOM and got that working first. I basically tinkered around, set the correct com port for the serial -> USB adaptor and it connected and worked first time (much to my amazement).

Once you have it working then install Stellarium Scope start it and follow the setup wizard, it prompts you to change Stellarium to a windowed mode, I think you need to say yes to this to get it working. Hit connect and it starts Stellarium, select the object you're currently pointing at and hit 'Ctrl-1' this brings up a dialogue box and lets you 'Sync' or 'Slew', choose Sync. I think then it's just a matter of choosing and object in Stellarium, hitting Ctrl-1 and choosing Slew, although I have yet to try this

3.23 firmware - http://snipurl.com/3h2zl

Firmware loader - http://snipurl.com/3h2zp

Ascom platform and Celestron drivers - http://ascom-standards.org/

EQASCOM - http://eq-mod.sourceforge.net/eqaindex.html

Stellarium Scope - http://www.bytearts.com/stellarium/

I've got it connected; usb->serial adaptor | serial cable->handset and selected 'PC Direct mode' from the utility menu, no other hardware was required and pc direct mode was stable for the few hours I was playing with it.

Let me know if you need more info and I'll dig the lappy out and see exactly how I've got it set up.

One thing to note - when I'm running Stellarium it halves my battery life, no problem if you've got mains close by.

Cheers,

Ian

[dph1nm]

Stellarium now has its own telescope drivers, independent of ASCOM. You can download the Celestron driver from their wiki (which I assume runs the HEQ5 as well, as it is the same protocol, although I haven't tried it yet). I found this driver much easier to use than Stellarium Scope, which is basically just a separate program, although it does not yet seem as polished as the ASCOM drivers.

NigelM