Setup for Remote Observatory

[AstroGS]

Morning - i am in the process to put together a rig + mount that i will be setting up at a remote telescope hosting facility in Spain. The weather in the UK does not allow me to enjoy this hobby any more (residing in Midlands does not help) and the level of investment so far, in my equipment, cannot be justified with 15 or 20 sessions each year. So, i have reached out to a couple of facilities in Spain that supposedly get over 200 nights of clear skies and with fully automated, secured and insured infrastructure.

 

I did start planning to build my own backyard obsy, with a roll off roof. I even bought a Pulsar pier, adaptor for my mount and i was about to bite the bullet for a ready-made obsy from shed shed shed. But, i still cannot justify this level of investment for up to 20 sessions a year. 

 

So, after a lot of thought i will be flying to Spain (subject to space availability on either of the facilities) end of Jan or early Feb, to setup my rig.
 

I will be using my existing available equipment:

• ZWO AM5 on a ZWO pier
• RedCat 61
• ASI2600MM + ZWO Filter Wheel + Antlia 2.8mn filters
• ZWO EAF
• OAG - L + ASI220mm
• Dewheaters + cabling

I am also planning to purchase the following: 

• Deep Sky Dad flat field panel for RC61 - to take calibration frames
• UPS (requested by the remote hosting obsies)
• Ethernet Switch (requested by the remote hosting obsies)
• Wi-Fi Power strips (recommended)

 

My main concern here is - taking under consideration that i am coming from ASIAir - that i am not sure which route to go down, regarding the PC. I will need to be able to control everything so, i would assume that NINA and PHD2 will be essential but, i would also need the PC to be powerful enough, to manage the pre-processing part and the stacking/ integration on Pixinsight so, i can transfer only the master files. So, i was thinking:

1. Either this one https://www.firstlightoptics.com/offers/offer_beelink-g6r5-5900hx-mini-pc_305574.html that has the ability to support pre- and processing tasks but, it will always be a mini PC
2. or this https://www.widescreen-centre.co.uk/primaluce-lab-eagle5-pro-computer-for-telescopes-and-astrophotography.html

 

The big difference is the price and i would probably think that the Eagle will be great but, i am not sure if it will cope die to memory and the processor with the integration of multiple files.

 

So, what are your thoughts? Am i forgetting something? Does anyone has any advice or suggestion for my quest?

 

 

Edited December 13, 2023 by AstroGS

[Space Oddities]

Out of curiosity, why do you want to transfer only the master files? Do you have a bandwidth limitation at the remote site?

I was under the impression that most people were using a service like Google Drive or similar, to synchronise the subs in real time to their cloud, and then sync/download everything to their main PC for processing. This way, they don't need a powerful PC at the remote site.

[AstroGS]

42 minutes ago, Space Oddities said:

Out of curiosity, why do you want to transfer only the master files? Do you have a bandwidth limitation at the remote site?

I was under the impression that most people were using a service like Google Drive or similar, to synchronise the subs in real time to their cloud, and then sync/download everything to their main PC for processing. This way, they don't need a powerful PC at the remote site.

Bandwidth can be an issue as far as I understand - especially when we talk about 100’s of light frames + calibration files. Of course if there is anyone with a personal experience from remote hosting observatories and can advice accordingly. I would love to be able to have a low spec Eagle or mini PC. 

[Starflyer]

Does the AM5 have the ability to search for and set its zero position remotely?  Things can and do go wrong and you need the ability to be able to reset the system into a known state remotely.

Remote hosting is something I'm thinking about too, I hadn't considered only transfering masters, I would expect to have everything uploaded somewhere for me at the end of a session.  It's not like you'll be in a rush for the data, if it takes a few hours then so what, and I reuse my darks and bias for a year and quite often reuse flats for a month or two.

[AstroGS]

14 hours ago, Starflyer said:

Does the AM5 have the ability to search for and set its zero position remotely?  Things can and do go wrong and you need the ability to be able to reset the system into a known state remotely.

Remote hosting is something I'm thinking about too, I hadn't considered only transfering masters, I would expect to have everything uploaded somewhere for me at the end of a session.  It's not like you'll be in a rush for the data, if it takes a few hours then so what, and I reuse my darks and bias for a year and quite often reuse flats for a month or two.

AM5 has the ability either manually or at the end of each session to park the OTA in the home position. The biggest complaint I’m hearing (as I’ve never tried it myself) is that the AM5 is a bit temperamental when it comes to alternative park positions. 
 

Re the file management I’m not sure and I will also need some advice from people with more experience than me. But, taking under consideration that the purpose of such a project, is to get as much data as possible as many night as possible, the total file sizes can escalate pretty fast. I only have a few examples, from my own projects, where  just the 120 light frames from one target resulted quite a few GB of data. 
 

 

[Space Oddities]

16 hours ago, AstroGS said:

Bandwidth can be an issue as far as I understand - especially when we talk about 100’s of light frames + calibration files. Of course if there is anyone with a personal experience from remote hosting observatories and can advice accordingly. I would love to be able to have a low spec Eagle or mini PC. 

Something that comes to mind - although I have no experience in running an observatory - if you use a cloud storage, you would have each file uploaded as it becomes available. Each file should take a few seconds to upload, and the next one would be available a few minutes later, depending on how long your lights are. So you wouldn't monopolise the whole bandwidth for hours.

Besides, I believe most cloud storage apps have a bandwidth limitation setting for upload and download. This could be useful if you're not in a hurry, and want to have the files uploaded in the background, without impacting the bandwidth too much.

You can see the bandwidth using Fast.com or Speedtest.net, and opt for a fraction of the maximum available bandwidth.

Are they charging you with the electricity you use? A more powerful PC would also be consuming more power, so that might be worth considering as well in the equation! 

[AstroGS]

2 hours ago, Space Oddities said:

Something that comes to mind - although I have no experience in running an observatory - if you use a cloud storage, you would have each file uploaded as it becomes available. Each file should take a few seconds to upload, and the next one would be available a few minutes later, depending on how long your lights are. So you wouldn't monopolise the whole bandwidth for hours.

Besides, I believe most cloud storage apps have a bandwidth limitation setting for upload and download. This could be useful if you're not in a hurry, and want to have the files uploaded in the background, without impacting the bandwidth too much.

You can see the bandwidth using Fast.com or Speedtest.net, and opt for a fraction of the maximum available bandwidth.

Are they charging you with the electricity you use? A more powerful PC would also be consuming more power, so that might be worth considering as well in the equation! 

No they do not charge electricity or any other utilities. These costs are part of the monthly rental fees. 
 

but, I agree that the possibility to store frames online as they become available could be an option. 

[discardedastro]

I'd go for something reasonably robust and ideally designed for unattended operation - small form factor servers like those used for edge computing which are set up to boot remotely, reliably. Whatever you go for, make sure you can get it booted up on just power (not needing the power button to be pushed - usually an option available in BIOS for "power on state") and go for as reliable you can on components - good-quality SSD of some sort, ECC memory, etc.

Bandwidth-wise, don't underestimate how much time you've got in daytime, I guess. If you're not getting frames back realtime, if you're moving files at just 1Mbps, in 12 hours that's over 40 gigabytes.

I'd focus on making your remote side ultra-reliable, ultra-robust, and just enough computer to do what you need for capture. If you're familiar enough or willing to learn, Linux will be far more reliable in general than Windows (don't have to worry about Windows Update halfway through a session, etc). If you've used the INDI stack before then KStars+INDI can be a very powerful setup on Linux, and pretty reliable. Otherwise, still focus on keeping the remote side simple. Keep the complex stuff and powerful machines close to home where you can apply percussive maintenance when they keel over!

For less than the (sexy, small, more-astro-features-in-one-box) Eagle you can pick up a brand new Supermicro tower server (e.g. this) with a reliable Xeon server processor, 32G of error-correcting reliable ECC RAM, dual 480GB Micron 7450 M.2 NVMe disks in RAID1 for redundancy for your operating system, dual 960GB Micron 5400 MAX SSDs in RAID1 with redundancy for your image data, out-of-band remote management through Supermicro IPMI, and expansion capability for days. For a splash more you could drop in a beefier CPU and GPU and have a very capable remote PixInsight box.

I'd suggest a CCTV camera if one isn't already provided. Vital to be able to see what you're doing when operating completely remotely. Reolink make perfectly good cheap IP cameras which also support turning the IR lamps off for (slow) low-light views.