Quote:
Originally Posted by gregbradley
I currently use an SBIG ST402ME as an autoguider.
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...and you're expecting something better on todays market? Let me know when you find it....
The KAF-402ME chip provides the best value for serious auto guiding with its NABG characteristics and extremely high QE. It makes obtaining guide stars an absolute breeze and is versatile. I've used it with OAG's attached to PIR's through to piggy-back set ups via a wide field refractor.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bassnut
It also has a shutter so you can easily take darks for it, which makes a huge difference and it can be binned.
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Too right Fred. Not sure if others have tried this, but guider darks and bias will allow you to obtained cleaner guider images allowing you to guide on even fainter stars. Why would I do that? We'll if you're operating an OAG and guide star selection is limited for a specific framing composition, you'll need to guide on a fainter star. Lets face it, guiding through an OAG doesn't deliver the brightest of images (MMOAG maybe an exception). How faint? It will depend on guider noise, but the concept of calibration frames is to reduce that noise so that the guiding algorithm doesn't mistaken a group of hot pixels as a faint star (rare these days but it happens). If you let automation software determine the guider interval, you can simply take a 15 or 20 sec dark and use the bias to scale to match the guider frame duration. Easy. MaximDL supports full guider calibration in which I recommend utilising.
Stick with the 402ME, or sell it to make someone else really happy.