ASIAIR Pro giving me headaches again.

[StevieDvd]

The ZWO sd-card is 32gb as that's the size of (all) the Linux partitions defined.  Unlike the PC disk copiers the sd-card write programs don't have an option to use the free space. I believe it is possible to resize the partition(s) later on a Linux system but not a trivial exercise for someone not familiar with Linux.

[Glenbo]

Well with all my equipment online I can verify that with V2.1 10.74  that my ASIAIR PRO is talking to my AVX mount (synced) Canon 100d DSLR, ZWO120 guide camera,  & ZWO EAF. The real test is getting it out on the field. But this is a positive sign so far. The mount is synced with my tablet coordinates & does a 1 star alignment & returns to home  position. Will keep u posted as I proress.

[The Admiral]

15 hours ago, Glenbo said:

The real test is getting it out on the field.

Well indeed that is a good start, but you certainly need to test for real. For example, the problems I had were things like PA alignment not seeming to work properly, tracking cancelled when trying to do all star PA, and failure to be able to successfully return to home properly after an imaging session, (but doing so before the session). I suspect everyone has different problems. Watch your mount like a hawk during the session.

Good luck!

Ian

[Elp]

33 minutes ago, The Admiral said:

problems

I can add more to that list if you want...

[saac]

@Glenbo, great to hear you are back talking to it, fingers crossed everything is fine now.  Yes please keep us posted, if it does start playing up I can provide an image of my flash card with its working OS.

I'm wondering what is going on here with the  AsiAir, within reason we should all be using the same software assuming we are all on the same firmware update. So if it is a software issue would we not all be experiencing the same glitches! I must admit, and touch wood, I haven't really had these serious problems you guys have been getting.  I connect to my AsiAir by ethernet mainly all the time but I don't think that should be a factor because the thing operates stand alone does it not?  Whatever it is , it is frustrating and spoiling the user experience of what is otherwise a great piece of kit. 

Jim 

[Elp]

It's not just same software/firmware/app version, obviously everyone's setup is different. But when I used my minis and pro with the latest app and firmwares, same setups, different setups totally random issues each time. In fact just the pro alone when I tried to use it with my azgti setup which had been working fine for two years prior, suddenly decided it wanted to throw me a random issue each time. I wasted six or so sessions and never got anywhere with it, I'm certain the software just didn't want to work with the pro as a result (maybe so users upgrade?). Rolled everything back, worked fine. Haven't got the pro anymore as WiFi range/signal is my priority so minis are my main, the plus is only marginally better WiFi wise than the gen 1, and I've had to mod the antenna bit, I'm sure zwo just don't test anything properly, or they don't write their own code and subcon it, hence so many issues.

Edited March 14 by Elp

[saac]

10 minutes ago, Elp said:

It's not just same software/firmware/app version, obviously everyone's setup is different. But when I used my minis and pro with the latest app and firmwares, same setups, different setups totally random issues each time. In fact just the pro alone when I tried to use it with my azgti setup which had been working fine for two years prior, suddenly decided it wanted to throw me a random issue each time. I wasted six or so sessions and never got anywhere with it, I'm certain the software just didn't want to work with the pro as a result (maybe so users upgrade?). Rolled everything back, worked fine. Haven't got the pro anymore as WiFi range/signal is my priority so minis are my main, the plus is only marginally better WiFi wise than the gen 1, and I've had to mod the antenna bit, I'm sure zwo just don't test anything properly, or they don't write their own code and subcon it, hence so many issues.

So it may be a conflict with other pieces of equipment, different mounts, cameras etc.  I use a plus and one of the old pros. My plus is mounted on my main setup at the moment and is getting fairly regular use with no real problems arising. Both connected by ethernet cable, I very rarely use the wifi. I connected the pro at Christmas just to get it ready for use with the other telescope and the only thing I had to do was update the firmware - this worked fine after an initial problem doing the update.  I haven't used it in anger yet seems to be doing what it is supposed to do. Fingers crossed it stays that way.

Jim 

[Glenbo]

2 hours ago, saac said:

So it may be a conflict with other pieces of equipment, different mounts, cameras etc.  I use a plus and one of the old pros. My plus is mounted on my main setup at the moment and is getting fairly regular use with no real problems arising. Both connected by ethernet cable, I very rarely use the wifi. I connected the pro at Christmas just to get it ready for use with the other telescope and the only thing I had to do was update the firmware - this worked fine after an initial problem doing the update.  I haven't used it in anger yet seems to be doing what it is supposed to do. Fingers crossed it stays that way.

Jim 

Well it's no secret that the ASIAIR & the AVX mount have relationship problems. More so than most other mounts. My AVX software is up to date & is a more recent model that uses a USB handset connector rather than a serial port. From what I have read the ASIAIR PLUS & MINI have a more AVX chipset friendly O.S., although I still hear unhappy Plus owners with their AVX. Lets face it astrophotography is expensive & the AVX is at the basement of its category in price & quality (IMO). At this point I am not willing to invest in another mount.  The closest spec mount would be the HQ5 mount which is quite a bit more $$$, older technology yet proven reliable. Is it the ASIAIR or the mount, or a bit of both? BTW I use a Vonnets wifi extender with my PRO  in station mode which considerably boosts my wifi signal. I have not yet dropped my signal during a session.

Edited March 14 by Glenbo

[The Admiral]

I think we need to be careful here, as if I understand correctly, the Plus (which is what I have) was launched using the standard RPi, before shortages caused ZWO to produce their own version using different chipsets. ZWO didn't change the model identifier, unfortunately. Please correct me if I'm wrong here.

I run mine with a ZWO harmonic mount, so running with all ZWO products you'd expect it to perform without issue, as indeed it did until it was auto-updated to v2 and above.  Initially I couldn't understand why things seemed to be going wrong. Now I've rolled back to v1.9 it seems to be working as before.

With luck yours will work without issue.

Ian

Edited March 14 by The Admiral

[Elp]

I think there's two or three versions of the plus and it's kind of bad zwo haven't defined them as such rather keeping the name the same (all this plus, pro, ultra, max nonsense needs to stop). I always wondered how my minis have better WiFi considering they're the "budget" one, I use them more than my plus for this reason alone. It was the latest air when I bought it near release. Some people report no issue with the WiFi of their plus which further confirmed to me there was another version compared to the one I've got. So the generational order is something like this: gen1, pro, plus, mini, plusV2, maybe plusV3.

Edited March 14 by Elp

[Glenbo]

13 minutes ago, Elp said:

I think there's two or three versions of the plus and it's kind of bad zwo haven't defined them as such rather keeping the name the same (all this plus, pro, ultra, max nonsense needs to stop). I always wondered how my minis have better WiFi considering they're the "budget" one, I use them more than my plus for this reason alone. It was the latest air when I bought it near release. Some people report no issue with the WiFi of their plus which further confirmed to me there was another version compared to the one I've got. So the generational order is something like this: gen1, pro, plus, mini, plusV2, maybe plusV3.

Yes you are right, it's getting ridiculous. I did not know that there were a few versions of the Plus that The Admiral & yourself have mentioned. I only knew there was a 32gb & a 512gb version.

[The Admiral]

This is interesting. The NarrowBand Channel has looked inside.

Ian

[Glenbo]

Thank you for that you tube liink. I bought a ZWO ASI224MC planetary cam for my Stellalyra 6" CC so it's good to know that the 256mb version has the faster frame rate if I plan to uprade in the future.

Edited March 15 by Glenbo

[The Admiral]

18 minutes ago, Glenbo said:

256mb version has the faster frame rate

Whether the 32GB version has the fast frame rate as the 256GB one is a bit if a moot point. This was asked several times in the comments, and the reply was that it has. However, I suppose the only way to tell for sure is to open one up, but it would be logical for ZWO to adopt the same hardware for both versions. BUT, ZWO's advertising is somewhat ambiguous: "The larger eMMC storage brings faster data transmission speed". This implies that the 256 chip is faster than the 32.

Ian

Edited March 15 by The Admiral

[Elp]

I've tested both the mini and the plus for planetary, made little to no difference and the mini "only" has usb 2 ports. There are only predefined set resolutions in the app so you don't get the flexibility to define your own small ROIs like you can on firecapture or OAcapture which is on astroberry.

[StevieDvd]

2 hours ago, The Admiral said:

Whether the 32GB version has the fast frame rate as the 256GB one is a bit if a moot point. This was asked several times in the comments, and the reply was that it has. However, I suppose the only way to tell for sure is to open one up, but it would be logical for ZWO to adopt the same hardware for both versions. BUT, ZWO's advertising is somewhat ambiguous: "The larger eMMC storage brings faster data transmission speed". This implies that the 256 chip is faster than the 32.

Ian

The early ASIAir Plus used the PI Composite module (processor) on a ZWO board.  These were soon replaced with a new ZWO board and a Rockchip processor.  ZWO cameras use Rockchip processors so they had a supplier when PI units were harder to source in volume.

When transferring files from the ASIAir Plus the sd-card is the slowest.  If not using wifi or ethernet you can also just connect the unit via the USB-c port and it should then act like a USB device to your PC, it's not well documented by ZWO but is mentioned here.

 

 

[Elp]

28 minutes ago, StevieDvd said:

When transferring files from the ASIAir Plus the sd-card is the slowest

I think you'll find if you actually remove said SD card and insert it into a dedicated SD card reader port on a computer it's actually the fastest transfer method. You get similar read speeds via a usb card reader but they're usually not as fast as having internal readers. I can copy a full sessions 15-20 odd Gb in around 2 odd minutes or less.

Edited March 15 by Elp

[StevieDvd]

11 minutes ago, Elp said:

I think you'll find if you actually remove said SD card and insert it into a dedicated SD card reader port on a computer it's actually the fastest transfer method. You get similar read speeds via a usb card reader but they're usually not as fast as having internal readers. I can copy a full 15 odd Gb in around 2 odd minutes or less.

I'm a bit outdated on the sd-card transfer speeds then - like in other things too 😶

I normally copy my image files using wi-fi/ethernet as it's less hassle, though I did try the USB-c connected to my laptop which seemed faster than using the sd-card via a USB3 adapter.

[Elp]

Most of the time I use the USB C via the mini, the benefit is it also powers on via the one cable, it's okay, not too fast just do it for convenience. With the plus you have to 12v power it to do the same. But I have found sometimes even though I know there's data written onto the memory as seen via the app, when usb connected they sometimes don't show in windows, so a workaround I've used is to WiFi connect to the mini, then web browse to the unit and copy that way (where they do show up).

Off topic, but hopefully the OP can resolve their AVX connection.

[Glenbo]

Because I use a DSLR for DSO & not a dedicated astro camera I transfer all subs directly to my camera via the Mini USB data cable. It saves me from having to use another USB 3 port to plug in the ASIAIR flash drive.

[saac]

I tend to transfer the files from the AsiAir by downloading to my laptop (in the house) using the ethernet connection.  I use a PowerLine Network adapter to connect the observatory to the laptop in the house. Works fine so far, touch wood. 

Jim 

[Glenbo]

To update the situation, I used a 64gb Micro SD this time to do the backup & it worked!  Now with V 1.9.1 installed in my app & was able to install the appropriate firmware with the new O.S. copy. I have since sold my ASIAIR PRO & purchased an ASIAIR Plus 32gb.