View Single Post
  #9  
Old 27-07-2017, 03:28 PM
gregbradley's Avatar
gregbradley
Registered User

gregbradley is offline
 
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Sydney
Posts: 17,877
I've been using SBIG STi guide cameras for the last several years. The main advantage to them is the shutter so it will do an autodark.

Sometimes with guide cameras you get hot pixels and line artefacts that the software can confuse with the guide star and give whacky corrections. It also makes callibrating the autoguider nearly impossible as the software keeps confusing artefacts with the guide star.

The STi is set to auto dark in the Sky X and you can see the hot pixels being removed that if you click auto select guide star before the dark subtraction you can see the software chosing a hot pixel very often. It takes one autodark when you start it and the software keeps using that and subtracting it from every exposure from then on.

I have found them trouble free. You can't run too long a cable though as you can get a voltage drop and the shutter can stick. But with a short good cable that isn't a problem.

Lodestar is more designed to work with Maxim or some other software that can do a library dark subtract. Otherwise you could collide with the problem above.

I don't use Maxim so I couldn't rig it to do a library dark subtract like the SBIG does. Also the build quality of the SBIG is higher than the Lodestar where the board you plug your cable into is weakly glued in place.

As far as sensitivity goes I think they are similar. If the Lodestar is a tad better that won't mean much if you get whacky corrections from a hot pixel that ruins your images.

Perhaps the Lodestar firmware has been improved but I would check that out pretty carefully as they are quite expensive for what they are. Also there is a newer model which is more sensitive. I think its called UltraStar.

Greg.
Reply With Quote