I've had my setup for about a month now, must preface the below by saying I'm not experienced enough to know if this is the most efficient way of doing things...but it is fun!
I use a Logitech F710, silver colour with pretty coloured "A, B, C, D" buttons to adjust speed. Very happy with that as it can be seen in ambient light, has rubberised grips (important if you can't feel much in the cold
) and all the other things the Rumble had.
By the way, I'll plug the iPhone and iPad apps combined with WiFi Scope (see thread
http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...ad.php?t=92391). No need to spend $500 on a piece of hardware...
That's my next favourite way to slew the scope (for viewing, probably not so good for photography) using the iphone or ipad connected to the IP address of my laptop on the same wifi network - and you use your iphone to create a local wifi network if you are in the field. I mention this because it's another way of controlling the scope 'wireless' which is essentially what one is doing with a control pad.
So...to summarise My 'control everything from anywhere with everything else' setup (which can be confusing at times):
Celestron 9.25 XLT (has the CG-5 bar...if anyone's reading this, I wouldn't mind asking how to put a losmandy style bar on it and replace the head of my HEQ5 Pro to accept that...but don't know exactly how to do that yet...
)
HEQ5 connected to a laptop with a shoestring USB cable (EQDirect compatible)
EQASCOM and EQASCOMPAD
WiFi Scope
AlignMaster for precise alignment (which I have not achieved yet)
PHD for guiding (successfully tested once so far)
SkySafari Pro and Starmap HD on both iPad and iPhone - note that Starmap HD will show you how the alignment of your polar scope should look if you go into 'Settings' and then 'Date & Time'.
Logitech F710 pad for manual slewing
Cartes du Ciel
Stellarium (with scope control plug-in)
...now, if only the sky would remain clear for more than an hour I would be able to try finding Sigma Octantis
(excellent thing that has helped me a little is here:
http://astrobob.areavoices.com/2010/...ar-inequities/)
Have not started on the road of astro-photography yet, but when I sell my 8" Meade LX200R (UHTC) I'll shell out and get some sort of ED to experiment with!
