SharpCap can't see my camera!

[StuartT]

I use SharpCap with my ZWO cameras and it connects to them just fine. 

But it can't seem to see my Meade LPI-G (even though it's on the Windows device manager and the driver is installed).

Any ideas?

 

 

Edited August 20, 2021 by StuartT

[StevieDvd]

Have you tried to install the Ascom driver Meade provides? That may give Sharpcap a little help in loading the camera.

 

[StuartT]

1 hour ago, StevieDvd said:

Have you tried to install the Ascom driver Meade provides? That may give Sharpcap a little help in loading the camera.

 

I already have ASCOM 6.5 installed. Meade only seems to have 6.3 so I don't want to install it and mess up the versions.

https://www.meade.com/ascom-platform-6-3/

I already installed Meade's SkyCapture which claims to have the drivers

Edited August 20, 2021 by StuartT

[michael8554]

You might need to move the LPI-G ASCOM driver into one of the SharpCap folders - read the help files.

Michael

[StuartT]

13 minutes ago, michael8554 said:

You might need to move the LPI-G ASCOM driver into one of the SharpCap folders - read the help files.

Michael

there's nothing in the SharpCap help files, unfortunately. 

It's strange because SkyCapture is seeing the camera, but it's not listed in ASCOM

 

 

Edited August 20, 2021 by StuartT

[JamesF]

SkyCapture will be using Touptek's own interface for the Meade cameras I would imagine.  That seems to be the way it works for all of their other rebadged cameras.

James

[StuartT]

1 minute ago, JamesF said:

SkyCapture will be using Touptek's own interface for the Meade cameras I would imagine.  That seems to be the way it works for all of their other rebadged cameras.

James

'Redbadged' cameras?

So I guess what you mean is the fact that SkyCapture can see the camera doesn't mean it's properly installed? Even though it's showing in device manager?

[JamesF]

1 minute ago, StuartT said:

'Redbadged' cameras?

Rebadged   Many (most?) of Meade's cameras now appear to be made by Touptek, but are branded as Meade -- similar to Altair, Omegon, Risingcam, some of Orion's cameras and others.  Touptek also produce the capture software which is also rebranded for each vendor.

5 minutes ago, StuartT said:

So I guess what you mean is the fact that SkyCapture can see the camera doesn't mean it's properly installed? Even though it's showing in device manager?

Touptek produce a driver/interface library for each of the vendors of rebadged cameras and SkyCapture probably uses that.  Sharpcap probably could use it too, but I'd guess it doesn't right now, so would have to use Meade's ASCOM driver instead.  I don't really do Windows I'm afraid, so I can't help with that bit.

I've no idea if it would work and I'd actually be a little surprised if it did, but assuming you have no Touptek cameras the hacker in me would be slightly tempted to try finding the meadecam dll(s) included with Skycapture and copying them over the equivalent toupcam dll(s) in Sharpcap to see if it might recognise the camera that way.  I'm fairly certain that approach wouldn't work on MacOS or Linux, but as I said, I don't do Windows: it might be a bit more relaxed about the library changing name.  It might even completely break Sharpcap to the point of needing to reinstall it.

James

[StuartT]

1 hour ago, JamesF said:

Rebadged   Many (most?) of Meade's cameras now appear to be made by Touptek, but are branded as Meade -- similar to Altair, Omegon, Risingcam, some of Orion's cameras and others.  Touptek also produce the capture software which is also rebranded for each vendor.

Touptek produce a driver/interface library for each of the vendors of rebadged cameras and SkyCapture probably uses that.  Sharpcap probably could use it too, but I'd guess it doesn't right now, so would have to use Meade's ASCOM driver instead.  I don't really do Windows I'm afraid, so I can't help with that bit.

I've no idea if it would work and I'd actually be a little surprised if it did, but assuming you have no Touptek cameras the hacker in me would be slightly tempted to try finding the meadecam dll(s) included with Skycapture and copying them over the equivalent toupcam dll(s) in Sharpcap to see if it might recognise the camera that way.  I'm fairly certain that approach wouldn't work on MacOS or Linux, but as I said, I don't do Windows: it might be a bit more relaxed about the library changing name.  It might even completely break Sharpcap to the point of needing to reinstall it.

James

thanks for this sneaky suggestion. I can see the meade dll in SkyCapture, but I can't see any toupcam dlls in Sharpcap. Also, the SharpCap folder seems to have a .DLL and .PDB for each camera

(I think this may be above my paygrade 🤣)

[JamesF]

2 minutes ago, StuartT said:

thanks for this sneaky suggestion. I can see the meade dll in SkyCapture, but I can't see any toupcam dlls in Sharpcap.

Well that's that idea blown out of the water then   Perhaps Sharpcap doesn't support the Toupcam cameras (I thought it did), or maybe it picks up the dll from somewhere else.

James

[michael8554]

So why don't you try copying those SkyCapture > X64 > Meadecam files into Program Files (X86) > SharpCap 3.2  ?

Michael

[StuartT]

58 minutes ago, michael8554 said:

So why don't you try copying those SkyCapture > X64 > Meadecam files into Program Files (X86) > SharpCap 3.2  ?

Michael

Hi. Because Sharpcap seems to also need something called a PDB file for each camera as well as a DLL.

I've contacted Meade for some support now.

Thanks

[michael8554]

You installed the ASCOM 6.5  Platform, but did you go on to install the ASCOM driver?

From the Meade LPI-G "Quick Start Guide:

"To install the ASCOM drivers, first install the "ASCOM Platform" by clicking on the "ASCOM Platform" button found on the CD-ROM startup screen and follow the on-screen instructions. 

After the ASCOM platform is installed, install the ASCOM Camera Drivers by clicking on the "ASCOM Camera Driver" button found on the CD-ROM startup screen.

Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the installation"

Michael

[StuartT]

On 22/08/2021 at 16:36, michael8554 said:

You installed the ASCOM 6.5  Platform, but did you go on to install the ASCOM driver?

From the Meade LPI-G "Quick Start Guide:

"To install the ASCOM drivers, first install the "ASCOM Platform" by clicking on the "ASCOM Platform" button found on the CD-ROM startup screen and follow the on-screen instructions. 

After the ASCOM platform is installed, install the ASCOM Camera Drivers by clicking on the "ASCOM Camera Driver" button found on the CD-ROM startup screen.

Follow the on-screen instructions to complete the installation"

Michael

Thanks. 

Problem is I already had ASCOM 6.5 installed from the ASCOM website, but the Meade CD only has ASCOM 6.3. So in order to install the drivers I'd have to downgrade ASCOM, which I guess could cause issues with my mount etc. 

I wish Meade would get their act together!

[happy-kat]

Have you tried firecapture, and another approach I took with a celstron camera is to ignore the branded driver software and get a driver straight from the sensor website though I didn't have to worry about warranty.

[JamesF]

2 hours ago, StuartT said:

Problem is I already had ASCOM 6.5 installed from the ASCOM website, but the Meade CD only has ASCOM 6.3. So in order to install the drivers I'd have to downgrade ASCOM, which I guess could cause issues with my mount etc.

Does the driver refuse to install with the 6.5 platform you already have installed then?  I'd kind of hope that all v6 platform releases would be backwards compatible for v6 drivers, but perhaps that's not the case.

James

[tomato]

I would have expected the latest version of ASCOM to be backwards compatible with older ASCOM drivers. I needed to reinstall ASCOM recently and went with the latest version, but all of my historic drivers worked with it.

[StuartT]

1 hour ago, JamesF said:

Does the driver refuse to install with the 6.5 platform you already have installed then?  I'd kind of hope that all v6 platform releases would be backwards compatible for v6 drivers, but perhaps that's not the case.

James

The original ASCOM installation I had (6.5) was direct from the ASCOM site and didn't appear to support the Meade camera. If the Meade version of ASCOM (version 6.3) contains the Meade drivers, I'd effectively be downgrading the installation.

I'm pretty confused about this to be honest. Are you saying that the ASCOM platform (of any version) should contain all the drivers it needs, irrespective of where I got it from?

[JamesF]

5 minutes ago, StuartT said:

I'm pretty confused about this to be honest. Are you saying that the ASCOM platform (of any version) should contain all the drivers it needs, irrespective of where I got it from?

No.  I'd expect that each vendor will supply their own drivers for their cameras.  I think you should try installing the 6.5 platform from the ASCOM site, then go back to the Meade CD, ignore the bit about installing their ASCOM platform and just try installing their ASCOM camera drivers.  I'd hope that process would just find an ASCOM v6 installation on your PC and go ahead with installing their drivers.  If it objects because the ASCOM platform version is not 6.3 that would be quite disappointing

James

[StuartT]

17 minutes ago, JamesF said:

No.  I'd expect that each vendor will supply their own drivers for their cameras.  I think you should try installing the 6.5 platform from the ASCOM site, then go back to the Meade CD, ignore the bit about installing their ASCOM platform and just try installing their ASCOM camera drivers.  I'd hope that process would just find an ASCOM v6 installation on your PC and go ahead with installing their drivers.  If it objects because the ASCOM platform version is not 6.3 that would be quite disappointing

James

right. I would have done that. Except that Meade doesn't provide camera drivers. I even contacted them and they told me all they have is ASCOM or SkyCapture! Hopeless.

I'm never buying a Meade product again. Total amateurs

[StevieDvd]

1 hour ago, StuartT said:

The original ASCOM installation I had (6.5) was direct from the ASCOM site and didn't appear to support the Meade camera. If the Meade version of ASCOM (version 6.3) contains the Meade drivers, I'd effectively be downgrading the installation.

I'm pretty confused about this to be honest. Are you saying that the ASCOM platform (of any version) should contain all the drivers it needs, irrespective of where I got it from?

 

On 20/08/2021 at 13:12, StevieDvd said:

Have you tried to install the Ascom driver Meade provides? That may give Sharpcap a little help in loading the camera.

 

Before I post an answer I usually do a quick google myself so I don't give a misleading answer.  On the Meade install guide it showed the option to install Ascom and another link to install just the ascom driver. An ascom installation does not come with all the available drivers and expects the makers to add their own as well.

If you autorun the installation CD does it give you these options? Don't assume the ascom includes the Meade drivers as standard.

Hope the above is the case for you.

 

Steve

[StuartT]

34 minutes ago, StevieDvd said:

 

Before I post an answer I usually do a quick google myself so I don't give a misleading answer.  On the Meade install guide it showed the option to install Ascom and another link to install just the ascom driver. An ascom installation does not come with all the available drivers and expects the makers to add their own as well.

If you autorun the installation CD does it give you these options? Don't assume the ascom includes the Meade drivers as standard.

Hope the above is the case for you.

 

Steve

Unfortunately I don't have the CD (no CD drive in my laptop anyway!) So I am reliant on the web. It's pretty unusual nowadays to have a CD drive I think

Edited August 24, 2021 by StuartT

[JamesF]

1 hour ago, StuartT said:

right. I would have done that. Except that Meade doesn't provide camera drivers. I even contacted them and they told me all they have is ASCOM or SkyCapture! Hopeless.

Ah, perhaps I misunderstood from the excerpt of the documentation that was posted.  I thought the CD contained both the ASCOM platform and the ASCOM drivers separately.  My apologies.  Their documentation does appear to be out of date, as the most recent version I can find, here, still seems to suggest that the ASCOM drivers are present, but that's talking about v6.1.

James

 

[JamesF]

1 minute ago, StuartT said:

Unfortunately I don't have the CD (no CD drive in my laptop anyway!) So I am reliant on the web. It's pretty unusual nowadays to have a CD drive I think

Ah, right.  That's not helpful then

James

[JamesF]

Oooh, ooh!  I could slap whoever did this, actually...

Looking at the photos in the documentation, it looks like the CD is called "Meade SkyCapture".  But SkyCapture is also the name of their own capture application and they may well not be the same thing.

Can you try downloading the top link from this page ("SkyCapture Software Download").  It's possible that you might find the ASCOM drivers in that zip file.

James