the grasshopper3 usb3 version?

[h0ughy]

http://grasshopper3.ptgrey.com/USB3/Grasshopper3

would this be good for solar work they have a 4mp version that does 90 frames per second?

[Merlin66]

Just a question....
For us minions who still have USB2 ports.....can a USB3 work with them?? (At a reduced frame rate??)
Also, what about pricing......

[Occulta]

These work very well for Solar imaging. A friend had one at the annular eclipse however she explained that she had to find a laptop with the 'correct' USB port configuration to get the camera to work.

Point Grey were very helpful and I would suggest you contact them before you make a decision.

[Derek Klepp]

Dave go onto Solarchat there is a lot of discussion going on there.Check out Randy Shivaks and Alan Friedmans recent posts.I honestly think there may be a need for two cameras if you were to concentrate on close ups as well as whole disc shots.Peter and Paul really have their discs looking very good with the new cameras.I,ll just wait for the Gstar to go kaput before I upgrade.

[h0ughy]

gee that's very hit and miss - i have two laptops and on the main observatory PC i have 3 USB3 ports? how can i tell if they are "acceptable"

[Occulta]

Sorry Dave I don't know the full details but she could only find one laptop that had the correct port configuration. That's why I suggested you contact Point Grey first.

[Peter Ward]

Humm...careful what your wish for.....

Can't say I'm totally happy with my GX 6.0mp...

There seems to be some sort of in camera processing going on that is impossible to switch off, that causes banding in areas of very low contrast
possibly due low well depth, but I *never* saw this in my Lumenera Skynyx 2-2...and it makes spickules *very* hard to capture without artifacts.

...and there is the data volume problem. 5-6 Gb raw data files take time to process, even on cutting edge PC platforms.

Lastly, support software.

Without Firecapture I'd be screwed with the GX 6.0mp, I'd want to make sure there was: capture + real-time camera settings + preview software available prior to parting with some serious $$

[stanlite]

generally USB 3 ports are coloured blue

click on the image to see what I mean

http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=XC4947

they are also usally only found on the latest laptops and even then usally only one or two with the rest being USB 2 (they are backwards compatiable with all USB but you can't connect a USB 3 device into a USB 2 port as it won't work.

USB 3 is the way of the future coming to a computer near you soon they offer data transfer speeds of up to 4.8Gb/s with plans to upgrade this to 10Gb/s by mid to late 2013. All the connections (apart from the normal USB port connctions) are different from USB 2 i believe also

[Paul Haese]

Hmmm, I have been watching the releases for some time as I want one camera in particular. The cameras released so far are not the ones I would purchase just yet. Personally I will be waiting for the releases in the second half of the year. I don't have the same problems that Peter has. My camera is working well.

The cameras coming will have higher through puts and larger sensors. My goal is to capture at 2.5x with one sensor and no mosaics.

The version you mention Dave, is a cmos sensor and certainly not my choice of sensor. Every thing sounds good at 90fps but your machine has to be able to guts that down. I can tell you that a fast machine is essential and I mean fast. You will have to buy a gaming fast machine and top of the line to even come close to that frame rate at 4mp.

Pete your machine must be too slow. I bought a 4 grand machine and it cranks out this stuff like no bodies business. 3 minutes to do a 4 gig data file from start to finish. Capture in real time view. ;)

[h0ughy]

what size camera would that be Paul?

[Peter Ward]

I'm using an very recent i-7, 3.2 Ghz, hex core processor on Win7/64 bit with 32Gig of RAM...I don't think it's slow....

...yet still the GX 6.0mp 2736 x 2192 files take time....my usual 5 pane mosaic will take an hour (i.e. about 12 minutes per pane) in .avistack.

[Paul Haese]

Looking at the 9mp version. Smaller pixels but it covers almost and using the a 2.5 will allow be to make the image smaller by going further out. Powermates are good like that.

[Paul Haese]

Hmmm must be hard drive then. 9 panels in 42 minutes here, and that is allowing for saving etc. Averages are around 3 minutes in Avi stack. i7 myself not as much RAM but using a 7200 rpm drive for both recording and storage. I do have an SSD too but not installed that yet. Admittedly I am using a 2.8mp camera and that would account for a slower rate but I would think 1 hour is not bad anyway. It used to take my old machine 12 hours to process out the same data, so 42 minutes for me is great.

[h0ughy]

is this in the grasshopper line or another manufacturer?

[Paul Haese]

It's the grasshopper line of cameras in USB3.

[h0ughy]

thanks Paul.

[Peter Ward]

12Tb (4x 3Tb 7200rpm) RAID? doubt it. the OS is also on a SSD.

I usually do 750 frames per pane....or 5Gb..... Probably a case of 6 million pixels per frame just taking time...

Thought about the 9.0Mp camera.... nup....seeing, rather than oversampling I think is the problem.

I'd rather see a 1.5", 5-micron form-factor CCD that can do, say, 20fps.

CMOS I think would end in tears, too many artifacts from the chip architecture....

[RickS]

That's the whole point of backwards compatibility. Generally, you can connect a USB 3 device to a USB 2 port and it will work but at the slower rate. That's what the spec says and also what appears to happen in practice: I have several USB 3 devices that I regularly swap between USB 2.0 ports on my old laptop and USB 3.0 ports on my newer desktop and laptop computers.

[Paul Haese]

I won't be oversampling that much. I would sample at a much higher rate with planetary work. At around 0.8"- 0.12" per pixel. Besides Alan Friedman is capturing in one panel on his 6mp camera. I am not sure what your concerns are here. Your focal length of your scope is a bit of an enemy to you. Yes seeing can be a problem but at that sort of mag it is nothing compared to planetary imaging.

I agree about the larger sensor with 5 microns and 20fps. That will come in time I suppose, but for now I am interested in not doing mosaics anymore.

[mithrandir]

What sort of RAID Peter? Software RAID like you find on PC motherboards is not fast. For speed you need a RAID card. If your RAID is on NAS it will never be as fast as if it was internal. Also RAID-5 (the norm for 3 disk configs) is slower than other formats. RAID-10 is the fastest but you need 4 disks to get speed and redundancy.

[Poita]

Definitely hard drive or some other issue. Try processing from the SSD, I am processing similar images in way less time from my 6MP camera on my Mac laptop with SSD.

[Poita]

If you are imaging in 8bit, then it will be the gamma problem with the grasshopper. I have been fighting with Pt Grey over this for a while now, they finally acknowledged that their gamma implementaion isn't correct. The only way around it is to capture in 12bit or 16bit and use a LUT to fix it.
I am testing a new Lumenera camera at the moment that is scheduled for release in Q4, there will be a 2.8MP, 6MP and 9MP model, the 6MP one looks to be the business at the moment, very impressed so far.
Pricing is going to be noticeably higher than the PGR cameras, but framerates and noise are better so far.

[Poita]

The 2.8MP model in USB3 is the one of choice I reckon at the moment. It will image at top framerate in 16bit which is important with Pt Grey's gamma being broken in 8bit. The firewire version of the same camera won't do the full framerate in 16bit so go the USB3 version.

However, wait a couple of months, there are new cameras coming from Pt Grey and Lumenera in the 2nd half of the year and they will be the ones you will want for solar. If you are using a desktop PC you are welcome to borrow my grasshopper and firewire card to have a play (I have the FW800 version).

[Peter Ward]

That's very interesting! Lumenera make a good product...but given the PGR
6.0mp is already $4k, even higher pricing could be a sticking point.

[h0ughy]

back onto this topic, how would the grasshopper3 compare to the Image source Celestron Skyris?

[Poita]

The Skyris is only 640x480, the PGR will eat it for breakfast :)

The PGR cameras have better images than the IS cameras, even when using the same CCD. Better layout and design internally seems to result in less noise and better images.

The new quad-tap Lumenera is worth waiting for if you want to do high-end stuff.

[Camelopardalis]

Only the 618 is 640x480. The 445 is 1280x960 and 274 is 1600x1200. And all under US$1000 :D

[h0ughy]

of course i am looking at the 274 - and as for the grasshopper i am not sure if that issue of the gamma has been rectified?