Philips SPC880NC is now.......

[lynnm]

ok i'm on the bandwagon to - just ordered the cam, filter and adaptor - look forward to playing with it and see what can be imaged....

[Andrew INT]

Hi Lynnm,

I did the conversion a couple pf months ago. It took a few attempts to get it right, but everying works a treat now )

Kind regards, Andrew

[Andymod]

Just got mine today from morgans, flashed it with my old laptop following the instructions from Russ. Now have a SPC900. Just a quick question, is there a thread which describes dismantling and fitting the nosepiece. I just cannot find one

[yesyes]

This very thread has several links to the procedure. But I do see how this could be hard to find on 20 pages.. :-)

Here is a link to instructions with pictures:

Philips SPC900NC Webcam for Astrophotography

[Red Alert]

Somebody please help me. I have flashed the camera, I am now on my windows 7 laptop that i want to use. I have installed the drivers from the phillips website but no matter how hard i try I can not get the camera to work. I am not able to find where the drivers get installed to, and i have found a 900 nc folder but it does not seem to have drivers for windows 7, says the .inf file is not for x86 bit windows. Any help???

[yesyes]

Back on your XP machine where you flashed the webcam, had it been detected as a SPC900NC after flashing, unplugging and plugging it back in?

[Red Alert]

To be honest I do not know if it said it was a 900 after doing it. It may well be that it has not flashed properly.

[yesyes]

That's what I was trying to find out from you :-)

Can you try on the other machine?

[Red Alert]

No I cant today, its at the in laws house. <shudder>

I will try and get it done again tomorrow. Shame because it looks like a crystal clear night tonight.

[Red Alert]

When I get back to the xp comp, will i need to install the drivers on there at all or do i just plug it in and it will see it is a 900 then i know it is done?

[parkwood-97]

Problem with SPC 900 & Win 7

I flashed an 880 to 900 on my XP laptop - no problems, thanks to Russ's tutorial. The camera was then tried on a friend's Win 7 laptop but it did not work. Downloaded spc900.00dw7_eng.exe from Morgans, ran it (no error reports) and connected the 900. The camera's light came on and there was the usual sound when things are plugged into USB port; however, Win 7 did not ask for the driver.

Windows reported “device working properly” but on opening capture software (Sharpcap), the camera was not listed , only the laptop's built in webcam. Over 2-3 hours we tried reinstalling software and anything we could think of - without success. We tested the ports with other devices and they were OK. If the 900 had inadvertently been plugged in before the correct drivers had been installed, would that prevent the 900 from working? Any help would be much appreciated.

[Andymod]

This very thread has several links to the procedure. But I do see how this could be hard to find on 20 pages.. :-)

Here is a link to instructions with pictures:

Philips SPC900NC Webcam for Astrophotography

Cheers for that I knew i had read something but just could not find it.

[stevenson166]

Ok ordered mine delivered today.. long story no XP but had an old legit disc. Gotten now a XP vm for windows 7 and have got the webcam to register as a PCVC750K (on XP) with a desktop folder 880 , been at this for 4 hours now and cannot seem to update it the info on the site is void of direct links unles it is me ??

Should have paid the extra #3 to have it flashed but missed the webpage for it

Edited January 8, 2011 by stevenson166

[JB80]

Just ordered mine.

Thanks in advance for this thread, I'm sure it will be very helpful to me.

[Altair]

Problem with SPC 900 & Win 7

I flashed an 880 to 900 on my XP laptop - no problems, thanks to Russ's tutorial. The camera was then tried on a friend's Win 7 laptop but it did not work. Downloaded spc900.00dw7_eng.exe from Morgans, ran it (no error reports) and connected the 900. The camera's light came on and there was the usual sound when things are plugged into USB port; however, Win 7 did not ask for the driver.

Windows reported “device working properly” but on opening capture software (Sharpcap), the camera was not listed , only the laptop's built in webcam. Over 2-3 hours we tried reinstalling software and anything we could think of - without success. We tested the ports with other devices and they were OK. If the 900 had inadvertently been plugged in before the correct drivers had been installed, would that prevent the 900 from working? Any help would be much appreciated.

If you havent resolved it yet - try disabling your laptop webcam first then start up sharpcap hopefully it will then find your 900

[SniffTheGlove]

Ok ordered mine delivered today.. long story no XP but had an old legit disc. Gotten now a XP vm for windows 7 and have got the webcam to register as a PCVC750K (on XP) with a desktop folder 880 , been at this for 4 hours now and cannot seem to update it the info on the site is void of direct links unles it is me ??

Should have paid the extra #3 to have it flashed but missed the webpage for it

Read post#5 in the first page of this thread, the instructions are there.

If you can not understand them, then you need unplug the SPC Cam, reboot the XP VM, Start Shapcap on VM, Run WcRmac on the VM then do the update.

Unplug the SPC Cam and shutdown the VM then reboot your PC, plug in cam and install the drivers for your OS.

For extras, then install WcRmac and Sharpcap on your PC, run Sharpcap, chose the SPC900 in Devices then run WcRmac and do any changes you might like as specified on the WcRmac webpage then do a backup of the firmware for safety.

Shutdown WcRmac and away you go. Should sort it for you.

If anyone else has trouble and you are not running a VM then subsitute VM for XP OS

HTH

[parkwood-97]

Thanks Altair. Have already tried that but no luck.

[griff_dai]

sorry for a newbie question, has anyone come up with a method and instruction list for people with only Windows 7 32 or 64 bit laptops.????????

from what I read problems are with the webcams in the newer laptops..

want to try this but flashing things are the bane of my life, bricked a few mobiles doing it

[haitch]

sorry for a newbie question, has anyone come up with a method and instruction list for people with only Windows 7 32 or 64 bit laptops.????????

from what I read problems are with the webcams in the newer laptops..

want to try this but flashing things are the bane of my life, bricked a few mobiles doing it

I've seen an SPC880 running on Windows 7 without being flashed. All you need to do is install the drivers manually and point it to the SPC900 drivers. It'll probably give you some warnings about the driver not being the right one but it does work - I've seen it.

Edited January 10, 2011 by haitch

[parkwood-97]

Your message may have solved the problem I posted on 8 Jan. It is the "point it to the 900 drivers" that may be difficult. When running the exe.file from Morgan's site to install the 900 drivers, there are no errors reported but it is not clear where the drivers are installed. How do you find them?

[david's dob]

iv'e just brought the SPC 880 and installed and flashed the software to 900, the only issue i have is with the focus. I attached the webcam to my 8' 200p dob tried looking at the moon with outthe IR/UV filter, but using the 2x barlows lens and it looked like a white blurry image.

I tried reducing the focus on my scope outwards direction but still blurry image, im using Wxastrocapture software. Is this to do the gain and brightness on the software

Iv'e read somewhere that i should focus the moon using the 10mm Eyepeice and then adjust the gain / brightness to get the right image. I have ordered the IR/UV cut filter from morgans in the meantime.

Edited January 11, 2011 by david's dob

[SniffTheGlove]

iv'e just brought the SPC 880 and installed and flashed the software to 900, the only issue i have is with the focus. I attached the webcam to my 8' 200p dob tried looking at the moon with outthe IR/UV filter, but using the 2x barlows lens and it looked like a white blurry image.

I tried reducing the focus on my scope outwards direction but still blurry image, im using Wxastrocapture software. Is this to do the gain and brightness on the software

Iv'e read somewhere that i should focus the moon using the 10mm Eyepeice and then adjust the gain / brightness to get the right image. I have ordered the IR/UV cut filter from morgans in the meantime.

I have just played with my modded cams (both of them) and can focus fine on the moon with or without the IR/UV filter.

I do have to have the drawtube really into to get the focus point but once there it does focus. The cam has a FL of about 6mm so once you have got your 10mm focused the swap out and shorted the FL with the focuser.

Using Sharpcam on XP on my 10in Dob.

[stevenson166]

Thanks SniffTheGlove...windows 7 now recognises SPC900N

[parkwood-97]

I've seen an SPC880 running on Windows 7 without being flashed. All you need to do is install the drivers manually and point it to the SPC900 drivers. It'll probably give you some warnings about the driver not being the right one but it does work - I've seen it.

Regards

Haitch

Your message may have solved the problem I posted on 8 Jan. It is the "point it to the 900 drivers" that may be difficult. When running the exe.file from Morgan's site to install the 900 drivers, there are no errors reported but it is not clear where the drivers are installed. How do you find them?

[Manning]

I dauntlessly ran into the Win 7 problem.

Got 880NC cam from Morgans, and cant install the 880NC drivers on my laptop (or any other pc in the house for that matter)

Has anyone confirmed the 900NC drivers work right off the bat on win 7 and all the bells and whistles are working with the cam for astronomy use, if win 7 is pointed to the drivers as stated?