Help with ZWO ASI120mc

[mars240]

I've recently been trying to connect a ZWO ASI120mc (USB 3.0) to my laptop. When it connected my laptop is detecting the camera but when I open sharpcap it isn't detected. On device manager, it appears with the device cannot start (code 10) insufficient system resources exist to complete the API. I've downloaded the correct drivers for the camera, updated, and restarted my laptop multiple times but nothing is fixing the problem. Does anyone know how to fix this issue?

Annabel.

[Moonshed]

I don’t profess to know how to fix your problem but as a suggestion check if your laptop  has sufficient memory to the run the program. It may have nothing to do with it but have you looked up to see if that could be the code 10 error?

[M40]

Looks like Moonshed may have hit the nail on the head with laptop resources available.  How about trying the camera using just asistudio, it may not put such a demand on your laptop. Hope it helps.

[StevieDvd]

Try connecting it to a USB2 port.

I had an issue with a ZWO camera that SharpCap and ZWO Studios would not connect to via USB3. Firecapture worked though and an updated set of drivers helped but it seemed the issue was with the USB3 speed settings hene why USB2 worked.

A stab in the dark that this is your error though.

[mars240]

15 hours ago, Moonshed said:

I don’t profess to know how to fix your problem but as a suggestion check if your laptop  has sufficient memory to the run the program. It may have nothing to do with it but have you looked up to see if that could be the code 10 error?

I recently reset my laptop so there should be enough storage to run the program. I will check later to make sure.

[mars240]

14 hours ago, M40 said:

Looks like Moonshed may have hit the nail on the head with laptop resources available.  How about trying the camera using just asistudio, it may not put such a demand on your laptop. Hope it helps.

I downloaded asistudio but it also had the same problem as sharpcap.

[mars240]

13 hours ago, StevieDvd said:

Try connecting it to a USB2 port.

I had an issue with a ZWO camera that SharpCap and ZWO Studios would not connect to via USB3. Firecapture worked though and an updated set of drivers helped but it seemed the issue was with the USB3 speed settings hene why USB2 worked.

A stab in the dark that this is your error though.

I unfortunately do not have access to a usb2 since I'm borrowing the camera. Does Firecapture work with the usb3?

[happy-kat]

Have you started first with installing the ZWO ASI driver.

[mars240]

22 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

Have you started first with installing the ZWO ASI driver.

Yes I did install the asi driver first.

 

[Elp]

58 minutes ago, mars240 said:

recently reset my laptop so there should be enough storage to run the program

Nothing really to do with storage (other than speed of writing the files), it's got more to do with available RAM and CPU speed. If you've installed the appropriate zwo drivers it should at least work in asi studio.

[Moonshed]

1 hour ago, mars240 said:

I unfortunately do not have access to a usb2 since I'm borrowing the camera. Does Firecapture work with the usb3?

Yes it does, my laptop has USB 3 and it runs FireCapture. 

[mars240]

1 hour ago, Elp said:

Nothing really to do with storage (other than speed of writing the files), it's got more to do with available RAM and CPU speed. If you've installed the appropriate zwo drivers it should at least work in asi studio.

I don’t think my laptop has a graphics card since it wont run any games or open word files properly, but I’m not sure about what the RAM and CPU speed is. Its not an expensive laptop so I wouldnt be suprised if it didn’t meet the system requirements.

[Elp]

How old is it? Or what operating system version are you running?

Edited March 3, 2023 by Elp

[Moonshed]

It really is beginning to look as if the problem is with your laptop, I suspect it isn’t capable of running the astro programs you are trying to use, maybe due to lack of available RAM and CPU speed as suggested by Elp. My first thought on reading your post was that it was likely a memory (RAM) problem. Have a look and see how much RAM you have and the operating speed, that could put the problem to bed.

[StevieDvd]

1 hour ago, Moonshed said:

Yes it does, my laptop has USB 3 and it runs FireCapture. 

The point was that Firecapture was handling the error with the camera and would run it on USB3 port - not a generic does Firecapture work on USB3 in general.

38 minutes ago, mars240 said:

I don’t think my laptop has a graphics card since it wont run any games or open word files properly, but I’m not sure about what the RAM and CPU speed is. Its not an expensive laptop so I wouldnt be suprised if it didn’t meet the system requirements.

Your laptop has a graphics chip otherwise yo'd have no display, you may just have a basic one built into the cpu. I doubt that's your issue.

5 minutes ago, Moonshed said:

It really is beginning to look as if the problem is with your laptop, I suspect it isn’t capable of running the astro programs you are trying to use, maybe due to lack of available RAM and CPU speed as suggested by Elp. My first thought on reading your post was that it was likely a memory (RAM) problem. Have a look and see how much RAM you have and the operating speed, that could put the problem to bed.

It is more likely to be the camera (driver or firmware) there was an early isse with ZWO using a non standard USB setting (Firecapture was one of the few programs that allowed for that). However, if you look at this link on ZWO support  it could be a firmware issue. Also, note the recommendation to try connecting the camera to the USB2 port of the computer - hence my earlier (poorly explained) suggestion to try USB2

 

 

[mars240]

55 minutes ago, Moonshed said:

It really is beginning to look as if the problem is with your laptop, I suspect it isn’t capable of running the astro programs you are trying to use, maybe due to lack of available RAM and CPU speed as suggested by Elp. My first thought on reading your post was that it was likely a memory (RAM) problem. Have a look and see how much RAM you have and the operating speed, that could put the problem to bed.

The laptop is a Lenovo V145-15AST 81MT with 8GB of RAM and I think it has an AMD A6 2.5Ghz CPU not sure if that is right though. If this isn't enough would using a Mac potentially solve the issue?

[Moonshed]

36 minutes ago, mars240 said:

The laptop is a Lenovo V145-15AST 81MT with 8GB of RAM and I think it has an AMD A6 2.5Ghz CPU not sure if that is right though. If this isn't enough would using a Mac potentially solve the issue?

A Mac could only solve the problem if it had more free RAM to run the programmes and if the CPU speed was fast enough. Sorry I can’t be of more help than that, I’m not that knowledgeable on computers.

[mars240]

55 minutes ago, Moonshed said:

A Mac could only solve the problem if it had more free RAM to run the programmes and if the CPU speed was fast enough. Sorry I can’t be of more help than that, I’m not that knowledgeable on computers.

Ah, thank you for the help anyway.

[Elp]

I would say the AMD A6 is a major bottleneck being a single core or a dual core entry level processor. You can get an indication of processing resource intensity when running programs in windows when running tasks if you press ctrl+alt+del and go into task manager and processes, you can see how much CPU, ram and HDD are being utilised.

I'm not familiar with Mac's so much but if it's got better hardware maybe worth a try.

Edited March 3, 2023 by Elp

[StevieDvd]

The specs for your Lenovo V145-15AST 81MT show an A9 AMD processor with 1 usb2 & 3 usb3 ports so should be able to run an astro capture program.

If you search for your issue on SGL, ZWO or SHarpcap sites others have had the same error and resolution was a firmware update, changing settings in Sharpcap, or using the usb2 port on your computer and not the usb3 which you would normally use.

 

[mars240]

1 hour ago, StevieDvd said:

The specs for your Lenovo V145-15AST 81MT show an A9 AMD processor with 1 usb2 & 3 usb3 ports so should be able to run an astro capture program.

If you search for your issue on SGL, ZWO or SHarpcap sites others have had the same error and resolution was a firmware update, changing settings in Sharpcap, or using the usb2 port on your computer and not the usb3 which you would normally use.

 

I have tried to update the firmware but that also just gave me an error message. When trying to access links from one of the manuals which has a section explaining how to solve the error I just get a forbidden message too. Using a different USB port and changing the sharpcap settings haven't helped either

 

2 hours ago, Elp said:

I would say the AMD A6 is a major bottleneck being a single core or a dual core entry level processor. You can get an indication of processing resource intensity when running programs in windows when running tasks if you press ctrl+alt+del and go into task manager and processes, you can see how much CPU, ram and HDD are being utilised.

I'm not familiar with Mac's so much but if it's got better hardware maybe worth a try.

I'm going to try using the mac instead since I believe that its more up to date than what my Lenovo is.

[mars240]

Managed to get the camera to work on my Mac with asi studio instead although the frame rate isn't amazing. I think it must've been my laptop not being good enough to run the programs. Thanks for the help! 

[Moonshed]

8 minutes ago, mars240 said:

Managed to get the camera to work on my Mac with asi studio instead although the frame rate isn't amazing. I think it must've been my laptop not being good enough to run the programs. Thanks for the help! 

Quelle surprise!  Haha. Glad you got it sorted. You do of course realise that this means you will now have a minimum of two weeks of total cloud cover? 

 

[mars240]

31 minutes ago, Moonshed said:

Quelle surprise!  Haha. Glad you got it sorted. You do of course realise that this means you will now have a minimum of two weeks of total cloud cover? 

 

Hoping that it clears up a bit soon since I need the pictures for my coursework 😭 probably be cloudy until the deadline!