Anyone using Metaguide?

[Andyb90]

Just reading about Metaguide. The website says "The key is an accurate and low latency centroid that can be chased aggressively". It seems like it might be a good match for my Avalon Linear mount with the fast reverse belt drives being suited to rapid corrections.

Also the website says the software stacks the video frames and calculates a centroid for the stack. It uses the stacked image to determine corrections and removes 'bad' frames. This sounds interesting.

Would be good to know if anyone is using the software for guiding and how you're getting on with it. Is it relatively straight forward to setup and calibrate?

Andy.

[ianaiken]

Hi Andy - I used to use it. Had positive results. Calibration is OK but you must set your config up correctly. I had good results but ended up going back to PHD as it had better integration with SGP at the time. The manual / help page is beneficial to use so you understand the differences and how it goes about stacking frames and uses that for guiding. Once you have it setup calibration is easy place the star central and calibrate and wait. That's it.

[Droogie 2001]

I tried it and found calibration difficult. Despite all efforts I could not get any consistent guiding, probably me rather than the application

Went back to PHD.

Sorry not much help!

[Andyb90]

I think I'll give the software a go. My QHY5iii can do video so should be compatible. I see it has a Native WDM driver which I'll install. Will try an initial test connection.

The online help and setup guide looks pretty good too.

It says on the website there is improved integration with SGP, so will see what thats like.

Andy.

[Jkulin]

I use it and it works fine, just make sure you set the parameters of your guide camera correctly and ensure that each time you add your scope in the setup for the Ascom side of the integration.

Just one small point to remember, if you are using a QHY Polemaster and a QHY 5L Guide camera, it sometimes thinks the polemaster is the guide camera, so just disconnect the polemaster first before launching Metaguide.

[Andyb90]

Tried metaguide last night with my new OAG. I could see the crosshair was centred on a star. I clicked on the quick cal button, but got a message saying I need to center the star manually. The problem is I'd already centered on my target with SGPro, so framing was correct. If I centered the star on the metaguide screen my framing would be off. Is there any way around this issue?

Can you manually pick another guide star in metaguide that is near the center of the screen?

Andy.

[Jkulin]

I never do a quick calibration, I always do a full, it will always bitch if the star you have locked onto for calibration is not bang in the middle of the cross hairs, I don't start framing until I have calibrated and once that is done I then frame my subject and then if need be choose another star to guide on.

HTH