Celestron’s starsense - could it be TOO good?

[Elp]

You'd think if they sold them standalone they'd sell far more. I'm still trying to persevere with Skeye as an alternative, there's also a camera plate solving version. My phone mount was easy enough to make.

[StevieDvd]

6 minutes ago, Elp said:

You'd think if they sold them standalone they'd sell far more. I'm still trying to persevere with Skeye as an alternative, there's also a camera plate solving version. My phone mount was easy enough to make.

If you were Celestron would you sell them standalone if that earned less than selling complete scope/starsense sets? They've most likely worked out what's best for them!

[happy-kat]

I'm assuming using starsense removes any metal object interference you might get with push to using say skyeye pro or google sky map

[Ratlet]

Trouble is that celesteon are probably shifting more scopes now with the Starsense unit and the markup must be pretty good.

To be fair, amatuer astronomers have basically said the phone holder/mirror thing is worth +/-£180 since most people will buy the scope just for the Starsense.  They'd be loopy to sell a standalone for much less.

[Elp]

21 minutes ago, StevieDvd said:

If you were Celestron would you sell them standalone if that earned less than selling complete scope/starsense sets? They've most likely worked out what's best for them!

I'd guess there's far more total telescopes out in the field already compared to new Celestrons including Starsense sitting on the shelves. They sell the autoalign as a separate unit.

Edited September 11, 2023 by Elp

[DaveL59]

15 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

I'm assuming using starsense removes any metal object interference you might get with push to using say skyeye pro or google sky map

It does, since it plate solves rather than relying on just the phone sensors. It seems to use those to track your movement of the OTA as directed then will solve again to home in closer to the target.

I had a play with Skyeye and it worked pretty well in the main but then most of my scopes aren't magnetic other than the TAL100RS but there I was using a stand-off arm which helped. Getting things well aligned is a faff tho where the starsense is fairly simple, just drag your finger on the screen to line up the target during setup and away you go.

[DaveL59]

23 minutes ago, Ratlet said:

Trouble is that celesteon are probably shifting more scopes now with the Starsense unit and the markup must be pretty good.

To be fair, amatuer astronomers have basically said the phone holder/mirror thing is worth +/-£180 since most people will buy the scope just for the Starsense.  They'd be loopy to sell a standalone for much less.

bear in mind also, all the extras they can convince you to buy like the eyepiece set etc. Best to get the same brand as you know it'll work properly etc 😉 

[StevieDvd]

What a lot of people forget to add in to their price guestimates is the post sales support that Celestron & the app authors have to provide. Several members here have had issues with phones on the compatability list who can attest to this. So it's not the same as the Celestron Nexyz phone holders which are hardware only which go for £50 or more and share a modular design with the Starsense to reduce costs.

 

[Sunshine]

You all may have heard me gush here on SGL about how awesome Starsense is, there are many who have stripped the module off the most inexpensive Celestron units and easily adapted them to larger dobs and such. Starsense is just plain awesome, best thing to come along in amateur astronomy since the eyepiece 😄

Edited September 12, 2023 by Sunshine

[RobertI]

5 hours ago, Sunshine said:

You all may have heard me gush here on SGL about how awesome Starsense is, there are many who have stripped the module off the most inexpensive Celestron units and easily adapted them to larger dobs and such. Starsense is just plain awesome, best thing to come along in amateur astronomy since the eyepiece 😄

Couldn’t agree more! It seems to be a situation where three technologies (mobile phone, Starsense and SkySafari) just work so well together and result in a simple to use product that maximises observing time and minimises hassle (at least for those with compatible phones!) whilst retaining the simplicity and “purity” of manual observing. I’m starting to sound like the Celestron marketing department! 😆

[bosun21]

I have been using the Starsense unit since its release more or less. I however ran into an issue the other night when I transferred it from my dobsonian onto my Skytee II mount. For the life of me I couldn't get it to recognise the sky. I'm not too bothered at the minute as it has worked flawlessly since I stripped it off of an LT70 .

[RobertI]

50 minutes ago, bosun21 said:

For the life of me I couldn't get it to recognise the sky. I'm not too bothered at the minute as it has worked flawlessly since I stripped it off of an LT70 .

Did you it getting working ok again? I had a similar problem, but realised I had the  time and location set to my holiday destination in Turkey, and it worked fine after that. I did have one issue last time out where it failed to find stars pointing towards the square of Pegasus, but was fine everywhere else, which was weird, as it’s been 100% reliable apart from that, even in moonlight. But pointing the scope in a slightly different direction picked up stars and allowed me to navigate to my target. 

Edited September 12, 2023 by RobertI

[bosun21]

23 minutes ago, RobertI said:

Did you it getting working ok again? I had a similar problem, but realised I had the  time and location set to my holiday destination in Turkey, and it worked fine after that. I did have one issue last time out where it failed to find stars pointing towards the square of Pegasus, but was fine everywhere else, which was weird, as it’s been 100% reliable apart from that, even in moonlight. But pointing the scope in a slightly different direction picked up stars and allowed me to navigate to my target. 

No unfortunately the clouds rolled in preventing any further investigation. I also think that there was a high layer of thin cloud hindering it further. The next clear night I will try it again. I also have two phones that I can use with the Starsense app installed ( both fully compatible. As I said it has worked flawlessly up to now so I am not overly concerned at this point. 🤞🤞.

Edited September 12, 2023 by bosun21

[paulastro]

On 12/09/2023 at 02:34, Sunshine said:

You all may have heard me gush here on SGL about how awesome Starsense is, there are many who have stripped the module off the most inexpensive Celestron units and easily adapted them to larger dobs and such. Starsense is just plain awesome, best thing to come along in amateur astronomy since the eyepiece 😄

Yes I have.  I'm a 'gusher' too.  Better than sliced bread 😊.

[Adrian_P]

This question is either so obviously stoopid or self evidently true that I almost hesitate to ask it, but I’ll go ahead anyway. Could a de-mounted Starsense scope like the Explorer 70LT be mounted on a twin saddle mount alongside your ‘good’ scope and be used effectively like a finder scope? So you use the Starsense to find objects, centre them with the 70LT, and then observe with your regular scope. I ask because I was thinking of getting a finder scope sometime and one one of these, even with a mount, is not massively more expensive. Would also help to balance the load without weights. Just an idea. 

[StevieDvd]

19 minutes ago, Adrian_P said:

This question is either so obviously stoopid or self evidently true that I almost hesitate to ask it, but I’ll go ahead anyway. Could a de-mounted Starsense scope like the Explorer 70LT be mounted on a twin saddle mount alongside your ‘good’ scope and be used effectively like a finder scope? So you use the Starsense to find objects, centre them with the 70LT, and then observe with your regular scope. I ask because I was thinking of getting a finder scope sometime and one one of these, even with a mount, is not massively more expensive. Would also help to balance the load without weights. Just an idea. 

Yes it could but the 70LT would need scope rings as the tripod it goes on is not a standard dovetail type. Though the usual answer is to use an adapter for the starsense to enable it to be mounted on a findershoe or similar.  The 70LT would be a bit big for a finderscope though.

The Starsense itself can be a replacement for a finderscope, that's how I use it.

 

[Adrian_P]

Ah, I see. The reason I asked was because my scope doesn't have a finder shoe and I'd been struggling with a stick on RDF for a while. As you say, though, a 70mm F10 refractor is a bit big and long for a finder scope, even if it could also double up, partially at least, as a counter weight on a twin saddle mount. 

It does make you wonder whether Celestron could chuck a Starsense onto, say, a 50mm finder scope, charge £150 or so and still make an honest profit rather than making folks cannibalise a perfectly good beginner scope just for a mirror, some plastic and a software license. 

[bosun21]

47 minutes ago, Adrian_P said:

Ah, I see. The reason I asked was because my scope doesn't have a finder shoe and I'd been struggling with a stick on RDF for a while. As you say, though, a 70mm F10 refractor is a bit big and long for a finder scope, even if it could also double up, partially at least, as a counter weight on a twin saddle mount. 

It does make you wonder whether Celestron could chuck a Starsense onto, say, a 50mm finder scope, charge £150 or so and still make an honest profit rather than making folks cannibalise a perfectly good beginner scope just for a mirror, some plastic and a software license. 

The LT70 is very light and wouldn't make much of a counterweight unless your main scope is very light as well.

[Concordia000]

On 11/09/2023 at 12:48, StevieDvd said:

Would I have preferred to buy the app & mount alone? Yes, of course and I too would like it to have been £25 for both, and I guess other scope manufacturers would like as well.

But let's be honest here, the app is written for Celestron by Simulation Curriculum Corp and includes a star catalog, plate-solvings and other features from their Sky Safari app which alone sell for £20 plus and don't need a phone mount.

I'm sure Celestron have looked at the options for the Starsense Explorer mount/app and have decided that selling as part of a product pack gives them a better return.  They have a similar phone holder mount that can get sales figures on (that sells for around £50) which does not include an app. Similar comments have been made at CN forum and sent to Celestron who rejected the sale of stand alone units being viable for their business model.

However, what I really wanted to post was that I think I found an issue and a solution for it that might help others.

I was using the Starsense without a problem until I zoomed in on an area and set a new target. The unit kept trying to find the position and seemed to be in a loop. As platesolving uses settings like fov I realised that a zoomed in image might not plate-solve. I zoomed out a bit and the plate-solve worked and the position was found and directions displayed on screen.

 

 

Speaking of SkySafari, I wonder if it is possible to DIY a Starsense by adding a board to a camera (say an ASI120mm) which plate solves the image and masquerade itself as an ASCOM-compliant push-to device. Then we can pair it up with SkySafari and use it to show the star map and catalog.

[AstroKeith]

1 minute ago, Concordia000 said:

Speaking of SkySafari, I wonder if it is possible to DIY a Starsense by adding a board to a camera (say an ASI120mm) which plate solves the image and masquerade itself as an ASCOM-compliant push-to device. Then we can pair it up with SkySafari and use it to show the star map and catalog.

Basically yes.

It's one of the versions of my eFinder project. ver 22 'The minimalist' just continually plate-solves and sends successful results direct to a wifi connected SkySafari.