Underwhelmed with SGP - freezes and hangs.

[kirkster501]

SGP when it works is a very good piece of software.

The operative word being "when".  I get lots of freezes with SGP needing it to be CTL-ALT-DEL to kill the process and restart it (and the consequence getting back to what I was doing and cooling the camera).  If something interrupts a slew it hangs.  It hangs when doing a Meridian flip.  It hangs during autofocus sometimes.  It hung last night doing a blind solve.  Seems whether or not it works is a throw of the dice exercise.

I have latest SGP SW, the required .NET Framework and redistributables.  Latest patches, ASCOM etc.  The PC does nothing but AP so there are no fancy drivers/games or anything on it.

Starting to get a bit fed up with it and thinking of going back to APT and AstroTortilla.

Has anyone got SGP working consistently and reliably please?

 

 

 

 

[swag72]

It's a shame to hear about these issues Steve - It's not helpful to hear people say 'I have it working and it's great' but it really is.

Perhaps your best bet would be to go onto the forum and upload your SGP logs for one of the times it has freezed and see what they come up with on there. Ken and Jared are really helpful and will no doubt be able to take a look at the logs and work out what may be causing it. 

[Barry-Wilson]

12 minutes ago, swag72 said:

It's a shame to hear about these issues Steve - It's not helpful to hear people say 'I have it working and it's great' but it really is.

Perhaps your best bet would be to go onto the forum and upload your SGP logs for one of the times it has freezed and see what they come up with on there. Ken and Jared are really helpful and will no doubt be able to take a look at the logs and work out what may be causing it. 

Hi Steve, I can only echo what Sara is saying and I know it isn't terribly sympathetic when you are having frustrating interruptions.  The developers are really responsive, please remember that they in the US though so sometimes the time difference means there can be a short delay in replying.  Logs can be found under 'Help'.

I have had SGP running reliably for nearly 4 years through various mounts, ccds and kit.  When I have had a problem more often than not it hasn't been SGP but the drivers, cables or peripherals I've been using.  The issue simply manifests itself when using SGP.  Occasionally a new SGP beta will introduce an issue however these have been resolved within 24/48 hours.  The latest beta 2.6.0.23 is stable.

Thoughts to help, however, I'm sure you have been working through potential issues:

There are plenty of SGP users with your mount and ccd/FW who have good reliable use.  Atik drivers caused some issues a couple of months ago with their FW not rotating properly however Atik did update their driver to solve this - have you updated your driver?

Which auto focuser system are you using, eg Lakeside Astro?

The meridian flip hang: is it related to the plate solve step within the flip and auto-centre during the flip, ie does a plate solve fail which causes the flip process to stall?  I'm sure Sara or Gnomus will help with any Mesu settings to ensure the mount will flip.

The forum recently reported a problem with local ansvr Astrometry.net and a bug, needing to re-install or 'check for update' to solve.  Do you use the local ansvr option?  Or PinPoint or PlateSolve2?

Plenty of folk have problems reported on the forum that turn out to be cable related, eg usb becoming faulty.  It's always worth double checking these and swapping out cables to eliminate.

Happy to help if I can and I would encourage you to post logs on the forum with a clear description of the events which lead to a freeze as well as a description of your setup.

HTH.

Barry

 

[Andyb90]

Is it just SGP you are having issues with? How is the general performance of your PC?

Reason I ask is because I have a laptop used only for control and capture and was having problems with various apps. I found out anti virus software, running in the background, was hogging resources. Up to 99% CPU!

Andy.

[kirkster501]

Thanks guys and glad your implementations are working.

Wonder why yours are all OK and I am having so many issues with freezing (rhetorical question)?   I may wipe the whole machine and start again with a fresh install.

 

[iapa]

On 29/05/2017 at 13:37, kirkster501 said:

Thanks guys and glad your implementations are working.

Wonder why yours are all OK and I am having so many issues with freezing (rhetorical question)?   I may wipe the whole machine and start again with a fresh install.

 

Just kick up task manger and see what si using the CPU.

Is there, perhaps, unnoticed network traffic happening?

Check if your internet browser is open.... I have seen single websites that take 20% plus of my 4 core 3 GHz CPU - just with the crap they constantly try to bombard you with. Just looking at recipes on the UK 'state' television taxation site - and they are not supposed to advertise  - I was nearly 90% total CPU with the browser minimised.

+1 for checking AV scanning

Use the cleanup tool first to get rid of unnecessary files - you AV app could be scanning these.

If you have cloud storage (dropbox, one drive etc) then your AV app can also be scanning these.

[kirkster501]

I have bought a new i3 SSD mini PC off of Gumtree, only cost me £170.  Cracking little machine and very small.

I have upgraded it to Windows 10 and reinstalled all the astro software.  That is the only software on this PC (ASCOM, CdC, SGP, Lakeside Utils, drivers and PixInsight) + Symantec AntiVirus.

Will see how I get on the next clear night.

Thanks for your thoughts.

[iapa]

30 minutes ago, kirkster501 said:

I have bought a new i3 SSD mini PC off of Gumtree, only cost me £170.  Cracking little machine and very small.

I have upgraded it to Windows 10 and reinstalled all the astro software.  That is the only software on this PC (ASCOM, CdC, SGP, Lakeside Utils, drivers and PixInsight) + Symantec AntiVirus.

Will see how I get on the next clear night.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Will you using this remotely?

If so, what will you be looking at for the connection to it?

[kirkster501]

12 minutes ago, iapa said:

Will you using this remotely?

If so, what will you be looking at for the connection to it?

I use VNC Connect - free for home users. Fabulous software.  Sorry forget to say I also installed that as well.

[iapa]

Thanks.

My stick PC came with Win 10 Pro which supports RDP so no issues with that one.

Win 10 Home doesn't do it tho', and I fear that future purchases may not have Pro installed, so looking for alternatives.

[Starflyer]

On 2017-6-2 at 09:01, kirkster501 said:

I have bought a new i3 SSD mini PC off of Gumtree, only cost me £170.  Cracking little machine and very small.

I have upgraded it to Windows 10 and reinstalled all the astro software.  That is the only software on this PC (ASCOM, CdC, SGP, Lakeside Utils, drivers and PixInsight) + Symantec AntiVirus.

Will see how I get on the next clear night.

Thanks for your thoughts.

IMHO, by running Symantec AntiVirus you're asking for trouble. That POS hooks itself into everything and interferes with everything silently in the background.