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Old 29-08-2011, 06:18 AM
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pmrid (Peter)
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Moravian Instruments CCDs

I'm looking at a new camera and have decided to include Moravians in the mix. I haven't heard much feedback about them from anyone though. I'd be glad to have the benefit of anyone out there who has one of them and can comment on their build, performance etc.
Peter
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Old 29-08-2011, 07:26 AM
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Geoff has one, Peter. He'll probably see this and chime in...
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Old 29-08-2011, 08:43 AM
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Not quite on the thread topic but for your fast Newtonian you ideally would have a small pixelled camera chip and of course low noise. The KAF8300 or any of the new KAI 5.5 - 6.8 micron pixelled chips would be good.
They go from .4mp to 50mp! Some are only offered as one shot colour. The KAI16000 mono is the same size as the 11002 chip but 16mp instead of 10.7 and smaller pixels for more resolution and similar QE ( a bit lower). The 11002 is the proven performer but is 9 microns.

I think there are several points to consider when chosing a chip:

1. Focal length of the scope and local seeing (smaller pixels (5-4 microns to 6.8 microns, work better on short focal lengths, bigger pixels (9 microns) are a good all round performer and are usually used in the larger chips (11002, 16803). 1 pixel/arc second is a rule of thumb for matching chip and
optics. There is a free Wodaski CCD calculator that is very helpful in choosing between different chip/scope combos. Its at NewAstro Press website.

2. Field of view you want to image at. A small chip will give a small FOV and a magnified image compared to a larger chip on the same scope. Generally speaking, wider FOV large chips are better as you can always crop them to produce the same magnified image if the pixels are the same size in the 2 cameras. For example you could crop a 16803 chip image in half to get the same FOV as in an image from a 11002 chip.

3. QE (sensitivity) of the chip. Higher QE camera chips are better than lower QE. Also well depth comes into it but in a lesser way - deeper wells are better than shorter wells as deep wells allow a broader dynamic range for the same noise level and prevent overexposing stars too easily.

4. Artifacts. Some chips have bad performance charateristics like too noisy, too low QE, QE performance weak in the Ha band, microlens artifacts (like 3200ME), reflections from the chip cover slip (some makers will install a chip without the cover slip - FLI and Apogee, you gain 2% QE, lose some minor reflections in some instances around stars). Another artifact is RBI - residual bulk image or ghosting. All KAF sensors do it, KAI Sensors do not.
Some KAF sensors do it more than others - KAF3200ME, KAF09000 chips.
In my experience and testing of my KAF16803 RBI seems to be virtually undetectable (a dark taken right after an image of a glob shows no unsual ghost images of stars except once). FLI and Apogee have built in RBI control which is controlled in Maxim. I don't think any of the others have that feature.

5. One shot colour versus mono. Mono is better performing but requires a filter wheel and filters which adds often another $1500 to $3500 more depending on the size of the chip, the size of the filter wheel and filters.
One shot colour is good for people with uncertain weather so every shot counts. Mono requires 4 filtered images to make one LRGB colour image.
It requires clearer stable weather to do that. One shot colour is usually a lot less sensitive than mono (typically QE for mono is 50-65% but for one shot colour often around 25%).

But there is a new type of one shot colour KAI sensors from Kodak that are LRGB instead of RGGB (Bayer matrix of coloured microlenses put on top of the mono chip to create one shot colour). These sensors are both small pixelled (good for your scope) and higher QE - more aorund 43% QE).
These are available in FLI, Apogee. Other makers may put one in if you asked for one.

For example the KAI8050 colour would be a competitor for the KAF8300 (same size but the KAI has both mono and one shot colour).
There is a 10100 that could be a nice chip for your setup.

6. Accessories and design.

The smallest, cheapest and best performing small pixelled camera chip is the KAF8300.

The main makers of 8300 chipped cameras are FLI, Apogee, QSI, SBIG,Moravian, QHY, Atik, Starlight Express.

The main features of a camera that should be considered once you know what chip you want are:

Noise levels (they are not all the same by a long way. Apogee and FLI have very low noise, clean electronics). I don't know about the others.

QSI makes a camera with built in filter wheel and offaxis guider that takes 25mm filters (the cheapest) for the KAF8300 chip (a very popular choice).

They now make a series 600 which has better cooling and faster downloads.

As far as I can tell the quality of fit and finish, electronics, fast downloads, RBI control, choice of chips, accessories and price seems to go in this very rough evaluation:

1. SBIG and QSI probably are slightly the cheapest.
2. FLI and Apogee are more the competitors for each other and are fairly close but I give the edge to FLI due to fast cooldown time, better cooling (unless you buy the Alta extra cooling DO9 body which costs more), sealed chambers (no frosting or desiccant plugs) with inert gas in them, clean electronics, fast download times (FLI is fastest, QSI series 600 may be similar), lowest read noise (FLI lowest, Apogee would be close), high quality electronics and CCD chamber windows, they offer no cover slip on CCDs (I don't know the others do), they guarantee their CCD chambers and guarantee squareness of the chips (very important with the larger chips) they have evolved to be a stable platform with no known issues.
QSI is a popular choice as the combo of built in filter wheel, offaxis guider is very appealling.

SBIG offer AO units which work on some cameras although the main advantage of the SBIB camera is self guiding and that is not available in the ST8300 camera. Also body and fittings quality of the ST8300 body is much lower than FLI and Apogee and probably QSI. Power fittings for example are cheap and break easily. ST402 is a great autoguiding camera though.

So to summarise if I were buying a camera for a 10 inch F3.8 Newt I would get either (depending on budget of course but assuming that is not too huge an issue given the PMX mount):

FLI or Apogee of QSI 8300 camera. If I got the QSI I'd go the bit extra and get the series 600 with the built in filter wheel and offaxis guider. I would get Astrodon Gen 11 filters not anything else.

Or an 11002 chipped camera (a bit dated now perhaps?? but still a good performer).

Or one of the new true sense one shot colour like the KAI 10100 or is it 10500?

Moravian is fairly new and in my experience watching camera makers develop their products it seems they take a few generations of cameras to hit a highly engineered and thoroughly developed camera. They rarely get it
right straight away. Bugs like pattern noise, reflections, CCD chamber window reflections, cover slip reflections, slow cooling, inadaquate cooling,
poor fittings, bugged software drivers that are incompatible with latest Windows version,filter wheels that are not 100% repeatable, too heavy putting stress on focusers, filter wheels only accept 3mm thick, FLI and Apogee can handle any thickness (Astronomik filters are only about 1mm thick).

I think this covers the main considerations. There are others. If you want to primarily do narrowband you go for the highest QE possible like 3200ME (89% QE) or 6303E (65% in Ha) or 16803 (60% QE and over 50% at Ha).

Choosing a CCD is a lot more complex and there a lot of considerations to take into account than there at first appears to be.

Greg.
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Old 29-08-2011, 10:45 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by RickS View Post
Geoff has one, Peter. He'll probably see this and chime in...
Greg, that's a very comprehensive contribution and one that I think probably deserves a wider audience.
(Mods to note)
Peter
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Old 29-08-2011, 05:31 PM
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Greg,

Whats your thoughts on KAF-6303E based sensors cameras ?

Regards
Chris
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Old 22-09-2011, 02:03 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by pmrid View Post
I'm looking at a new camera and have decided to include Moravians in the mix. I haven't heard much feedback about them from anyone though. I'd be glad to have the benefit of anyone out there who has one of them and can comment on their build, performance etc.
Peter
Peter,

Excellent camera and well made. I use the G2-8300 for my imaging and I am very happy with the simplicity of the camera and how well it operates. Camera's are well built, easy to use and the service from the Australian distributor is excellent. I have had nothing but happiness since I got mine. A steep learning curve but once I mastered it, it is easy to use and the CCD is very sensitive. Happy to show you if interested. Check out this site for some user images....

http://www.astroshop.com.au/moravian/customer.htm

Drop me a line if you have specific questions....

Robert
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Old 22-09-2011, 03:26 PM
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Robert

Whats typical download speed of a full frame ?
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Old 30-09-2011, 07:35 AM
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Greg,

Whats your thoughts on KAF-6303E based sensors cameras ?

Regards
Chris
Sorry only just saw this.

I have never used the KAF6303E but it is a highly regarded chip.
One of the highest QEs in the Ha band and a total QE of about 68% which is similar to the KAF09000.

9 micron pixels seems to be a good one size fits all scopes type pixel size. Large well depth - 100,000+. The main drawback of this chip is it is not anti-blooming. From what I have been told you have to watch the brighter stars and exposure lengths because of that as even though there are software that claim to handle blooms in reality they don't do a perfect job.

I think that is why it seems to be mainly popular with narrowband imagers who are looking for high QE in the narrowband ranges which this chip delivers. Steve Crouch has demonstrated it is a powerful imaging chip as well. Just the blooming thing would be a pain.

The 6303 also seems more prone to degradation over time - based on a comment by Richard Crisp.

It is also quite an expensive chip and 6303 chipped cameras are usually around US$7000+. STL6303 is one of the cheapest especially at the moment with their sale at $5995.

The KAF8300 is better bang for your buck, is antiblooming, more defect free, way cheaper and not that much less sensitive. I think its about 50% QE in Ha.

Greg.
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Old 01-10-2011, 07:22 AM
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Greg. Thanks for the comprehensive ccd round up and your response to my thread. Choosing is not so easy given the variety and price differences.

Quote:
9 micron pixels seems to be a good one size fits all scopes type pixel size.
I'm using Canon lenses in varying focal lengths, 100 - 400mm and thinking of a KAF8300 or KAI 8050 OSC in either the QSI, Moravian, FLI or Apogee. These sensors have 5.4 and 5.5 micron pixels and are 4/3 format. At 200mm, under my seeing conditions 5.5u is about right (according to the Apogee ccd university). At 400mm the pixels will be too small - binning can be used to 'increase' pixel size in this case. At 100mm the difference seems marginal. There are sensitivity issues as well. This part of the decision is more complex - smaller pixels or bigger pixels vs sensitivity and sampling??? Should I be looking at a larger pixel size and less megapixels (say 4) for this application?
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Old 01-10-2011, 03:15 PM
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I don't think the 5.4 micron pixels will be too small at 400mm focal length at all. They are good up to about 1200mm.

If you want one shot colour I would consider the 8050 over the 8300 as the 8050 is the true sense Kodak sensor. They are supposed to be twice as sensitive in low light situations than the traditional colour sensor.
The new true sense sensors (there are several) should outperform the traditional Bayer style one shot colour sensors. There is also a 10 megapixel one as well.

The downside is I haven't seen anyone use one yet so you may be the first one to use one!

Greg.
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Old 08-10-2011, 07:17 AM
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I can make some comments about the Moravian G2 8300 since I own one. I've yet to actually use it for imaging partly due to the long wait for my MX, lousy weather, and not being motivated to use my old equipment. But in the meantime I've "experimented" quite a lot with software, particularly with software that would play nice with the MX.

Here are the issues as I see it. I can say without hesitation that the ASCOM drivers for the G2 8300 are unreliable, especially with regard to moving the inbuilt filter wheel. I tested the ASCOM drivers in CCDSoft, AstroArt and TSX (camera plugin). In all of these programs the movement of the filter wheel is unreliable and I cannot get Moravian to admit that there is a problem. Moravian did fix an issue with dark frame exposures that I brought to their attention, but it took some time. This presents some real problems; without a reliable ASCOM driver you can basically forget about CCDSoft, especially in WIN7 64 bit. In Win7 images from the G2-8300 will not download (they do in XP). After working with Evan Warkentine for over a month he finally wrote an X2 driver for CCDSoft that will allow an image to download though in order to achieve this he had to remove all CCD temperature readouts. Given that there is no native driver for the G2-8300 in CCDSoft (and Moravian seems uninterested in writing one) I have abandoned the idea of using this software. I think I can use the TSX camera plugin, ignore the filter issue, and at least use TSX for T-Point with the camera, but imaging will be a no go.

I'm trying to decide between spending a lot on MaxIM, or somewhat less on AstroArt. Both have native drivers, but obviously MaxIm is much deeper. The camera does come with a reliable imaging program (SIPS) but I find it limiting in that it will not run FocusMax, or guide with the equipment I own (SSAG). In fact with FocusMax it's either CCDSoft, or MaxIM.... I did get AstroArt to run my focuser (Starizona Microtouch), but I'm not sure how their builtin autofocus program compares to FocusMax (I'm guessing perhaps not as well).

The bottom line for me is that I'm not thrilled by the software for the G2-8300 and I wish I'd done my homework better before trying to match it up with the MX. I was enamoured by the inbuilt filter wheel, price point, and good images I saw in researching my choices. If I could do it again I'd give a very close look to the FLI even though it rather more expensive. (The image download time for their camera is stunning.)

There is a lot of discussion about the hardware aspects of cameras, but perhaps not enough consideration about the software that accompanies the camera. It's a huge factor when you try to get everything working together. I'm still very much scratching my head while looking for the best solution.
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Old 01-05-2016, 11:25 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by PRejto View Post
I can make some comments about the Moravian G2 8300 since I own one. I've yet to actually use it for imaging partly due to the long wait for my MX, lousy weather, and not being motivated to use my old equipment. But in the meantime I've "experimented" quite a lot with software, particularly with software that would play nice with the MX.

Here are the issues as I see it. I can say without hesitation that the ASCOM drivers for the G2 8300 are unreliable, especially with regard to moving the inbuilt filter wheel. I tested the ASCOM drivers in CCDSoft, AstroArt and TSX (camera plugin). In all of these programs the movement of the filter wheel is unreliable and I cannot get Moravian to admit that there is a problem. Moravian did fix an issue with dark frame exposures that I brought to their attention, but it took some time. This presents some real problems; without a reliable ASCOM driver you can basically forget about CCDSoft, especially in WIN7 64 bit. In Win7 images from the G2-8300 will not download (they do in XP). After working with Evan Warkentine for over a month he finally wrote an X2 driver for CCDSoft that will allow an image to download though in order to achieve this he had to remove all CCD temperature readouts. Given that there is no native driver for the G2-8300 in CCDSoft (and Moravian seems uninterested in writing one) I have abandoned the idea of using this software. I think I can use the TSX camera plugin, ignore the filter issue, and at least use TSX for T-Point with the camera, but imaging will be a no go.

I'm trying to decide between spending a lot on MaxIM, or somewhat less on AstroArt. Both have native drivers, but obviously MaxIm is much deeper. The camera does come with a reliable imaging program (SIPS) but I find it limiting in that it will not run FocusMax, or guide with the equipment I own (SSAG). In fact with FocusMax it's either CCDSoft, or MaxIM.... I did get AstroArt to run my focuser (Starizona Microtouch), but I'm not sure how their builtin autofocus program compares to FocusMax (I'm guessing perhaps not as well).

The bottom line for me is that I'm not thrilled by the software for the G2-8300 and I wish I'd done my homework better before trying to match it up with the MX. I was enamoured by the inbuilt filter wheel, price point, and good images I saw in researching my choices. If I could do it again I'd give a very close look to the FLI even though it rather more expensive. (The image download time for their camera is stunning.)

There is a lot of discussion about the hardware aspects of cameras, but perhaps not enough consideration about the software that accompanies the camera. It's a huge factor when you try to get everything working together. I'm still very much scratching my head while looking for the best solution.
I have got a moravian g2 8300 and it works with Ascom drivers
and it works perfect a superb camera easy set on a usb so simple
works with maxim dl you need to take time and read how to set up properly
and it will work properly so simple and what a great camera and not chinese
like most need to follow the instructions properly.
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Old 01-05-2016, 11:49 AM
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This was a very old post by Peter. I believe it was all resolved a long time ago as evidenced by his post on my thread asking about Moravian. He was very positive about them.

Greg.
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Old 01-05-2016, 01:25 PM
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Yes, Greg is totally correct. That post is nearly 7 years old and for sure at that time there were many issues with drivers which now are completely resolved. I have no hesitation recommending this camera!

Peter
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