Astrophotography Laptop Specs...

[Ian McCallum]

I've dipped my toe into the astrophotography water, but am unsure if my old laptop is up to the job?🤔  Here's the specs for those in the know.  It's only got three USB 2.0 ports, but I'd only do lunar and planetary imaging, not DSO work.  Would I be better off with one of those ZWO ASIair Plus thingies?🤔

Quote

OS Name    Microsoft Windows 8.1 Pro
Version    6.3.9600 Build 9600
Other OS Description     Not Available
OS Manufacturer    Microsoft Corporation
System Name    RADIO
System Manufacturer    Acer
System Model    Aspire E5-411
System Type    x64-based PC
System SKU    Aspire E5-411_087F_1_13
Processor    Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU  N2840  @ 2.16GHz, 2159 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
BIOS Version/Date    Insyde Corp. V1.13, 21/10/2014
SMBIOS Version    2.7
Embedded Controller Version    0.00
BIOS Mode    Legacy
BaseBoard Manufacturer    Acer
BaseBoard Model    Not Available
BaseBoard Name    Base Board
Platform Role    Mobile
Secure Boot State    Unsupported
PCR7 Configuration    Binding Not Possible
Windows Directory    C:\Windows
System Directory    C:\Windows\system32
Boot Device    \Device\HarddiskVolume1
Locale    United States
Hardware Abstraction Layer    Version = "6.3.9600.18969"
Time Zone    GMT Standard Time
Installed Physical Memory (RAM)    2.00 GB
Total Physical Memory    1.89 GB
Available Physical Memory    511 MB
Total Virtual Memory    3.39 GB
Available Virtual Memory    1.04 GB
Page File Space    1.50 GB
Page File    C:\pagefile.sys
Hyper-V - VM Monitor Mode Extensions    Yes
Hyper-V - Second Level Address Translation Extensions    Yes
Hyper-V - Virtualization Enabled in Firmware    Yes
Hyper-V - Data Execution Protection    Yes
 

 

[teoria_del_big_bang]

Personally I would just try it first before splashing out on a new laptop.

Funnily enough lunar and planetary work probably more demanding on the computer than DSO work because (I think - not done any planetary stuff) planetary uses either video of a lot of short exposures whereas DSO is usually a much smaller number of frames but each frame a longish exposure (typically 2 to 10 mins). So the planetary stuff I would think needs more memory (but could be a USB hard drive or memory stick of some sort) and will have more USB traffic to contend with.

Also even new state of the art laptops rarely have enough USB ports for Atrophotography and so most people end up looking for reliable USB hubs of which there are plenty of threads about as these need to be reliable (usually powered) and people do have issues with cheap ones.

So try your current laptop and see what issues, if any you have, you can try in daylight so not to waste a valuable clear night 🙂 

Steve 

[geoflewis]

22 minutes ago, Ian McCallum said:

I've dipped my toe into the astrophotography water, but am unsure if my old laptop is up to the job?🤔  Here's the specs for those in the know.  It's only got three USB 2.0 ports, but I'd only do lunar and planetary imaging, not DSO work.  Would I be better off with one of those ZWO ASIair Plus thingies?🤔

 

I agree with what @teoria_del_big_bang said about lunar and planetary imaging being much more demanding on the laptop than DSO imaging. For planetary work you need to capture and download images at very fast frame rates to optimise the ‘lucky imaging’ concept. When I’m imaging the planets, each video being downloaded can quickly reach sizes close to or greater than 1Gb. If the device (PC/laptop) being written to is slow then you may experience download buffering and in worst cases the system may hang, losing part of the capture sequence. You also need greater storage for planetary imaging, as capturing an hour or so of video data can quickly rack up 20-30Gb, or more data files; I have on more than one occasion captured in excess of 50Gb, even 100Gb of data in a single planetary imaging session, whereas an all night DSO session might not even acquire 1Gb data. Ideally you need USB3 written to an SSD for planetary work, but I have successfully used USB2 writing to an older style SATA HD, so I would say give it a try.

Conversely the laptop that I use for DSO capture is a 10 year old i5 Win7 with only 4Gb RAM and no SSD, and it is perfectly adequate to control all my observatory equipment for deep sky work.

Good luck.

[malc-c]

Quote

Processor    Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU  N2840  @ 2.16GHz, 2159 Mhz, 2 Core(s), 2 Logical Processor(s)
Platform Role    Mobile
Installed Physical Memory (RAM)    2.00 GB

Personally, for planetary work where you are capturing video this machine is very borderline, more so as you then need to process the video files to strip and stack the frames and process the end result.

But you don't need to spend a fortune on some over priced dedicated "astro" computer.  An older generation i5 or i7, with 4 or better still 8gb of ram can be had form e-bay or any computer repair shop that deals in old business machines.  I picked up a small compact HP8200 i5, with 500gb drive, 8gb RAM and stacks of USB ports for £60 which included a licenced copy of windows 10.  I replaced the mechanical drive for a n SSD for £30 and the machine is very capable.  A similar spec machine should be very capable of catering for your needs.

[Ian McCallum]

13 minutes ago, geoflewis said:

I agree with what @teoria_del_big_bang said about lunar and planetary imaging being much more demanding on the laptop than DSO imaging. For planetary work you need to capture and download images at very fast frame rates to optimise the ‘lucky imaging’ concept. When I’m imaging the planets, each video being downloaded can quickly reach sizes close to or greater than 1Gb. If the device (PC/laptop) being written to is slow then you may experience download buffering and in worst cases the system may hang, losing part of the capture sequence. You also need greater storage for planetary imaging, as capturing an hour or so of video data can quickly rack up 20-30Gb, or more data files; I have on more than one occasion captured in excess of 50Gb, even 100Gb of data in a single planetary imaging session, whereas an all night DSO session might not even acquire 1Gb data. Ideally you need USB3 written to an SSD for planetary work, but I have successfully used USB2 writing to an older style SATA HD, so I would say give it a try.

Conversely the laptop that I use for DSO capture is a 10 year old i5 Win7 with only 4Gb RAM and no SSD, and it is perfectly adequate to control all my observatory equipment for deep sky work.

Good luck.

Looking at the ZWO cameras,  I incorrectly assumed that for DSO stuff a USB 3 port was essential.  I also thought that DSO's required more resources, due to the very long exposure times I was seeing quoted.🙄

[Ian McCallum]

Perhaps I should look into DSO subjects, instead of lunar and planetary work?🤔

[Elp]

I would just try what you have at the moment. You will find computer specs matter a lot more if you're processing a lot of images creating large single files (like more than 100Mb in size) when they eat into RAM, most of it comes down to how impatient you are. I can still use my 10 year old laptop to process images though it's not as fast as my current especially when it comes to stacking hundreds of images.

[Elp]

An Asiair does however make the process of image acquisition easier (for me anyway), though the computer is still needed to process the images after.

Edited January 11, 2022 by Elp

[teoria_del_big_bang]

9 minutes ago, Ian McCallum said:

Perhaps I should look into DSO subjects, instead of lunar and planetary work?🤔

Have a good think.
What I wouldn't do is try for both to begin with.
The techniques and much of the equipment is totally different, and trying to have a stab at both with same gear will not yield good results and you will get very frustrated and more than likely give it up.

I do DSO and tried a bit of lunar early days but not any planetary so cannot really comment on the planetary side but for sure enough DSO stuff out there to keep you interested for a lifetime.

But in a way you are maybe looking at it the wrong way in trying to get your laptop to work with either DSO or planetary, what you maybe should look at is what scope you have, if intending to use a scope you already own, or what scope you intend to buy, and maybe even more important than the scope is what mount you have or intend to buy.
These are more likely to suggest DSO or planetary than your laptop and whichever way you go you will easily find a pretty cheap laptop that will do for either 2nd hand whereas the other gear may not come so cheaply.

Steve

[malc-c]

7 minutes ago, Ian McCallum said:

Perhaps I should look into DSO subjects, instead of lunar and planetary work?🤔

To give you some idea, the PC in my observatory is a dinosaur.  It's a tower case, based around an E5700 dual core pentium running at 3Ghz.  It has a 500GB system drive and a 2Tb data drive and 8GB of old DDR3 ram.  It runs windows 10, it connects to my HEQ5 mount via an EQDIR cable and EQMOD / CdC handles the telescope control just fine.  I use a Canon d400 as my main DSO imaging camera, controlled via APT.  Guiding is performed using a MK1 QHY5 camera and PHD2. - The PC has also been used for planetary work, using Sharpcap to capture the video from a very basic webcam.  Processing that video is where the machine struggled, taking 20 minutes to stack an standard HD format video of just a few minutes duration.  If a dedicated astro video camera is used and the file sizes are larger.

The best thin to do though is as others have suggested.  Try your existing laptop with the gear you have and see how it performs.  It may do the job, but the time taken may be unbearably slow, or it may fall over and fail completely... you won't know until you try it

[Ian McCallum]

13 minutes ago, teoria_del_big_bang said:

Have a good think.
What I wouldn't do is try for both to begin with.
The techniques and much of the equipment is totally different, and trying to have a stab at both with same gear will not yield good results and you will get very frustrated and more than likely give it up.

I do DSO and tried a bit of lunar early days but not any planetary so cannot really comment on the planetary side but for sure enough DSO stuff out there to keep you interested for a lifetime.

But in a way you are maybe looking at it the wrong way in trying to get your laptop to work with either DSO or planetary, what you maybe should look at is what scope you have, if intending to use a scope you already own, or what scope you intend to buy, and maybe even more important than the scope is what mount you have or intend to buy.
These are more likely to suggest DSO or planetary than your laptop and whichever way you go you will easily find a pretty cheap laptop that will do for either 2nd hand whereas the other gear may not come so cheaply.

Steve

The telescope is a SW Evostar 120 achromatic refractor and the mount is an EQ5 Deluxe with the Enhanced dual axis motor drive with ST-4 guiding.

[teoria_del_big_bang]

17 minutes ago, Ian McCallum said:

The telescope is a SW Evostar 120 achromatic refractor and the mount is an EQ5 Deluxe with the Enhanced dual axis motor drive with ST-4 guiding.

In my limited knowledge as still a relative newbie, for serious AP probably not the first choice of scope or mount, but they will be members on SGL who have given it a go so maybe others can give better advise.

But as you state you are just dipping your toe into imaging so I would not spend a fortune until you have a go, perhaps a good way to try it without spending a fortune is to get a 2nd hand DSLR (unless you already own one), and do some lunar stuff and also there will be some DSO targets that suit the FOV you get.
Use the FOV calculator in astronomy tools menu on SGL to see what you would get.

FOV calculator

Steve

[AstroMuni]

4 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

Perhaps I should look into DSO subjects, instead of lunar and planetary work?🤔

Your choice of DSO vs planetary is also dictated by your scope. For planetary you need higher magnifications to get closeup views whereas for DSO you can get by with widefield.

EDIT: saw that you use SW 120 refractor. You should get pretty good images of DSOs. If you use a computer to drive your mount then it would make your life easier. Take a look at the RPi as well. Thats a cheap option which delivers great results. I use a combination of laptop + Rpi and Ekos is a great software.

Edited January 11, 2022 by AstroMuni

[Bluemoonjim]

Hi

I think the suggestion to try it and see how it goes is a good one. So easy to keep spending money on bits of kit!
Having said that, I suspect that you will quickly find the limitations of your current setup. (USB2 rather than USB3 ports being one possible limitation with some cameras)
I don't know what your financial situation is (obviously) but there are some very well specified, older laptops on the used market that would cover all the bases for around £200 or less.

Good luck
 

[rickwayne]

It also depends on where you image. If you work out in the field off batteries, that bumps the Pi way up in the rankings IMO, since even a pretty snazzy Pi 4 will pull 0.3A or less. I really like having a headless computer that will reliably sequence all night even if I burn up my laptop's battery and can't see what the Pi is doing anymore. It's also easy to attach to your scope, mount, or tripod so that you needn't worry about pulling a cable loose in the dark. 

[Grant93]

21 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

Perhaps I should look into DSO subjects, instead of lunar and planetary work?🤔

Not had a read through all the answers, so I don't know if someone has already said this. But one thing that came to mind when I read this, is if spending more money on a better laptop or pc to be able to handle planetary is an issue, then investing in the rest of a set up for DSO imaging will be even more eye-watering 😆, especially to be able to take long exposures with the FL of the SW120Evostar.  So if planetary is what you really wanna do, get yourself a decent laptop. 😀

[Ian McCallum]

I've heard of the Raspberry PI and Arduino, but have never used one.  I know that they are a small, standalone computer, but little else.  At the moment, I'm reading this article below...

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/344913-getting-started-with-astroberry-for-the-raspberry-pi-beginners-guide/

I'm not sure what specs I need or even want. Can the RPi act as a standalone image and video gatherer, if connected to a suitable ZWO camera or similar?🤔

[teoria_del_big_bang]

19 minutes ago, Ian McCallum said:

I've heard of the Raspberry PI and Arduino, but have never used one.  I know that they are a small, standalone computer, but little else.  At the moment, I'm reading this article below...

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/344913-getting-started-with-astroberry-for-the-raspberry-pi-beginners-guide/

I'm not sure what specs I need or even want. Can the RPi act as a standalone image and video gatherer, if connected to a suitable ZWO camera or similar?🤔

Absolutely it can. I think Ideally needs to be a version 3 or better still 4 pi and the amount of images it can store is just down to the size of the memory, either SD card or SSD.
I actually have mine booting up from a SSD so everything runs fast and plenty of memory available.

You could then, if you were happy to do so, sit next to the scope with a USN keyboard, mouse and a HDI monitor and run the whole setup from there (although when running you can just leave it to do its thing) or as most do connect to it over your network from a remote computer or laptop, that laptop does not have to be anything special.

And to transfer your images from the night either download to a portable harddrive or SSD card or with a bit of messing about transfer them over the network to another computer or Laptop.

Just get it all working in the daytime first rather than leaving it to a night as you might need to play about a bit to get used to it all but generally pretty easy (must be I did it).
 

Just one thing to note the RPi obviously needs some sort of case and often these are metal which does tend to limit the wifi capability of the RPi but there are wifi doingles that work a treat and get your wifi range and speed to something useable, or use a LAN cable.

Steve

 

Edited January 13, 2022 by teoria_del_big_bang

[Ian McCallum]

Regarding the Raspberry Pi, I've read that there are fake ones out there. Is this true? If so, where's a reputable place to buy one from? 

[Grant93]

1 hour ago, Ian McCallum said:

Regarding the Raspberry Pi, I've read that there are fake ones out there. Is this true? If so, where's a reputable place to buy one from? 

I'm not sure about the fake ones. But I got mine from https://thepihut.com Works, nice and reliable, no issues

[Shimrod]

On 13/01/2022 at 09:25, Ian McCallum said:

I've heard of the Raspberry PI and Arduino, but have never used one.  I know that they are a small, standalone computer, but little else.  At the moment, I'm reading this article below...

https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/344913-getting-started-with-astroberry-for-the-raspberry-pi-beginners-guide/

I'm not sure what specs I need or even want. Can the RPi act as a standalone image and video gatherer, if connected to a suitable ZWO camera or similar?🤔

If you're more comfortable with windows, you could always get one of these Beelink mini-pcs and RDP onto it from your laptop instead. A similar price to an ASIAIR although you will have to do software installs and configuration.

[Ian McCallum]

10 hours ago, Shimrod said:

If you're more comfortable with windows, you could always get one of these Beelink mini-pcs and RDP onto it from your laptop instead. A similar price to an ASIAIR although you will have to do software installs and configuration.

Looks very tempting, especially when there seems to be a lack of Raspberry Pi's to be had at the moment.  It's something that I'll be looking in to.👍

[Ian McCallum]

So after buying a Raspberry Pi 4 with Astroberry, I've just discovered that my old laptop already has a USB 3 port on it! 🙄

With only 2Gb of Ram, it's still slow. I'm wondering if it's worth getting more Ram for it, even if I don't use it for Astrophotography? 🤔

[savcom]

2 hours ago, Ian McCallum said:

So after buying a Raspberry Pi 4 with Astroberry, I've just discovered that my old laptop already has a USB 3 port on it! 🙄

With only 2Gb of Ram, it's still slow. I'm wondering if it's worth getting more Ram for it, even if I don't use it for Astrophotography? 🤔

If you can, increasing your RAM will help.  Windows 10 itself struggles to be comfortable in 2GB, preferring 4GB.  Even then you can often end up with only around 1.25GB left for programs once everything is loaded.

Pricing Samsung DDR3 Ram, I have just increased my laptop capacity from 4GB to 8GB for £20 (Amazon).

Edited February 10, 2022 by savcom
correction

[AstroMuni]

On 11/01/2022 at 10:38, Ian McCallum said:

Looking at the ZWO cameras,  I incorrectly assumed that for DSO stuff a USB 3 port was essential.  I also thought that DSO's required more resources, due to the very long exposure times I was seeing quoted.

I use ZWO cameras as well and primarily capture DSOs. My laptop is an old i3 with 3GB RAM and 256GB HDD running Linux Mint. I also use an RPi as it gives me the luxury of being able to sit inside my house on laptop without having to run wires to scope etc. The RPi runs the INDI server and drivers and comes with 2 USB3 ports + 2 USB2 ports. I changed to Linux when my laptop was struggling to run windows 7, 8 and I couldnt be bothered to buy a new laptop.

Ref long exposure times most of the hardwork is being done by the camera and it only calls upon computer resources when it saves the files. I tend to use a combination of 30s and 120s exposures as my camera is just a good old uncooled ASI224mc and I figured out that light pollution in my area anyway contributes a lot, so I can get away with short 30s exposures. See the video by Robin Glover on optimum exposure.

 

Edited February 10, 2022 by AstroMuni